A broken laptop: Sony VAIO Pro
23/8/2014 Filed in: News
Long time no see.
I've been the happy owner of a Sony VAIO Pro for about one and a half year. Great peice of hardware with great support on Linux. Two weeks ago the LCD backlight ceased to function. The LCD panel itself is working, but the backlight is gone. Mind you I have been taking very good care of the laptop. Off to service at Sony. Not a great experience. It turns out that if you have Linux installed on your Sony laptop their service/repair center (at least in Denmark) are not able to service your hardware. WHAT? I know, it sounds ridiculous. That is how it went. It seems like a cheap way of avoiding covering a warrant and quite frankly I think it is illigal according to danish law. What if the motherboard or the ssd inside the laptop broke? Solution: install Windows on the laptop without a properly functioning screen. What a nightmare... not only because of EFI and the shitty implementation. Luckily I had a Windows 7 license I could use... the original OEM license was gone. My fault really. The laptop has now been sent off to a repair... and hopefully it will get repaired. I decided to install Windows and not waste my time with the bureaucratic "tech support" offered by Sony. Their support staff seemed like nice people, but I still think this is a ridiculousway of handling your customers. I can't be the only one with Linux on my Sony VAIO.
I think it is unacceptable to not warrant a repair because you don't have Windows installed on a laptop. It really seems like a easy way of avoiding a warranty, and I'm sure it is. I paid for the hardware, not the software. Take note Sony.
UPDATE:
I received my laptop today. Back from repair. The LCD backlight works again. Included with my laptop was a paper describing what had been replaced and a nice little microfiber cloth as a 'gift'. All in all I am fairly satisfied with the service I received from Sony. The repair took about a week (including shipping). Thank you Sony!
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