Ok, I finished my letter.  Hopefully it will get me some results.

I'm glad I took so long to write it up because I had time to think about the situation, and realized that while I bought it in October 2002, I only used it about 15 times between the date of purchase and mid 2004.  Mid 2004 I got Poser and my laptop being a newer and better machine, I started to use it as my primary computer instead of my desktop. So it was only used on a regular basis for less than 18 months before the motherboard went on it. 

Plus I had a chance to dig out the bill of sale.  I paid $4,500.00 (including taxes), and I sure expect it to last more than 3.5 years (for 20  months of that  it spent most of its time in the travel case)

"It is good to see ourselves as others see us. Try as we may, we are never
able to know ourselves fully as we are, especially the evil side of us.
This we can do only if we are not angry with our critics but will take in good
heart whatever they might have to say." - Ghandi