You’re excited about a new laptop or desktop you decided to buy. While you may think the decisions are over, there’s still another important decision to make -- the warranty.  Many manufacturers offer a set of warranties including extended warranties, and most big-box stores (such as Best Buy, Target, etc.) offer a third party warranty. In this post I will discuss the various pros and cons of different types of warranties and provide some advice on how to decide which is best for you.   When considering these different warranties, many consumers tend to look only at the price. You should look further as there are some features where your warranty will make your experience with your new purchase much better.

 The best warranty for your computer depends on your situation.  Is this a laptop for your son or daughter to take to college, or a backup netbook used only for traveling?  Can you be without this machine for 3-5 days, or would you need it fixed right away?  Do you plan to keep the computer for a few years? Will there be sensitive data on this machine?  These questions all come into play when determining the type of warranty to purchase, and from whom to purchase.

If it is a laptop for school, buy an extended warranty with ACCIDENTAL DAMAGE coverage. This point cannot be stressed enough.  Accidental damage coverage will protect you for such common accidents like the laptop screen breaking, or something being spilled on the keyboard.  As responsible as a student is, these types of accidents are always very common among teenagers. Far too often, the student himself or his parent must pay for a screen and keyboard installation because accidental damage was not covered by the warranty. Also check the warranty to determine if there is a limit to the number of times certain failures are covered.  This means that replacement of certain kind of accident or certain types of specific failures may not be covered. Some providers limit cracked screen replacements to one a year. In most standard warranties (i.e. not an extended warranty), accidental damage is NOT covered. 

Keeping a machine for years beyond the standard 1-year warranty may sway you to include extended warranties if you consider the meantime between failure and subsequent replacement cost for certain components (hard drive, keyboard) may exceed the cost of an extended warranty. 

The warranty should also include next-day on-site service if the laptop is pertinent to your daily activities (learning, communication, etc). With on-site service, the machine is unavailable for only about a day. Omitting this service can lead to being without your computer for up to a week. Do not forget about the inconvenience of having to mail the computer to a repair center, and sometimes even having to wait for a box to be sent to you before you can mail the computer to the repair center. 

Consider your data: Losing your data or having it inaccessible for an extended period could be detrimental both to school and to work. This holds true for both the student’s laptop and the primary family computer. If the computer holds sensitive or essential data, accidental damage and on-site service must be included in your warranty purchase. A simpler mail-in option could be chosen only with the understanding that the computer and the information it holds will be out of commission for an extended period.  

Another consideration is what to do when the computer requiring repair contains truly sensitive data.  If your computer holds sensitive data, it should never be sent away to be fixed unless the hard drive is removed.  In cases where the computer in question holds sensitive data, always purchase on-site service, or plan to remove the hard drive before sending the computer away for repair.

For a backup computer (a travel netbook, or a laptop just for checking email, etc.), the warranty is much less important. The extended warranty cost is often not justifiable, as the machine is not a necessity. There is no need to pay extra for on-site service when the computer can be gone for a week with little to no issues. Accidental damage is also generally not purchased for these systems, as they can be replaced much more easily and cheaply.

After thinking about the warranty options presented so far, you will also want to consider whether you should purchase your warranty from the manufacturer or from a third party such as your retailer. Normally the third party provider will offer some sort of differentiator – such as a replacement battery, coverage for non-OEM provided add-ons, and other incentives not provided by the manufacturer. You will want to ask for a list of such items from your third party provider. In almost all cases, Software support is not covered by the manufacturer's warranty or the third party warranty.

Side note about sensitive data: You should have any sensitive data backed up. With the prices of external storage coming down recently (1TB USB drives under $100 or 8GB thumb drives under $15) back up all of you sensitive data to an external drive is one item you should not overlook.