The Nvidia Defect Forum

The Sale of Goods Act 1979 (as amended) does not require goods to remain fault free or fit for purpose until the end of their accepted working life. It only holds the retailer responsible for faults present at the date of purchase. It does not hold the retailer responsible for faults that develop after purchase, as the Act is not the equivalent of a guarantee.

As the laptop was purchased more than 6 months ago, the Sale of Goods Act 1979 (as amended) requires the purchaser to prove that the fault was present from the date of purchase.

You have not supplied any evidence of a manufacturing defect and we have not had the opportunity of inspecting the product before you arranged repair through a 3rd party repairers.

Consequently, as they have replaced the motherboard, we would not be able to confirm that original fault. As you have stated the repaired item has become faulty again, Comet would not be responsible for the laptop and you would need to take the repair failure issue up with the repairers.

In the circumstances, we are unable you meet your request for a free repair or replacement or further discount on a new purchase.

Thank you for your reply, when I spoke to Trading Standard they made no mention about them contacting you directly. They simply informed me of the legislation regarding The Sales of Goods Act 1979, advising that the good should be of satisfactory quality and should last a reasonable amount of time. Trading Standards said that I need to make my intent clear and give yourselves one last attempt at a resolution before filing a claim. As we have already had lots of communion regarding the matter I think you should fully understand my feeling regarding this, and I understand your unwilling to offer any resolution to this mater. As requested by Trading Standards here is my finial communication regarding the matter before filing the small claim, parts of this is are a copy of what will be submitted to the court:


The Sales Of Goods Act 1979

In August 2008 we purchased two HP dv9820ea high end laptops at a cost of nearly £500 each, in November 2011 one of these laptop failed. Upon contacting Comet customer service I was informed to contact HP, who told me to contact the retailer we purchased the unit from.

After many phone calls back and forth we took the laptop to a local computer engineer who quickly diagnosed the laptop as a faulty main board, he then advised that the laptop had a NVIDA 8400M Graphics Chipset which has a know overheating defect that causes the life of the laptop to be reduced significantly.

We then approached Comet and HP with this information, they both denied the NVIDA defect on the 8400M Graphics Chipset. After been informed about the defect I looked on-line and very quickly found evidence of the defect and even learnt of money set-a-side by NVIDA to deal with this defect.

Video of NVIDA CEO Jen-Hsun Huang talking about the defect: http://youtu.be/QZB6kxxgnOQ

We also found a UK based community forum at http://www.nvidiadefect.com with many laptop users who have the same problem with laptop containing the NVIDA 8400M Graphics Chipset, also on that website successful claims can be seen...including ones with Comet Group Plc.

After many letters, emails and phone calls with Comet Group Plc and HP we decided to talk to the Chester store where we purchased the two laptop from in 2008. Although they sympathised with the problem, they still were unable to offer anything other than a good will gesture of 10% off a brand new laptop. They did however mention that Comet customer service did used to have a sliding scale costs for out of warranty repair costs, which has never been offered to me, Comet customer service have only really said “sorry we cannot help as it’s out of warranty”.

I do not feel that a 10% discount on a new laptop is a satisfactory offer and I feel that Comet’s customer service should be offering better service to their customers, especially given that the product in question has not lasted a reasonable length of time. In order to understand what Comets laptop sales specialists think is a reasonable about of time I visited another Comet store in Wrexham and expressed an interest in a 17” HP laptop which was similar specification to our defect one. When I quizzed the laptop sales specialist about the life of a laptop I was informed that “with a high end branded laptops like this, you’d expect to get at least 5 years as they buy better parts over cheaper laptop brands”. Now I understand the one sales persons opinion cannot be taken as company policy, he was however as laptop sales specialists and I also feel that 5 years is at least the amount of time you would expect from a laptop.

Given that the laptop had been used for 3 years then I’m clearly not looking for a full refund, however I feel Comet Group Plc should be offering a part refund or replacement at a significantly discounted price totalling at least £220. After reading information from a number of sources include Trading Standards I understand that we can claim upto £220 based on that fact that the unit should have lasted a reasonable length of time. This reasonable length of time has been highlighted on a number of sources as six years and our figure of £220 comes from that fact we have not had full use of the product for this amount of time:

• £482.49 (purchase price, less discounts)
• Divide Purchase Price by 72 Months to get Monthly Rate (anticipated usage of six years)
• Anticipated Usage less Actual Usage = 33 Months (unused usage)
• Multiply Monthly Rate by 33 months (unused usage) = £221.14

On top of this we have had numerous phone calls to 0871 and 0844 numbers, totalling over £10 dealing with this matter. Then all the time dealing with this matter and now the court costs which I understand Comet Group Plc would pay if, really the claim should be for more as I must have spent nearly a day on this matter now....however if we are able to claim for £220 plus costs I will be happy with that conclusion to this matter.

You have not supplied any evidence of a manufacturing defect and we have not had the opportunity of inspecting the product before you arranged repair through a 3rd party repairers.

Consequently, as they have replaced the motherboard, we would not be able to confirm that original fault. As you have stated the repaired item has become faulty again, Comet would not be responsible for the laptop and you would need to take the repair failure issue up with the repairers.

Hello Jon,

The three beeps are definitely related to the video card so I would now say that it is highly likely that your laptop is indeed inherently defective.



I have a quick question to see what route this can go down and that is does the laptop have the mainboard fitted that it was sold with or does it contain the mainboard that you purchased via a repair?

Please let me know and I will advise further.

Best wishes

Paul
The Admin Team

You have not supplied any evidence of a manufacturing defect and we have not had the opportunity of inspecting the product before you arranged repair through a 3rd party repairers.

Hello Jon,

If the original board is in the laptop then Comet have no right or reason to refuse your claim so it is all systems go.

You should now send Comet a letter before action as advised in the Step By Step Guide. Please ensure that you send this via recorded delivery and please keep copies of the letter and postal receipt.

You will still need to obtain an engineers report in order to prove conclusively that your laptop is indeed inherently defective. The cost of the report is recoverable from Comet as a consequential loss.



I am a little intrigued by this statement. Did you tell them that you had a repair? If you did, was this verbally or in writing?

In any event it really does not matter for a number of reasons:-

1) At the time of the repair you were out of warranty.
2) At the time of the repair you were unaware that your laptop had failed due to an inherent defect.
3) The original mainboard is now back in the laptop.

This can easily be defended in court so you shouldn't worry too much about it.

Send the the LBA and see what reaction that prompts. If they fail or refuse to capitulate then it is time to move on to the net step in the Step By Step Guide.

I hope the above helps.

Any questions please let me know.

Best wishes

Paul
The Admin Team

Guess we need to get this report, as it's been diagnosed does it need to come back to you?

Hello Jonny,



We will need to perform a number of tests on the laptop in order to be able to irrefutably prove the presence of the defect.

Once the defect has been proved then a report is produced.

For information on how to book your laptop in for a report please see the following post:- need-an-independant-engineers-report-t62.html

If you have any questions then please let me know.

Best wishes

Paul
The Admin Team

I am sorry to hear that you are unhappy with my previous response.

This issue was reviewed with a Manager prior to my previous reply and while I am of course very sorry that you disagree with the information in my previous e-mail, I am satisfied that it is correct and our decision would stand on this matter.

You would now need to take up the fault with the third party repairers as they have completed a repair and you state that the item is now faulty again.

Please accept my apologies for the inconvenience you have been caused.