rademach@tramp.Colorado.EDU (Simon Rademacher) (08/19/89)
In article <26542@shemp.CS.UCLA.EDU> michael@cs.ucla.edu (michael gersten) writes: >In article <5093@ucdavis.ucdavis.edu> kuan@iris.ucdavis.edu (Francois Kuan) writes: >>As far as I know, once you break the plastic, NO software is >>returnable, unless the disk is defective. It appears to me that perhaps >>there is the merest possibility that Briwall is doing a no-no. >>Briwall is the first place I've heard >>of that will let you return opened software. > >This is simply not true. There is no reason why you should not be able to >return a program even after the shrink wrap is opened. I've seen >MANY places that allow this, and I will not buy software that does not >either allow me a trial or return. > >Why might you not be able to return software after the wrap is broken? I think many places are wary that people will come in and buy some program, take it home, copy it, and bring it back. (I don't mean to extend the piracy junk.) Many stores are willing to replace a program with the same title, but not with a different one. A local store here had a policy like that. I got bitten by it, too. They allowed me to look at a program and it looked good so I bought it (Dark Castle by Three-Sixty). I had never heard of copy protection so poorly designed that a given disk wouldn't run on a given drive, so I thought I had nothing to worry about. But when I got it home, it wouldn't run on my A500. I took it back and they tried it on their machine and it worked. Since they didn't have another copy, they said I would have to take it up with the publisher. I never got around to going through that much trouble. (BTW, it worked on a friend's 1000 also.) Well I resolved never to buy from that store again nor buy any of Three-Sixty's products 'cause I don't need the hassle. (Not buying from the store will be easy--they went out of business a while ago. grin.) This brings me to my new subject--has anybody else had problems with Three-Sixty's products? Are there any other companies that have protection schemes that cause problems on a large percentage of machines (I define large in this case to be >1%)? Can my drive be adjusted (speed?) so that this program might work or might it be something else (its a vanilla 500, tho)? Of course, now that I'm seriously considering a hard drive, I look for software to be protection free, but if I see a really killer program, I would still get it. ======================================= = Simon Rademacher = = rademach%tramp@boulder.colorado.edu =