smsmith@hpuxa.ircc.ohio-state.edu (Stephen M. Smith) (02/28/91)
Recently I posted 3 articles on the net in comp.sys.ibm.pc.misc and misc.forsale.computers to ask people about a company called Touche (a division of PC Pros in Darien, Illinois). The response I got was overwhelmingly negative. I was thinking about buying a 386-33 from Touche until I was persuaded not to. I love Touche's system--it's got great components--but I found that I could not trust Touche to even deliver it to my door based upon my findings after hours of research on this company. I called the Better Business Bureau in Illinois and they said that there were complaints about "inoperative replacement parts" and "nondelivery of merchandise." I then called Touche (for the third time) and asked them to respond to these things. Touche's rep (Joe) said that they were back ordered for months on DOS 4.01, and that they are shipping it now--and that was what was meant by the "nondelivery of merchandise." But he said he didn't know about the "inoperative replacement parts." I asked him what the replacement policy was, and he said that the customer calls their 1-800 tech support (a new service) and then they send out via Federal Express a NEW part for replacement. AFTER the customer receives the part, he is to replace it and then send the old part back to Touche. He also said that there was no VISA deposit to ensure that they would get the old part back. I called back at another time and spoke to a woman who said she wasn't aware of the problem. I called on 4 different occasions and was assured that if a part failed it was definitely promptly replaced by a NEW part via overnight Federal Express. They were upfront about this, and were consistent in what they said. I asked PC Pros why they don't have a 30-day money back guarantee. They said that they only want to deal with serious enquirers (which is why they have toll-free tech support, but NOT a toll-free sales line), and they said they do not want to deal with used equipment. They argued that they put together the best system (I do have to agree with that) and that they were backing it up with proper support (guarantee, Federal Express new parts, etc.). They also said that they can keep their prices so low because they don't have a huge overhead--namely a small staff to answer phones and one-page ads (their ads are always only 1 page). This is what TOUCHE says. But it seemed funny to me that they weren't aware of the fact that there had been complaints to the Better Business Bureau. I called the Computer Shopper's customer service line (Touche advertises in the Computer Shopper). The lady cheerfully looked in her files...then very glumly told me that she could not tell me anything, and that I would have to act upon what I'd already been informed (I had just told here about what the Better Business Bureau said). To me, this was her way of letting me know things weren't good with Touche, but without getting herself involved in legal difficulties. I had the strong impression that she would have said something like "we don't have any complaints on file..." if there hadn't been any complaints registered. I also called...well, I can't say who, but it was a major supplier of Touche's system components. (A VERY MAJOR supplier, hint, hint) The person I talked to there READILY CONFIRMED that they also had complaints about Touche, but found himself in a very awkward position because he immediately gave me indication that he wasn't supposed to be divulging that sort of information. There were several people who had positive dealings with Touche, and to be fair I have put their remarks at the beginning of the following collection of comments I gathered over the net... -------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 25 Feb 91 20:57 CST >I'm thinking of buying a 386-33 from Touche. If you have had any good >or bad experiences with Touche or PC Pros, please post or email. Good outfit. Motherboard, multi-function, hard drive, floppies, controller, VGA card, monitor all name brand equipment. Only "generics" are case/p.s. Keyboard is a re-labeled Keytronics. I got mine last July. 386/33 I see they now have it with a better VGA card, for less money. What can I say, it runs like a champ, and they were gentlemanly and honourable in our transactions. Can't ask for better than THAT. ------------------------------------------------------ Date: Wed, 27 Feb 91 15:46:20 EST Subject: Re: Has NO ONE had a good experience with Touche/PC Pros??? I am happy to say that I have owned a Touche for 2 years now and have had no troubles. I bought a AMI 25 MHz '386 w/ 150 MB hard drive way back in 1989. Since then it has gotten lots of use with the only problem being a loose power connector to the hard drive when I moved the system here to Australia (I was originally in Minnesota). I found the sales people varied a lot in quality but I was willing to put with that for the approx. $1000 I saved on the system compared to Dell and Zeos. If you know what you want and are technically informed, which is the sort of buyer they aim for, their fine. ------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed Jan 23 11:48:51 1991 Subject: Re: Touche >Does anyone know the pc-clone make 'Touche'? Touche is the brand name for the clones assembled and marketed by the mail order firm PC Pros, 8205 Darien, Illinois 60559, telephone (708) 810-9490. They advertise in Computer Shopper, Info World and I'm sure others as well. I bought a system from them in September configured and priced as follows: AMI Mark III motherboard, AMI Bios 25 Mhz 80386 CPU , 64 KB Cache 4 MB 80 NS SIMM RAM 1.2 MB 5.25" Floppy, 1.44 3.5" floppy Maxtor 348 MB (formatted) 15 MS ESDI hard disk Ultrastor disk controller Orchid Prodesign II super VGA Sony 1304 (14" 1024 x 768 non interlaced) color monitor Microsoft Mouse Tower case w/ 280 W power supply 1 year on site service. $4,197. With the big, fast disk and good VGA monitor it seemed like a good deal. The system runs DOS, Windows 3.0, ISC Unix 2.02 and X11r4 without any problems at all. A couple of things to watch out for: The keyboard seems cheap and is not to my liking at all. There was no 30 day "no questions asked" return policy. They failed to ship the mouse with the system. It took 4 phone calls and 2 letters over a 6 week period to finally get it resolved. Overall, I'd have to say I'm a satisfied customer. ----------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 27 Feb 91 01:20 MDT Subject: Any experiences with Touche? (PC Pros?) I bought a Sony 1304 monitor and Orchid PDII card from PC Pros last summer (July). They told me the monitor was backordered, and wouldn't ship out for one week. It took over a month for my order to arrive, mainly because the Sonys were scarce at that time (I called several other places during the wait, and nobody else had the monitor in stock either). Other than that, I thought they offered good service, the price was right, and they were fairly friendly. -------------------------------------------------------- Subject: Touche I bought one of Touche(PC-Pro's) 386 33 machines. I have been somewhat less than impressed by their tech support. I am having problems with the power supply "hanging" after a brown out. They sent me a replacement however it did the same thing. Now they have been trying to push me off on their supplier who has not been all that cooperative. So I am back hassling with Touche. I love the AMI motherboard it is FAST and the Sony monitor is excellent. The machine is running 24 hours a day doing high speed modem transfers under Desqview. I just wish it had been trouble free from the start. In all likeli- hood I will probably be forced to buy a UPS to make this thing reliable. I HATE technology that is a step backwards in reliability. The American Enhanced power supply is trying to do some sort of circuit protection internally but is not doing it correctly. Date: Sun, 24 Feb 91 22:20:14 -0900 Subject: Re: Need info on Touche. [I wrote back and asked if this person had complained to the Better Business Bureau] No I did not complain to the BBB so this doesn't bode well. Others apparently did. They told me up front they were having trouble shipping msdos so I said no problem. 6 weeks later still no msdos I requested a refund. 4 weeks later I finally got it. Not great but no big deal. The system I got is the same except you better ask about the Orchid board because mine was shipped with 512k. It cost extra for the extra 512k. I got 4megs not 8 on the motherboard. Here is my complaint. They never really took my problem seriously with the power supply problem. Instead they pawned me off on their suppliers to get my questions answered. I have about $40 in long distance calls talking to pc power and cooling.....it is a 300watt supply and so far has been fine. The American Enhanced was junk which someone at the Touche acknowledged but of course no one else would. They had alot of defective units. So to settle my problem they agreed to ship a pc power and cooling if I paid a $50 upgrade. I said fine. I got the unit and found they also charged me for the shipping. Now that made me very angry. This should have been a warranty situation. So far no answer to my letter requesting a refund of those charges. The hardware is a very nice combination which except for the power supply has run quite well 24 hours a day since mid Nov. Can I recommend Touche? NO their attitude toward technical support is poor. On the other hand I have heard universally good things about Gateway tech support. I had considered Zeos but contact with their tech support was poor. Oh if you plan on high speed modem operations with 19200 serial port speeds the Boca I/o card is junk. It uses a 16C450 uart and some vlsi circuitry to manage 2 serial ports. There is NO upgrade path to 16550AFN uarts. I had to disable their ports and add my own cards to get my serial io working right. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 25 Feb 91 16:41:46 EST > ...thanks for taking the time to answer me--I think you just > saved me from making an aweful mistake. Well Steve, PC Pros gave me such a prolonged headache, the least I could do was make sure they lost at least one potential customer. I too was attracted to their list of manufacturers but, unlike you, I went ahead and bought without checking their track record. Good luck in purchasing your system! ----------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 25 Feb 91 13:34:57 EST Subject: PC Pros Not knowing if you've read my posting to comp.forsale.computers, I would just like to say that I strongly advise against buying from these mailorder bozos. Spend the couple hundred bucks extra and get a good machine with a good reputation like Gateway or Northgate. PC Pros stinks to high heaven for service. In particular, the lady I dealt with, Marva, was just despicable when I was trying to get my machine serviced. If you'd like an opinion with a little more weight, contact the Better Business Bureau in Chicago. There opinion of PC Pros concurs with mine, and they have several complaints lodged against them. ------------------------------------------------------ Date: Mon, 25 Feb 91 14:51:08 EST Subject: Re: Any experiences with Touche? (PC Pros?) >I'm thinking of buying a 386-33 from Touche. If you have had any good >or bad experiences with Touche or PC Pros, please post or email. Stay away from Touche! I was thinking of buying from them myself. I called to ask a few questions- they have no 800 number, even for orders- and the guy (who said he is the "vice-president" of PC Pros) seemed irritated and immediately put me on hold. (Are there really that few employees that they have the vice-president taking orders?) I have an uncle who lives near Darien; he is in the skip-trace business and has access to a reasonable amount of sensitive information... Apparently these guys aren't so clean. The BBB said complaints had been filed on various topics, including failure to deliver the ordered merchandise. Get the picture? Their prices are pretty low, almost TOO low. It's not worth the risk. True, the Sony 1304 is nice (are they still bundling it with their systems?), that's why I ended up buying one. For a VGA, stay away from Orchid or Paradise. Go with a Tseng 4000-type card. I would highly recommend the STB Powergraph VGA. As for an actual system, go ahead and buy mail order. But don't buy a mail order system with the bundled video. You'll get a cheapo monitor in most cases, and a nonstandard cheapo video card. You should carefully select these items yourself and shop around- after all, this is what you'll be looking at every day! After the Touche investigation, I decided to order from Tri-Star Computers in Tempe, AZ. (I ordered a 386-25 cache system with 4MB, one 1.2 MB floppy, and a 150 MB ESDI hard drive. It ran right out of the box, and I've had no problems. Their warranty and money-back policies are a little longer than most companies'... 60 day money-back, I think. ---------------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue, 26 Feb 91 11:56 EST Subject: Touche / News Re Touche/PCPros. Our purchasing dept. wouldn't let me order from them from what they had heard through some sort of informal inter-university grapevine of purchasing agents. I looked some more and found a COMPLETELY reputable company offering essentially the same high quality system for even less money. I just ordered my (not actually MY) 3rd machine from them: EPS Tech. of Jefferson S.D. They have an 800 number for sales & tech. Their support has been great, and their equipment superb. Give them a call. Their prices have been dropping, so the latest ads are usually a bit on the high side of the actual current ones. ----------------------------------------------- Date: Tue, 26 Feb 91 16:06:28 CST Subject: Re: Any experience with Touche? >Please email or post if you know anything about Touche Computers >(a PC Pros company). They advertise in Computer Shopper and Computer >Monthly. Yeah...Don't bother! They tried the old bait n switch on me with an AMI 386-20SX Motherboard. Drove 30 Miles to get it and was told someone "accidently sold it out of the box" they set aside for me. I just called 2 hours prior to double check it was there. Turns out they never had the 20MHZ boards in yet. Told them to F... Off! Read where they have some outstanding complaints against them. ----------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 27 Feb 91 13:56:27 EST Subject: PC Pros/Touche Saw your post about the PC Pros/Touche guys. I looked at them last April for much the same reasons as you. But they were terrible about returning phone calls and other basic information. I agree that they machine you want to buy is a great choice, so I started looking for an alternative source. I found one right here in Columbus [OH]! Try Columbus Micro Systems. They were up on 161, but just moved to a larger building so I don't know if I still have the right phone number. Try [614]794-1981. Or call information. ----------------------------------------------------------- Your mileage may vary. Stephen M. Smith \ + / <smsmith@hpuxa. \+++++/ " #*&<-[89s]*(k#$@-_=//a2$]'+=.(2_&*%>,,@ ircc.ohio-state. \ + / {7%*@,..":27g)-=,#*:.#,/6&1*.4-,l@#9:-) " edu> \ + / BTW, WYSInaWYG \ + / --witty.saying.ARC
chaz@chinet.chi.il.us (Charlie Kestner) (03/02/91)
The ONLY problem I had with my PC Pros 386/33 was a bad power cord. (WHICH, btw, they replaced via FedEx.) I received prompt service from them. When I called to find out about the machine, before I ordered it, the saleman was knowledgeable and didn't mis-represent anything. The machine arrive on my doorstep ONE DAY after they said they were shipping it. (Which date they gave as about a week after I placed my order, and they were right on time.) I have the older Orchid ProDesigner board in it, and it is just fine (and not "something to stay away from" line SOME weenie put it), albeit limited to 1024x768x16. I got a great machine, at a great price, and great followup service. Go ahead, call Gateway, pay more, and wait longer. Ditto Zeos. Ditto Northgate. Or did everyone suddenly forget all the problems, reported on the net, about THOSE companies.