If you are thinking of an HP laptop, beware. I had a ze4610us that I bought last January, and a bios upgrade failed. I contacted HP right on the day (a year later) that I have received the laptop, however they start your year warranty from the day you purchase the system, not recieve or register it. So I got screwed out of a week's warranty...it wouldn't be so bad if they laptop would have been designed with a socketed bios. This one was soldered to the motherboard, so the whole motherboard would have to be replaced for ~$650. I expect a computer system to at least give 3 years of use...this one was a backup and used very little. HP just doesn't have the quality of hardware or give the support of the HP of old.

Me and My sister both purchased a Pavilion ze4400 from HP and have had nothing but trouble with both computers. Her computer has been in for service 7 times in less that 2 years. Mine has been in 4 times and finally her warrenty has switched from HP to Circuit City and they are finally fixing her up with a new computer. If you purchase an HP make sure to but the super extended warrenty because it is worth it.

I bought a customized HP Pavilion a750y from HP on October 26th 2004 and it has been the worst buy in my life. The CPU fan is incredibly noisy and I can't bear to sit in the same room as it without ear protection. This computer came with no disks that might have had documentation about the computer and only a small amount of useless paper documentation. No backup disks and useless documentation I can live with, but the way I was treated by HP I can't. I phoned HP support and ended up in India with someone I could barely understand. After what seemed like hours on the phone with this guy he decided that the CPU fan was bad (eh duh I told him that in the first place) and told me he would send me a new one and not to use the computer till it arrived. A few days later, a fan arrived but it was a chassis fan, not a CPU fan. I called again, was on the phone for ages again with a barely understandable fellow; he decided my CPU fan was bad and would send me a new one. A few days later a CPUfan arrived but was the wrong fan for my computer. Meanwhile I was sent an HP customer survey and filled it out echoing my dissatisfaction with their product. I was assigned a “case manager” who emailed me to say that she had been trying to call me all week about my computer problem, but couldn’t get me. Wrong; both my phones log anybody who calls me whether the phone is answered or not. HP had not called me. I then got a terse letter in the mail from this case worker saying that if I didn’t contact them, within seven days they would consider the issue resolved and close the case. I called this caseworker and that’s when the situation went from bad to unbelievable bizarrely awful. This caseworker was arrogant, rude, aggressive and totally obnoxious. I told her that the CPU fan was bad, I couldn’t get their Indian support people to send me the right one and all I needed was a new CPU fan. She told me she “didn’t have the option to send a CPU fan". I could send the computer back for repair, or send it back for my money back, or keep it as is. I told her she was being unreasonable, that all I needed was a new CPU fan that could be easily replaced in a couple of minutes. Then she floored me. She said that the CPU fan was not a customer replaceable part because their customers ARE TOO STUPID TO REPLACE CPU FANS. Well I have a message for HP: Yes, your customers are stupid: stupid, stupid, stupid…..stupid for buying a product from you. When you consider buying an HP you think that you are buying a solid American product – what you really are buying is a box of cheap Chinese components, assembled in Mexico and “technically supported” by a bunch of incomprehensible Indians. And when you finally get through to an American HP employee all you get is a rude aggressive retard. BUY FROM HP AT YOUR PERIL.

In October 02 2003, I purchased a Pavilion ZE4400 for my son. He started college in August of this year. In January of this year, he sat something on top of the laptop and the LCD panel cracked. Of course, HP was not responsible for this. I told him that he would have to use an external monitor for this system. It worked fine. In April of this year, the harddrive failed. HP was contacted and they agreed to repair the harddrive. They were made aware of the LCD issue and they were instructed to not fix it because it was not their fault. They agreed.  
 
They received the laptop and when contacted, they advised that they would not repair the harddrive until the LCD was repaired . . . $700. I asked them to return the laptop.  
 
I replaced the LCD with a new panel for $200. I contacted them again and requested that the harddrive be repaired. In May, they agreed. It was repaired and returned.  
 
My son went away to college in August. In September, the computer stopped booting. I retreived the system and contacted HP. I suggested that the laptop was not booting once again. Their reply:  
 
Your warranty is out and you need to send $279.00 to get it repaired. I advised that this is a re-occurring problem that they obviously didn't fix the first time. They said . . . "NO . . . Out of Warranty".  
 
I have had many computers. HP is the worst company to handle customer problems. What they don't realize is that I make computer purchases for my agency of 25,000+ employees.  
 
Their inferior product and customer "service" probably just made DELL a fortune.

I have been a happy HP customer for about three years. However, in March--within about a week--I purchased an HP paviliona462x, a monitor (hp pavilion f17030, and two printers (including an hp 2175 all-in-one.0 Within a few months, the monitor died. HP graciously helped me--the tech support person was originally from the US but situated--if I remember in the Netherlands--and replaced my monitor with another one within less than a week. I was psyched. This was the HP I knew and loved.  
 
This week my printer died. I took it back to Best Buy (where it was purchased)and the technicians said, "It is under warranty. This is an electronics problem. Call HP." I had had good service before. I figured all would be well. As of this week the love affair with HP is over. Over the last two days I have been caught in the web of people who could not speak English, who told me I needed q-tips to repair contacts, who asked me for serial numbers even for the ink cartridges, and who kept telling me I was not in their computer database. I had just moved and for some reason no one seemed to understand that my name and phone number could not match up with what they had in their database.  
 
Undaunted, I emailed the company. Through email, I did get a brief glimmer of hope. Through an email response I was promised a replacement printer and was told that I would be called this morning to give a credit card number so that they could ship me a replacement printer and keep my credit card on file until I returned the defective printer. I figured I was set. This was the HP I knew and loved.  
 
However, the call never came, and when I called HP rather than wait for their promised call, I got caught in the web again where I was shuffled from department to department, where I spoke to two people--one in India--and where no one would take my credit card number. The person in India went back to "You're not in the computer (but every other product was) and you need an invoice." Growl.  
 
I told HP that I would contact QVC who handles their products, the Better Business Bureau, the state attorney general's office and the IT segment of the college where I work. I have followed through on that promise. I also went out a bought another printer because I do not have time to sit around and fight for what should be mine.  
 
It is a shame. This was a good company with good products. However, quality seems to have diminished. Moreover, the outsourcing has resulted in scripted responses from people who often do not seem to understand English. I am loyal to companies with good service. I waved the flag for a long time for HP. However, the company has lost favor with me.

Item:Compaq laptop. Rebates promised: $350.00.  
Original unit was defective and was exchanged.  
2 Rebates were offered by Circuit City 1 by HP.  
All paperwork was assembled at Circuit City for the rebates. They assured us the documents were ready for mailing except for the upc code which we removed and sent.  
Rebates from Circuit City were recieved in 5 weeks.  
After 6 weeks,we recieved from HP a Denial of the rebate based on the fact that the unit had been returned for credit.The original invoice and the exchange invoice were both included in our mailing.  
A call to the rebate center got the response: "we are looking into it. Circuit City records do not reflect your claim."  
Basically we were accused of fraud.  
Beware of the rebait bait!

i bought a 725n hp pavillion from staples and 2 weeks after i brougt it home the hard drive quit i would keep getting black and blue screens the staples techs are idiots they couldn't figure it out and even said it was the mouse that was causing the problem! hp gave me the run around too i told them that i thought it was a hard drive crash but they sent out 2 sets of system restore disks before they sent me a new hard drive then when i got a hard drive it was the wrong one the hd in this model is 80 gb a computer tech sent out a 40gb! then i had to send back that drive before they finally sent me the 80gb the worst part is this wnt on for 7 months from from june till the end of january 2004! on top of the i couldn't understand most of the techs they all sounded like they're from india,and i'm disabled and had to get my 64 yr old father to help who was panicking cause he don't like computers! i will never buy a computer from hp or another big name company ever again!

I purchased an HP system with printer and monitor last month. I live in a very crammed apartment so I only kept the boxes around for about a week, then realized later I needed the boxes for the $300 rebate, as sold through Best Buy. I feel that a rebate of this size really warrants that trickery be kept to a minimum. My question is, is this rebate offer extended to all legitimate customers, or just certain ones? Yes, I tossed the zebra stripes, but I have proof purchase and my trust in HP will be shaken, should they not honor the rebate. I'm trying to gather information that might help me make a case. I'm prepared to write letters to executives at HP, Best Buy, the state's attorney general, as well as the big media. Anybody got any helpful suggestions?  
 

Hewllett Packard is really bad company. They use Indian servicemen who are not native English speakers and I had hard time to understand them.  
Also while I have remaining warranty, they ask me $671 for reparing laptop. Sorry, I will never pay for repairing my laptop and I am not gonna buy their low-leveled laptops in the future.

HAHAHAHAHA take this rating you losers at HP. Anyways, if you look about 5 reviews down you'll see where someone else experienced the same situation I'm in right now. I bought an r3000z via phone because their website is sub par to an extreme. I am quite knowledgeable about computer hardware so I was very specific with the sales rep. In this description I said in completely clear and natural English that I wanted ONE 512 dimm of ram. Well I got the order through and sat complacently at home for several days. Then I decided to check my order. In the receipt I found that my ever so helpful salesman had given me 2 bloody 256 chips. Now for all of those of you out there that don’t know this; good old HP, being the towering titans of design that they are, thought it would be a great idea to separate the two dimm slots. This means that you are only able to access one of them for upgrading purposes (in other words ditching the lowsy 256's) the other is conveniently placed under the keyboard where you would have to disassemble the entire laptop(voiding the warranty btw) to get to it. I’m not a happy customer at this point. Still hopeful in my naive world I just thought I could call them up and change it. Well guess what, all orders are locked so we can’t change the settings for you. Ok I can almost understand that given the scale the company is working at so I ask if I can just cancel it with the intention of getting another one with the right specs. "I’m sorry all systems are locked. Why don’t you, wait around and be ready to refuse the bloody thing after we ship it to you from China and while your waiting why don’t you max out your credit card and get another one already started." Yep, HP is nothing but helpful. Now it’s practically impossible for me to get it before my trip unless *I* pay for rush shipping. Yah, so that’s not happening, time to take my not too unreasonable expectations and money elsewhere.

Bought a Pavilion ZT3000 laptop. Ordering experience was great. Shipping was good. Not having any problems with my laptop.  
 
Built well, runs smooth. Great features.  
 
A note to anyone who buys a computer from any company:  
 
Computers tend to screw up when applications, programs, hardware or other things are installed in them. They can screw up when you remove a program.  
 
The best way I've found to keep a computer running good is to buy a decent utilities program and use every so often. I use Norton Systemworks - it isn't the absolute best but it keeps my PCs faultless. It'll scan the computer for Windows problems and fix them. It'll keep the HD in good condition, too. I never have a failure. Before I got wise to Windows fixers I've had problems of the computer freezing, shutting down, running snail slow, crasing and various other problems.  
 
Since installing a decent utilities program using my computers is a reliable and consistently routine and trouble-free daily experience.  
 
There are a lot of decent computer makers that, I believe, get bad ratings because computers tend to screw-up no matter how well they're made or who makes them.  
 
Granted, there are issues of hardware quality, stay away from such computer makers because a utilities program won't help such a situation.  
 
My first PC is an Emachines. Paid a whopping $400 for it. About 2 years ago - I've had it for more than 3 years - I installed Norton. It still run and work great. Utility programs won't cure everything but they do keep the day-to-day operation of a PC trouble free.

I am disputing my charge of $269.00 from Hewlett Packard dated 4/9/2004. We were forced into accepting the charge, as I shall further explain.  
We were having a problem with a Compaq laptop computer we purchased in September of 2003. After numerous phone calls to service techs in India and all around the globe nothing was resolved. The problem was that the monitor was dark whenever the battery was in use. We were shipped numerous batteries but that didn’t solve the problem so we were told that someone would pick up the computer and fix it. We were never told who would be picking it up or if there were any special considerations, which needed to be made. On March 3, 2004 a courier from FedEx arrived at the house to pick up the computer. We didn’t have the original box for the computer because it was destroyed when we had to remove the UPC label to get our rebate. The FedEx courier went and got a box from his truck and wrapped it in bubble wrap and left our house with the computer. The package was sent “priority overnight”. It was suppose to be a 4-day service, door to door.  
After about a week, my wife called Hewlett Packard and they told my wife that the computer case was cracked and the problem was not covered under warranty. My wife stated that the computer was in perfect condition when it left the house and the reason we sent it back was because of the dark screen condition when the battery was in use. Hewlett Packard’s service department informed my wife that they would have to make a claim to FedEx for the damages and it would take approximately 2 weeks to resolve the problem. When my wife finally heard back from Hewlett Packard they said FedEx denied the claim because the computer was improperly packaged (as I mentioned before, we were never told how to get the computer ready for shipping). Hewlett Packard doesn’t disclose the names of the people who work there. They only give you their first names. They have no ID numbers so that you can reference them.  
Hewlett-Packard refused to get the adjustment from FedEx and told my wife and myself that if we do not pay to fix the damage they will ship it back damaged. They claimed the package from FedEx was not damaged in transit and that we shipped it to them with a cracked case, which is entirely wrong. They basically extorted the money from me. Hewlett Packard’s service department is horrendous and we could never get anyone of authority to talk to.  

Hewlett Packard has absolutely gone down in Quality Control and their Tech Support / Customer Service personnel are among the worst I have ever encountered in the business, we have been waiting for a solution to 2 BAD HP Laser Printers for 2 weeks now, DOA out of the Box and HP will not do anything about replacing them.  

This review was modified by its author, raycanales, on 5/2/04 3:14 PM.

I placed an order online only to receive note that they had declined my order! The message said if I felt I had received the decline in error I should contact HP to see if something could be worked out. I immediately checked my bank account to verfiy that I had the funds - not only did I have the funds, but HP had already deducted the funds from my account. I called and was treated quite rudely with no explanation other than occassionaly they check orders for customer satisfaction. They customer service rep asked for more information and then told me that someone would contact me in 2 days. I was totally mystified! Call me back about what? I called back the next day and asked what was up and they told me they couldn't tell me. They did reiterate that they were declining the order to immprove customer service. When I asked if this was an attempt to uncover fraud (my billing and shipping address were different) they became very defensive and said they never said that and that they could not discuss the matter further! The funniest part is that they still think I am interested in doing business with their company!!

Worst expirience I have ever head!!! Beware!!!  
It took me 2 weeks of painfull phonecalls, hours and hours on the phone with useless HP technical support. The worst part is when your call is getting transfered to Deli / India... once you there your day FINISHED! You will never get any answer from one person, you will be transfered to 3-10 deiiferent departmants and after that they'll tell you that model you have is not in stock and you have towait few more days to get it replaced... But here is more, once you call second, third ... time there is 50/50 of a chance (if you lucky) that they'll find your case # otherwise you will run into the same circle...  
 
FYI: Dell s about to be the same.  
Good Luck. Be strong.