It has been a weekend filled with glitches…
The weekend starting of 8/19/07 will go down in my life as one of those weekends where everything I touch turns to manure!
That’s right. Nothing went right, and it was all techie related! As most of you know, I make my living working on and installing broadcast equipment, and when something completely out of left field breaks and I can’t figure out how to fix it, I’m ready to carry it to the dumpster.
What really ticks me off is the horrible customer service and “I don’t give a crap” attitude some of these people have in places like Circuit City and Best Buy (yes, the so-called Geek Squad).
Customers (that would be US) are their reason for existing! They would not have a job without us spending money with their employer. Not MY fault if they hate their job. Try making sandwiches at Arbys instead. Sometimes radio doesn’t pay very well and once in my very ancient past, I DID. I NEVER treated fast food customers that way.
I won’t go into detail now about it except to say I WILL continue to support online businesses who atleast you usually don’t have to deal with these people.
In reverse order…
Things that are pending and messed up in my life:
Bought a new CD and after listening to it awhile the factory CD player in my Jeep Liberty would not eject! I like the CD, but not to listen to for the rest of the time I have the vehicle! Pending at this very moment.
Got a new processor for my band and either the damn thing is defective, or I can’t figure out how to use it! I think it’s defective. If it’s that hard to figure out for me, it’s a piece of crap design, but I really think it’s messed up. Thank you Behringer. Most of your products are great, especially for the money. This one sucks. Another pending item.
My Gateway computer (only 6 months old) with all the pricey Adobe software, website stuff and databases for everything turned itself off and would not turn on. Circuit City, where I bought it, said it was a power supply, but since I didn’t buy THEIR service policy, wouldn’t honor the manufacturer warranty (Gateway would later tell me that was nonsense). I decided to try Best Buy since they were an authorized service center, but they refused to lift a finger and had no sympathy. I did buy a power supply and swapped it out myself along with a bunch of other parts, but the computer was still dead. It has a "null stop" where it won't even boot. Sounds like a failed motherboard to me.
So now Gateway tells me to take it to Staples, BUT if I did take it back to Circuit City and they refused again, to get the store number and employee name and they would “report it.” Report it!!? To whom? The computer warranty cops? Big deal. I just want a functioning box that I paid a lot of money for!! I will say I appreciate the fact that Gateway support is actually based in the U.S.
Meantime, because of the dead Gateway, I managed to bring back to life a very old (almost 10 years) Mac that had most of the functions of the Gateway – if incredibly outdated or very painfully slow. After some problems, it (more or less) worked. My life is a little less painful. Thank you Apple. Your reliability always rocked!
(But sorry, these days I still prefer Windows machines).
Meantime, my laptop; only about a year old – also a Gateway – also lost sound. I was told the sound card failed, but it would need a new motherboard because the sound was built in (completely out of warranty). I decided to live without sound and add a separate sound card later. Too many trips through airport security? Maybe, but I don't think so.
There’s a lot more annoyances going on, but for now, those are my weekend issues.
Maybe I should just skip next weekend and work straight through. Everything at work seems to function pretty much reliably, day in, day out, and I like that!
Part of that is I’m NOT a snotty “big box” store employee who couldn’t care less about customers.
NEXT COMPUTER: I’m building it myself from scratch! The computer I built a few years ago for audio has had its share of freakishness, but it WORKS day in, day out. It’s a rock, and the Customer Service Center is ME!
I know everything here boils down to petty whining, but everything I buy comes with dollars that I worked for. Nobody gave me anything, so I expect something of reasonable quality for my investment. If part of the selling point is “how great” the warranty is, and I get nothing but aggravation and hassle when I have to use it, I feel ripped off!
Why not just BUILD THE PRODUCT BETTER so it doesn’t fail within months!? There’s a concept. Stop building stuff in Korea and China. I’ll gladly pay the higher price so that more people in the U.S. can have jobs building them.
The reason my job is easier is so much broadcast equipment is built in the good ole U.S.A. and the person who installed it is, too.
