korn@cory.Berkeley.EDU (Peter "Arrgh" Korn) (08/26/87)
There are not many mac-related companies that I feel qualify to be called 'slimey companies'. Relax Technologies, however, is fully deserving of that title. How are they slimey? Let me count the ways: 1) Their main mode of selling their product involves driving around a $100,000.00 RV to dealers (blocking their parking lots), and showing off their equiptment inside their networked, air-conditioned motor/mac-home. 2) Their sales pitch to dealers can be roughly paraphrased as follows: "so the other drives may be a few mili-seconds faster--with our drives you can RELAX -- we'll support any and all drives we sell; even guarantee a 2 day turnaround time on drive repairs" (which they have shown they are not able to meet). They then try to woo the computer salesperson with promises of a night on the town in a limo if that salesperson sales the most drives in that area. That's followed up by the $1/megabyte spiff offer (but once a large hard drive is sold, the salesperson finds out that that spiff is only available on the smaller [20 Mbyte] drives). 3) After finding out that some computer stores sold the 80 Meg Quantum drive (purchased via CMS) to customers coming in off the street for *less* than Relax sold *the same drive* to computer stores for resale, they immediately started downplaying the quality of Quantum drives (after only the week before touting the 80 Meg Quantum as their most reliable drive). >>Then, the started to allude to a 'rumor' they had heard that CMS had purchased Apple reject Quantum drives-- that being the way that CMS could undersell Relax<< 4) In the August issue of "The RelaxLetter", Relax has an article called "Tips on Merchandising Hard Drives." To quote a relavant section: "Saving the empty shipping boxes will allow for an inexpensive pyramid that looks like your store is stocking and selling lots of Hard Drives. If you don't have boxes available we will be happy to supply them at no charge....In our product line we have the MiniMate as a promotional line and the Hard Plus as our high end. You can use the MiniMate as a loss leader and sell it as your advertised bargain. The Hard lus on the other hand is a natural up sell..." Shades of bait-and-switch here... 5) In the same issue of "The RelaxLetter", they have an article on spiffs, and I quote "...One dollar per megabyte for the first ninety days. Maybe that doesn't sound like a lot but when you consider a $300 spiff for a 300 megabyte drive..." Never mind that the article doesn't agree with what the company says. Never mind that if they didn't offer spiffs they could be more competitive on pricing (and warranty). Never mind that... With all of this crap going on, I refuse to sell Relax drives, and I cannot recommend that anyone purchase a Relax Technologies drive, nor any store carry Relax Technologies drives. Peter "shit but I'm sick of slime" Korn Disclaimer: The above are my opinions, and are not meant to in any way libel the company--all the stores I cite are either from direct conversation with Relax Technologies sales staff, or from Relax Technologies publications. -- Peter "Arrgh" Korn korn@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU {decvax,dual,hplabs,sdcsvax,ulysses}!ucbvax!korn
olson@endor.harvard.edu (Eric Olson) (08/26/87)
I rented two Relax ("your hard disk doesn't work? Reeeelaaaxxxx. :-)") 20 Meg hard disks (the old kind: convection cooled, vertical stand-alone SCSI). Both failed because the blue plastic DB-25 connectors on the drives wore out. Since they were rented, I just returned them. Now we use Hyperdrive FX20s, and they seem much more reliable. -Eric Eric K. Olson olson@endor.harvard.edu harvard!endor!olson
cramer%clem@Sun.COM (Sam Cramer) (08/26/87)
I believe that Relax was implicated in a bit of nastiness which involved them buying and reselling "from the dumpster" reject Macintosh boards. I don't recall the specifics, so I'm not sure how they represented these refurbed Macs. I believe Relax stopped when Apple threatened their disposal service with legal action for not destroying the motherboards, as their contract required. Sam Cramer {cbosgd,decwrl,hplabs,seismo,ucbvax}!sun!cramer cramer@sun.com