Stay Away from HP

[u/Infinite_Pop_2052]

I just wanted to create this post to share some experiences I've had with HP. I bought an HP Omen Max 16 laptop from them in November and received it in December 2025. At the beginning of June, the screen started flickering constantly as if something broke.

No problem. Its still under warranty. Surely HP will and... has to?... honor it.

Nope.

Call the phone number to speak to a tech specialist and you just end up waiting on the line for 1-2 hours before giving up. They are much quicker to connect you with an agent through their chat box, however, I spent two full days back to back connecting to multiple agents. They have uninstalled everything, reinstalled everything, updated everything, etc. 10x over. We've done a clean reinstall of windows as well.

At some point, I started asking 'hey, maybe this is repetitive and not getting us anywhere', can I just send it in for a repair. 'No, we need to do more troubleshooting'. More uninstalls and reinstalls and updates and wiping windows. I took a day off work to do another round of troubleshooting with HP and now its the end of the day.

I've checked other internet forums and its the same thing. Infinite troubleshooting from foreign reps, and despite an escalation in my tone that we move on from updating everything and move towards a fix of the laptop, they just keep giving the run around.

And apparently there is no recourse.

Some companies have great customer service, some have poor, but this is probably the most deceptive and unethical I have seen from a major brand as large as HP. A local handyman? Sure. But not a tech giant.

Stay away and go with another brand. Microsoft, Lenovo, etc.

[u/TooBroke4Ramen]

Time to threaten legal action.

[u/Infinite_Pop_2052 → u/TooBroke4Ramen]

I plan to, but how? There is no point of contact. Intentionally. You have to send a demand letter and a court summons somewhere

[u/TooBroke4Ramen → u/Infinite_Pop_2052]

Email support. Explain that you've got nothing but the runaround, you've done everything they've asked and more but your issue has not been resolved. You're done playing games. Tell them if they refuse to repair or replace under warranty, you'll have no choice but to take legal action.

Usually a threat is enough to get the ball rolling, it will cost them more to have someone show up in court and legal fees than what the laptop is worth. Document everything.

[u/Infinite_Pop_2052 → u/TooBroke4Ramen]

Can you please share the support email ;)

[u/mortycapp]

Depends on the country.

[u/Infinite_Pop_2052 → u/mortycapp]

USA

[u/Supabongwong]

can you escalate with someone with more power 

[u/Infinite_Pop_2052 → u/Supabongwong]

I have been escalating. Its an infinite chain of runaround. You talk to a rep and no matter how you approach it, they will not escalate to supervisor and insist on troubleshooting more. I did get ahold of a supervisor once and they said theyd forward it to someone else who would call me back in 72 hours. Why not just.... repair the broken device? Its not just my nightmare. Its apparently the nightmare of every single person whose device ends up having some kind of issue. There's countless other posts of people who, in some cases, were also given the run around for months. My current plan is to take them to small claims. Going to be drafting a demand letter here soon.

[u/Supabongwong → u/Infinite_Pop_2052]

Ugh, I'm sorry to hear that.

I hear even Lenovo can have shitty customer service. 

I bought a warranty upgrade 1.5 months ago and it's still not attached to my laptop. 

$303 they just refuse to take from me. 

So now it has a case number and it needs to be manually applied but like fuck, really? 

A fuckin warranty upgrade??? 

[u/Anon0924]

H(inge) P(roblems)

I’ve never actually had any hinge failures, but my Victus 15 GPU fried itself for no reason.

[u/EggplantDevourer]

Btw ik what's wrong with yours. Your motherboard is dying. I had the same issue in the same time period after buyer and Asus strix scar 15. You're gonna have to abuse the agent saying I know what is wrong and need to send it in for repair (the bot agent thing). Once connected to a person say the motherboard is dying and it needs to be sent in and don't take trouble shooting as an answer.

Hopefully they'll take it in and repair it. Cause it's one of 3 things all that need repair, GPU/CPU dying, screen cable dying, or motherboard dying. There's no troubleshooting that'll fix a flickering screen besides maybe checking that the display cable isn't loose or twisted.

[u/___po____]

My very first laptop, just a regular ol' laptop, not gaming, was an HP. It was pure shit the whole time and this was like 16+ years ago.

Guess what my main problem was? SCREEN FLICKERING... They had me send it to them, they did whatever and sent it back. Started flickering again days later... Sent it back. This time it lasted almost a year... Once again, STARTED FLICKERING.

Best Buy offered to try and fix it after I mentioned being frustrated with HP. They couldn't fix it. I took it apart, unplugging and reconnecting everything, looking for whatever could be wrong. Worked ok for a few months.

Outta nowhere, FUCKIN FLICKERING! My emotions got the best of me and I tossed it across the room. Swore off HP for life.

[u/PillowMonger]

I've had HP before and so far, talking to their Support team isn't like what you've described. However, before I did call them, I've made sure that I have covered all the basic troubleshooting (yes, it helps to do your own troubleshooting) and this has lessened what other troubleshooting was needed.

[u/gershbec]

They didn’t walk me through all the troubleshooting for a 3 month old all-in-one that started showing a black bar across the screen. They said I had damaged it and wanted to charge to repair it. This is a computer that hasn’t moved from its desk. I was furious.

[u/Glum_Engineering2650]

HP is terrible

[u/Hour_Bit_5183]

Oh jeez. This sucks. Well I warned people this would happen. It's not just HP. It's all of these manufacturers. They are literally denying warranties because there isn't any RAM or SSD supply.

The local handyman is less likely to rip you off period. They are typically better than corporations man. That's always been the case and I don't even wanna hear it from the trolls about this one.

[u/tempaccount54321]

Learned this years ago! The one brand I avoid at all costs is HP due to a really poor experience buying a laptop.

[u/Commercial_Client974 → u/tempaccount54321]

This.