Geek Squad — Local services in Williston

On June 20, my laptop took an unfortunate tumble to the floor—and just like that, it stopped working. It wouldn’t boot up and instead began emitting a strange beep code I’d never heard before. Since I had previously purchased a Total Care service contract from Best Buy's Geek Squad in Williston, VT, I brought it to them on June 22, hoping for a positive resolution. After a quick check, the technician confirmed that the machine wouldn't start and told me it would be ready for pickup by June 25.

When I returned, I was disappointed—and frankly stunned—to hear that the laptop had been deemed beyond repair. With no clear explanation, they handed it back to me and essentially declared it dead. My only goal at that point was to retrieve the 4TB SSD inside and move on.

Thankfully, on June 27, Mary and I brought the laptop to Dylan at Wizard Tech located at 113 College St, in downtown Burlington, VT — a skilled and experienced technician I’d worked with before and trusted. I explained the situation and asked him to recover the SSD from what I truly believed was a hopeless case. But Dylan decided to give it a try, anyway. He attempted to boot the machine, encountered the same beep code, then opened the back panel, inspected the motherboard connections, and hooked up an external monitor via the HDMI port. To everyone’s shock—and my immense relief—the external monitor came to life with my desktop.

Since the external monitor came on, we initially thought the internal display might be damaged, but Dylan quickly spotted a loose monitor cable on the motherboard. He carefully secured it with tape, and in an instant, the laptop’s screen also came on. So, the laptop wasn't dead; it was fully functional!

That moment was a flood of joy, frustration, and anger—joy that Dylan had revived the machine, frustration at the Geek Squad's misdiagnosis, and anger at the thought that Geek Squad had either failed to conduct even the most basic hardware diagnostics or had grossly misjudged the situation. Whether it was just carelessness or to push me toward a new purchase, I can’t say. But one thing is certain: from now on, all my tech repair needs are going to Dylan and Wizard Tech. As for the Geek Squad, I’m beyond disappointed. I’ll be canceling my Total Care contract and will not...

I initially had a relatively nice interaction with the agents at this location. My laptop needed to be sent in for repairs and was covered under warranty. The source of the issue was the USB charging port jarring loose, which i learned is a common issue with regular use. After receiving my repaired laptop, I inquired about purchasing another warranty since this problem is likely to recur with normal wear. The response I got from the agent was essentially that my laptop was too old. There was also a large, obvious scratch on the laptop, that I mentioned. And was told that because there were other small blemishes already present, I "couldn't prove" this was the fault of Geek Squad or Best Buy. I understand policy is policy but this information was delivered rudely, and in a way that was clearly meant to insult a (two year) old crappy laptop. Lastly, I explicitly asked more than one agent everything I should do if I choose to back up my computer myself, and am now realizing "making sure you can retrieve your Microsoft license" was completely overlooked. Your experience is a luck of the draw of who you end up speaking with. I'll be going out of my way to avoid...

Terrible service. They didn't even take a look at my iPad before telling me they can't help me due to the fact that I came a hour earlier than scheduled for an appointment with them. I asked them to just hold my iPad until the appointment time because I had to get back to work. They denied me and said they can't do anything until my appointment time. They also denied to keep my iPad until the appointment time. I was told there would be no availability to schedule me for appointment after my work schedule. They employee look at me and said there is absolutely nothing they could do for me. I went to the mall and got the iPad fixed the same day at a repair booth. 35 dollar fix. Funny best buy couldn't do anything to service me or help at all. Geek squad...