blgardne@esunix.UUCP (Blaine Gardner) (02/20/89)
I found this on a local BBS a couple of days ago, any comments?
89Feb10 1:32 am from Pete Ashdown
Well, Telebit screwed us over, sort of. They just came out with the T-2500.
A modem that sells for $1600 and has everything the TrailBlazer Plus has
plus V.32 and MNP 5. They do have an upgrade policy but get this, its
different for people who bought their modems before the first of the year....
It doesn't matter that you have the TrailBlazer Plus, what matters is WHEN you
bought it. If you bought it after the first of the year, its $395 to upgrade,
because you need to send the modem back to Telebit to get it upgraded. If you
bought it BEFORE the first of the year, its $795 to upgrade!! What can we
do? Get on UseNet and complain your butt off. I'll bet they are already
getting ranked upon on there right now. At $795, I'd rather just sell the
TrailBlazer and get a dual-standard HST. They are calling me back tomorrow to
tell me when the upgrade will be available. I already expressed my dismay
over the price. I asked them if there was going to be a UseNet price like
they have done on upgrades in the past. She said no.
The only thing we can do as Telebit owners is complain about this and get
them to reverse their decision. I'll bet about 50 modems were sold in
January. The rest of us are going to have to pay 800 bucks just to upgrade.
The address for Telebit is:
Telebit Corporation
1345 Shorebird Way
Mountain View, CA
94043-1329
The phone number is of course - 1-800-TELEBIT
I URGE you to complain your head off if you are affected by this. $795 is
out of the question. $395 is a bit steep. $300 is the max I would pay for an
upgrade of this sort. If they don't change their policy on this, I'm just
going to sell my Telebit to a lonely Mac user and buy a dual-standard HST for
$750.
--
Blaine Gardner @ Evans & Sutherland 580 Arapeen Drive, SLC, Utah 84108
Here: utah-cs!esunix!blgardne {ucbvax,allegra,decvax}!decwrl!esunix!blgardne
"Nobody will ever need more than 64K." "Nobody needs multitasking on a PC."brad@looking.UUCP (Brad Templeton) (02/25/89)
Before we flame, let's get the facts straight. For example, we don't know that there isn't a hardware change involved here, and that modems sold this year had the new hardware (but not the software) and modems sold last year had the old harware. That is possible -- you should find out before you flame. And finally, the fact that they sold their modems half price to usenauts but don't intend to give the same upgrade price to the discount customers is hardly something to complain about. There is no free lunch here. If the modem does V.32, I wonder if it can also do the V.32 subsets that are used in some other 9600 bps modems like the Hayes. What about the courier? If it could do V.32, the Hayes, the Courier (and if it can do those it can probably do Fax, which is unidirectional v.32-like isn't it?) then that might well be worth even $700 to upgrade. -- Brad Templeton, Looking Glass Software Ltd. -- Waterloo, Ontario 519/884-7473
kevin@aablue.UUCP (Kevin Benton) (02/25/89)
Reguarding the exorbatant price for the upgrade of the TB+, I do think the
$795 is VERY unfair, especially since I can go get the U.S.R. at Dealer cost.
I don't seem to understand why Telebit charges soooooooo much for their modems
in a market where, by far, they're the highest priced modem that I know of at
that speed. Rather obviously, almost twice that of the USR! Personally, I
just happen to like Telebit, but if this kind of thing keeps up, I'll move to
USR and leave the TB behind. Rather interesting. How much does somebody want
to bet that TB waits till April 1 to release the updates... Anyone who bought
the modem in 88 will be out of their 90 day warranty period. Gee, my modem
doesn't work. I'm seeing gar{{{bage on {_) my screen. Maybe the {ele*^&it is
going ba%.
aablue!kevinrjg@sialis.mn.org (Robert J. Granvin) (02/26/89)
>Well, Telebit screwed us over, sort of. They just came out with the T-2500. >A modem that sells for $1600 and has everything the TrailBlazer Plus has >plus V.32 and MNP 5. They do have an upgrade policy but get this, its >different for people who bought their modems before the first of the year.... >It doesn't matter that you have the TrailBlazer Plus, what matters is WHEN you >bought it. If you bought it after the first of the year, its $395 to upgrade, >because you need to send the modem back to Telebit to get it upgraded. If you >bought it BEFORE the first of the year, its $795 to upgrade!! This is not an unstandard business practice. You have described a new modem. People who have other modems (not replaced, just a different model) have been given an upgrade policy. Most companies will not offer this. If you want the new product, you go out and buy it. Telebit is being unusual by offering an upgrade to a new product at all. It is standard practice to provide different pricing for an upgrade depending on when you purchased the item. They are NOT penalizing, by price, someone who purchased long ago. What they are is consciously not penalizing someone who bought _recently_. When you realize that, you realize that everyone is charged $795, but because you bought one recently you're given a break. Many companies do this. Microport, MicroSoft, Borland... The list goes on forever. The next question is to consider whether you need a T-2500. If you did, why did you buy a Trailblazer+? Do you _need_ V.32? If you do now, but didn't then, you have nothing to complain about. If you do now and did then, you have no one to complain to but yourself. The next step is to consider what upgrades are or will be available for the Trailblazer+. Let's consider the 5.0 ROMs which doesn't yet exist. These ROMs will implement some fixes, MNP 5 and "other things". Based on all past information, this "upgrade" is inexpensive, and is a drop in place ROM that you can do in the privacy of your own home. So, this will give you some of what the T-2500 offers. Does it give you what you're looking for? Moral of the story? Don't just talk to an on-phone sales-person. Also talk to technical support or another person if the sales-person can't give you answers to your questions. You also have to be able to give good questions. -- Robert J. Granvin National Information Services Gorn base 2 just appeared. rjg@sialis.mn.org {amdahl,hpda}!bungia!sialis!rjg
chris@mimsy.UUCP (Chris Torek) (02/26/89)
In article <1217@sialis.mn.org> rjg@sialis.mn.org (Robert J. Granvin) writes: >This is not an unstandard business practice. ... Just a marketing-sort-of-practise. . . . Actually, the situation is probably that the `upgradable' modems have a different (heftier) power supply, or something similar. (The TB+ modems we bought last year are not going to be upgraded, but we do not care. We can afford to throw them out, for they have already paid for themselves.) -- In-Real-Life: Chris Torek, Univ of MD Comp Sci Dept (+1 301 454 7163) Domain: chris@mimsy.umd.edu Path: uunet!mimsy!chris
rick@pcrat.UUCP (Rick Richardson) (02/26/89)
In article <1217@sialis.mn.org> rjg@sialis.mn.org (Robert J. Granvin) writes: >go out and buy it. Telebit is being unusual by offering an upgrade to >a new product at all. Not really, since many (most?) of us were under the impression that the Telebit was a software platform. Early on, we all thought that the Plus would support V.32 and FAX, eventually, with ROM upgrades. It wasn't until I talked to a Telebit used car salesman marketing slug at UNIX Expo that I realized that this philosophy had been dropped. It is hard for me to believe that this is a technology problem. I think it is purely a marketing decision. BTW, I've refused to upgrade to 4.0 ROMS on the principal that I should have gotten them in the first place if I had waited just 4 weeks. I kept waiting for the V.32 and FAX upgrades, before I'd blow my wad. I'm blowing it now on whoever comes up with a FAX modem and V.32 in the same box. The writing is on the wall. -Rick -- Rick Richardson | JetRoff "di"-troff to LaserJet Postprocessor|uunet!pcrat!dry2 PC Research,Inc.| Mail: uunet!pcrat!jetroff; For anon uucp do:|for Dhrystone 2 uunet!pcrat!rick| uucp jetroff!~jetuucp/file_list ~nuucp/. |submission forms. jetroff Wk2200-0300,Sa,Su ACU {2400,PEP} 12013898963 "" \d\r\d ogin: jetuucp
ken@gatech.edu (Ken Seefried iii) (02/27/89)
It is my understanding that that V.32 requires much more in the way of computational hardware than the Trailblazer Plus has to offer (I believe the Fujitsu V.32 modem has 5 DSP chips). This being the case, I would have to assume that the upgrade consists of a new modem board. Also, implimenting FAX on a 68000 would be pretty slow, especially if you were trying to do Group 4, 2D. Most implimentation of FAX that I have played with were custom logic or special purpose chips such as the AMD 7970A/7971 or TI34010 w/ FAX library. If I am mistaken, please correct me, but the only way I see to get these features is new hardware. Thus, an $800 charge is not so unreasonable. ...ken seefried iii ken@gatech.edu
romkey@asylum.SF.CA.US (John Romkey) (02/27/89)
In article <682@pcrat.UUCP> rick@pcrat.UUCP (Rick Richardson) writes: >Not really, since many (most?) of us were under the impression that >the Telebit was a software platform. Early on, we all thought >that the Plus would support V.32 and FAX, eventually, with ROM >upgrades. Telebit may not have much choice in this matter. It's my impression that the older trailblazers don't have enough horsepower (particularly, the digital signal processing chip) to do V.32. I don't know if there trailblazers purchased after Jan. 1 are built differently or not, though... -- - john romkey USENET/UUCP: romkey@asylum.sf.ca.us Internet: romkey@xx.lcs.mit.edu "Can you find me soft asylum..." - The Doors
henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) (02/27/89)
In article <682@pcrat.UUCP> rick@pcrat.UUCP (Rick Richardson) writes: >... many (most?) of us were under the impression that >the Telebit was a software platform. Early on, we all thought >that the Plus would support V.32 and FAX, eventually, with ROM >upgrades... Those of us who have been reading this newsgroup for any length of time, or who *asked* Telebit about this, have never had any illusions about upgrading old Telebit modems to V.32. Telebit has said, openly, repeatedly, for a long time, that the TB and TB+ do not have the CPU crunch to do V.32 and new hardware would be required. Where did you hear otherwise? -- The Earth is our mother; | Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology our nine months are up. | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu