CompUSA
I spent about a day trying to get the zv6008cl work with linux. Turns out that the video card and the memory card reader are poorly supported, and not at all under 64-bit linux. I was running out of time (I'm not very billable to our clients when I can't develop or manage advertising) ... and ran out to CompUSA to see what they had.I spent some time w/ a "Hardware Team Manager" named Tommy. His name isn't really Tommy, but that's a-ok. He seemed knowledgeable enough, and I ended up picking out two laptops to go do some research (a Satellite A75 and a Satellite M45 model). I showed back up about two hours later and wanted to clarify before buying:
1. If it doesn't work, can I return it w/o a restocking fee? Yes.
2. Are you sure that I can return it w/o a restocking fee? Yes.
Tommy did clarify that if it didn't work, at all, then I would get a refund. If it just didn't work for ME, then I would get in-store credit. Fine.
I purchased up the A75, after reading some good things about it over at linux laptop. $1700 later, I was home w/ the Toshiba.
Off the bat, I noticed that across the box is a big sticker which says "If you're not happy with your purchase, you may return it within 21 days for a full refund" -- optionally, I can have store credit. I'm very confused, but I'm pretty sure they have to take it back and give me the money back, if I'm not happy. It says so, very plainly on the box.
I was immediately NOT happy with the laptop. The video is shared, and it's not changeable via the BIOS. 128MB always. Toshiba says it's upgradeable to 2GB of RAM. It's really only 1.5GB ... minus the 128MB of shared video RAM. The hard drive literature says 100GB. I'm not going to split hairs over whether a GB is 1000MB or 1024MB, but the linux partitioner says there's only 95GB. That's 5% less than what's advertised. After fussing with the laptop for 48 hours, I couldn't get the ATI video card [again] to work. The native driver (from ATI!) would not do more than 2048x2048 in resolution, and I need it to power itself (1280x800) and a 20" LCD (1600x1200) -- a total of 2880x2000. Windows, nor linux, were going to run on this system.
So, I packaged everything up, with my receipt in hand, and went back to say "Haylo" to the local CompUSA.
And things turned .... ugly.
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