gary@mic.UUCP (Gary Lewin) (12/03/88)
A short story and a few comments:
Last August I bought a Packard Bell 2400B modem from Soft Warehouse,
here in Dallas. The case looked good, the writing on the box said
all the right things and the price was $139.00. To make a long story
short, the first modem would not toggle properly between 1200 and
2400 baud on incoming calls. I exchanged it for another.
The second Packard Bell 2400B modem would not hold the factory
configuration information in memory and randomly changed default
settings on power up. I exchanged it for another (somehow thinking
that "the third time is the charm" :-).
The third Packard Bell modem would not dial out or answer the phone.
I returned it, added a little money and bought a Practical Peripherals
PM2400SA (total cost $166.00).
Upon opening the Practical Peripherals box, I found a slip of paper
stating something like "We burn in our chips for 24 hours" and felt
encouraged. I hooked it up and it has been running for 24 hours-a-day,
7 days-a-week, ever since, with no difficulties.
Regarding manuals, the Packerd Bell Manual had a little more information
than the Practical Peripherals but was full of typographic errors
and even had some completely incorrect information. Even though the
Practical Peripherals manual leaves a lot to be desired, there is
nothing incorrect in it.
I left much out of this story including time, calls to Packard Bell
and advice from the Soft Warehouse repair personnel. Now that several
months have passed, I am not nearly as angry as I was in August. The
Packard Bell people did not know much except how to say "Return it" in
a placating manner. The Soft Warehouse people said that they were
getting a lot of Packard Bell 2400B modems returned and that it could
be a "bad batch". In all fairness, Packard Bell could have corrected
the problems in future production runs. I am not interested in finding
out, though.
I have NO affiliations with any of the companies mentioned.
Gary Lewin
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