arxt@sphinx.uchicago.edu (patrick palmer) (07/08/88)
There have been a series of questions about experience with Great Valley Products on the net recently. Tuesday, I received a Great Valley Products hardcard (40meg Quantum drive) and plugged it in and it works fine. The documentation and the software are well designed so that a novice can install it in a few minutes without without any ambiguity. (To those as ignorant as I was a few days ago (if such exist), a hardcard is just a hard drive mounted on a controller card. Then, you just plug in the card, and do not use up a drive bay.) The requirements that I had were (in order of priority): 30+ meg drive, controller that will autoboot with 1.3, easy installation, medium drive speed, and reasonable cost. The costs for systems I investigated seemed to always end up $800 - $900. The GVP hardcard cost $825 through Go Amigo. Strange as it seems for a positive report, I already have some experience with customer service. I received one last week (serial number 0001) which had some kind of residue on the contacts. I was loathe to clean them very hard, so I sent it back Thursday, and received a replacement Tuesday. (I feel somewhat responsible for the problem because I had been rushing them so that I would receive the product and have it checked out before I leave here for the next few months. They had discovered this residue problem, and no others were shipped with it.) They were very responsive in fitting into my travel schedule, and very helpful about exchanging the hardcard quickly, so I am very impressed with their customer service. So, I have the GVP hardcard, I like it, and based one what I have seen, I recommend it highly. It seems to be a very nice product at a very reasonable cost. Sorry I do not have any quantitative comparisons on data transfer rates during "average" applications. I have no connection with GVP except as a satisfied customer (really, would such a company hire someone who didn't know what a hardcard is?).