HP Pavilion Model #: m9600t Vista 64-bit

[woxofog]

Keyboard and mouse always freeze about 30 secs to a minute after morning boot and password typed in OK. Immediate reboot usually gets desktop OK, with kbd and mouse mostly OK for a while then a freeze and crash.  Reboot allows further work.

Occasional "first in the morning" bootups never get to Welcome screen, machine just freezes with the BSOD.

Also a correctly plugged in 500 GB pocket media drive is almost never recognized on morning first boot. Boot dialog screen messages indicate it is a "Raw Data" drive. After booting to the desktop and unplugging and replugging the drive, the system usually recognizes it as a correctly formatted pocket drive..

Any suggestions on the cause or causes of such faults? Likely hardware problem??  Faulty bus? Bad power supply? Bad system board?

Have had this lemon of a computer for several years always with these problems.  This is the second "high performance" HP machine I have had (consecutive purchases) that has exhibited such unstable operation. Think I will buy a third HP?  Guess again.......

[Hanspuppa]

Hello woxofog, It appears that your system (m9600t) is one that is included in the class action suite.

You might want to contact the Settlement Administrator, at this  Link , and see if you are eligible for a free motherboard replacement.

[woxofog]

Thanks for the comment and the link. Will check out the Class Action settlement, even though a new mother board would hardly compensate for many hours of frustration and aggravation, and now further stress maybe getting a fix.      

[woxofog]

I checked out the class action settlement document.  I appear to be excluded because of having purchased a 3 year extended warranty and service agreement (yeah, I read Consumer Reports, and they had some serious reservations about HP computers), so HP never informed me of the Class Action settlement.  Apparently they could do so on the grounds that they only needed to inform m9600t customers witha one year warranty.. (They were the only ones in the Class??)  In any case the 90 day claim filing period has passed.

It does appear, however, given the existence of the settlement that I might get the same fix--new mobo--IF someone can tell me how and where to contact HP with the m9600t complaint I just posted.  Anyone know how to go about dealing with the "inner workings and hidden mechanisms" of the HP complaint system? Anyone?.......  

[Hanspuppa]

Hello woxofog, If your system has the extended warranty, it should be covered by this warranty.

Here  is a link where you can submit a warranty claim and have a Case Manager assigned with a case ID.

Look in the upper left side of the page for Submit a case, and then just follow the onscreen instructions.

You will need all the information on your system, especially the Model Number, Serial Number, and Product Number.

You may need the purchase date, but HP can most likely locate the information with the serial number.

If you can manage to get HP to accept your system for repairs, this repair process only takes about 7-10 days, depending on how far you are from the HP Repair Facility.

Be sure to try and backup any data you may need later since HP may change the motherboard and the hard drive.

I sent my HP system in for repair three times and they changed the motherboard and the hard drive on each occasion.

That was over two years ago, and HP seems to have resolved the initial issues with these defective motherboard since then.

From what I gather, these replacement motherboards work just fine.

[woxofog]

Thanks again for the detailed reply with a link. I will submit a warranty claim. As you most likely know, Ctl+Alt+S brings up  the machine's critical warranty ID data--enough to start the claim process.  Example; (My machine),   Model #: m9600t, Product #: KX745AV-ABA, followed by three more lines.

Glad to learn that HP fixed your machine three times. Unfortunately the downside is that you had to have it repaired that often. One cannot help but wonder if HP really cares anymore about their reputation. When a customer buys a high performance computer, the thing most wish to avoid is warranty and repair hassles.

Along with the downtime loss on a mission critical machine, the worry that HP Repair will trash the HD is unavoidable. (This is true even though I use three different HD backup methods--Windows, Backblaze, and hard copy--all needed because I am writing a second textbook book and do NOT want an irretrievable loss of all files.)

Anyway you have been most helpful. We will see how HP responds to the claim. I will make an effort to keep posting on this continuing story . . . . .  

[Hanspuppa]

Hello woxofog, I seem to have been on the very first batch of defective motherboards, even before HP knew of the issue.

I never use the Windows or HP backup methods, since many members here have experienced issues with both backup programs.

I use a hard drive image program that creates a hard drive image that I can store on another hard drive. Many years ago, I got a virus that actually deleted the partitions on all my hard drives, the C: drive and the backup drive D:.

I managed to retrieve the partion on the backup drive, so I got out of trouble with that one. Since then, I now create the hard drive image, store it on my internal backup drive, and then copy the image to another network hard drive , and also to an external hard drive. With this approach, I now have three redundant hard drive images.

I usually make a new hard drive image about once every 7-10 days, as time and my memory allows. This does take about a hour to accomplish, but at one time it took four days to reinstall all my applications. I can now perform a hard drive image restore in less than 15 minutes, and only have to update my anti-virus definitions and any Windows updates.

This may seem a little extreme, but it works for me, and seems reasonable, considering the alternative.

[woxofog]

Hello Hanspuppa,

I have a good friend, retired electronics engineer, long career with the US Navy being sent around the world on "Black" projects, who uses almost the same method you do for backing up his PC's HD. Every Sunday morning he makes an HD image. He and another good friend, (professional videographer who records Jazz concerts live--instant disaster if the sole original recording gets trashed, for whatever reason) both use Acronis for this purpose (think I got the name right). 

Anyway they both think Acronis is great and both have urged me to acquire the code and do the same sort of imaging.

I dunno if Acronis imaging is really needed on top of Backblaze. It is very true that HP's pseudo "high performance" machines (m9600t with a cranky pocket drive & etc. and an earlier lemon that burnt out its on board video card--HP wanted $300 to replace) have stressed me to the point where I now auto back up every day--all day long continuous--with Backblaze, via the Internet onto their servers.   

Tried to start a complaint to HP via your link and was informed that I was an "out-of-hardware" warranty person. Turns out that what I thought was a three year warranty is really only a three year non-hardware "free help" pseudo-warranty and only a one year warranty on the hardware. I was allowed to file an email complaint, citing my original posted complaint on this forum, and stating I was aware of the Class Action settlement. I also stated that, in my opinion, HP had a duty to inform me of the settlement, but never did. Ergo I wanted a mobo replacement. So far their reply has been just to kick the compaining email up to "higher authority". 

So. . . Stay tuned . . . It could get interesting.  : -))

[Hanspuppa]

Hello woxofog, It is my understanding that HP has until Dec, 9, 2011 to notify the owners of the affected model number systems by email or by USPS if HP does not have a valid email address or if the owner advised HP they did not want to be contacted by email.

If your system is one that is listed in the Settlement program, you should be getting a response from HP soon.

If you do not, contact the Settlement Administrator and notify them of the issue.

I also use Acronis, and it works extremely well for me. I have also used Norton, but it did not work for me as well as Acronis. Norton actually took about two times as long to do the same hard drive image as Acronis did. I just received the new Norton 15 Backup application, included in a SSD purchase, and I didn't even install it.

I would not trust an online backup method, simply because of the security issues, and also the possibility of a faulty backup due to Internet unreliability.

I prefer to insure my backups are valid, and will work when I need them.

Usually when HP escalates an issue, you will be assigned a Case Manager, but if your system is out of hardware warranty, they cannot offer you a new motherboard.

You best option is the HP motherboard replacement program, but you must get your claim in before the deadline.

[woxofog]

Hello Hanspuppa,

Well good news indeed re the Dec 9, 2011 deadline. I thought HPs 90 days were up some time ago and I was just "SOL" as far as the board replacement option was concerned. Just maybe my emailed complaint and HP's escalation will pay off. I do now have a complaint manager and case number, Justin. He called this morning and left a message (I heard the phone but could not get to it in time.). I since returned his call, (naturally he was on another case) and left a message for him to try again.

Interestingly Justin also sent an email which I could not read in timely fashion, because--you guessed it--the m9600t produced its usual BSOD on this morning's boot. A reboot has settled things down and produced the desktop and  this reply to your email. This time I copied the error message, an uninformative "Uncorrectable Hardware Error", AND all the hex code following. The machine also did a physical memory dump to HD 100 (I assume that means drive 4, which still leaves me in the dark.  I have drives C, D, G, H, plus 2 DVD drives and a thumb drive.)  

Re Acronis glad you concur that it is an excellent and valuable product. I definitely have not ruled out imaging with the program, (I agree that backing up via the Internet has its own set of failure and security issues), but would like to get some closure first with HP on this m9600t lemon. I have already visited Dell online and personalized one of their Dell XPS high

performance machines. Without your first reply to my original (desperate) post,, the Dell machine would already have been ordered. I may do so anyway and use both machines for some sort of synchronized backup.

The never ending saga continues, stay tuned . . .