Technical support Ethical behaviour??? 8

[PalmStrike]

Hi all, i am just curious to peoples opinion about chargeable technical support from the big software providers.

Namely... actually, no names lets keep this wide.

I personally go on the net a lot to try and find answers to problems, as a lot of you will have noticed (a big thankyou to anyone who has answered any of my threads in the past)

But sometimes, the answer is so elusive for so simple a problem. And more often than not, it is an answer people don't think of giving because it is so obvious that you assume that has already been looked at.

I personnaly resent sending more money to a big corporation for a three minute phone call (well 20 minute phone call, 17 mins to get to the techy). Maybe it is just the anarchist in me, but there are a lot of modest people out there that are so willing to help, it is a shame we are being held to ransome by big corporations.

I am willing to accept that I might be missing the point.
Gis an opinion.

 

[gurner]

I think you'd need to *fake* quite a bit of Latency to make a Virtual London to Brighton run watchable!

 

[Tarwn]

You could specify certain servers to pass through, we are talking about a virtual run, so name a couple of servers around the world and make someone find a path through them
Oh, without bang pathing an email, that'd be cheating

-Tarwn [sub]01010100 01101001 01100101 01110010 01101110 01101111 01101011 00101110 01100011 01101111 01101101 [/sub]
[sup]29 3K 10 3D 3L 3J 3K 10 32 35 10 3E 39 33 35 10 3K 3F 10 38 31 3M 35 10 36 3I 35 35 10 3K 39 3D 35 10 1Q 19[/sup]
Get better results for your questions: faq333-2924
Frequently Asked ASP Questions: faq333-3048

 

[PalmStrike]

Hi, sorry to break up the fun, but I have an outrageous update on the exact reason I started this thread.

I just Paid Veritas £50 for the answer as to why I can't get 12Gb onto a 12/24Gb tape.

The bloke on the phone told me "It can't be done, we wont support you for this"

Now tell me that I am abusing the system, I think i have done my research on this six months trying every fix I can find, and of course it can be done, but ot pay to have an idiot tell me that a problem that is quite obviously fixable (I have seen it fixed, but payed no attention at the time, as i didn't realise how much of a problem it was, my coleague did it in less than a couple of minutes)

And what is more annoying, is that I know I am not the only one with this error.

It is one thing to charge for support, and fix the problem. but to charge and refuse to help is outrageous.

I might add, that I held for an hour, to get through, and I spoke to the bloke for only 5 mins trying to persuade him to help me.

If anyone else has had treatment like this, I think a campaign is in order to stop this sort of robbery.

regards

Rob

P.S. Tarwin, love the idea, if I knew how to do it, I would give you a race! )

 

[dilettante]

Have you done any testing to find out how much you can get on one of these tapes?

And what sort of tape is it... 12/24 doesn't tell me much. Perhaps that's two rated capacities, differing based on the make & model of drive?

Sometimes you run into the old "decimal vs binary" thousand, million, billion thing. The vendors will always quote the higher figure of the two. Take a peek at this for grins:

http://www.pcguide.com/intro/fun/bindec-c.html

The other factor with PC tape media and drives is compression. Yeah, this crud has creeped into the mainframe world in the last decade now too.

Sometimes they'll quote a capacity that makes the assumption your data fits the criteria for ideal compression using their technology. Sometimes this ideal (or target) is a 2:1 compression ratio. That's why you sometimes see ratings like 12/24. Don't EVER count on getting that 24GB onto that tape.

When I finally "turned to the dark side" and gave up the 68000 world for the Wintel universe I got a deal on a really sweet '486-based mini-tower. This thing came with a "Jumbo 250" (250MB) QIC tape drive. Boy did I find out fast what a joke that was.

Not only wasn't it capable of getting close to 250MB on a tape (with slooooow software compression). One look at the innards and I gasped. The thing looked like it was designed by Fred Flintstone and ought to cost about $10 USD!!!

It actually had the head mounted on this little lever. The opposite end of the lever was tilted up and down by a plastic worm gear mounted on a stepper motor. The ridiculous contraption worked by setting the head at one level against the tape, running the tape for a few feet, then rewinding back and resetting the head for another pass. Rinse, repeat. Then it moved on to another stretch of tape to repeat this comical action.

So "caveat emptor" as always. This outfit just charged you 50 pounds to help "pound" the lesson home I guess.

 

[Kjonnnn]

We use 12gb backup tapes. And they usually compressed 19bg worth of data on them.

 

[lionelhill]

I'm nearly seriously considering setting myself up selling copier paper at 75% of the normal price. It will be advertised as A4, but I'll be selling A5. Just there'll be some small print somewhere explaining that it is A4 assuming you use the zoom feature of the photocopier.

I personally feel that a media storage device should always quote its real capacity, not some compressed one, because not all data is compressible - and how can the manufacturer know what sort of data you intend to save??

But that's just my feeling.

 

[PalmStrike]

A standing ovation for lionelhill, that is superb.

 

[dilettante]

Sort of like the broadband service ads you see: "Unlimited" this and that... then you get it and they hand you a list of fine print that says they guarantee nothing and basically expect you to use the service only for text emails for hobby purposes.

 

[ST0RMCHASER]

Laws online are less enforceable because what can be against the law in one country is fully legal in another. Case in point, quite a few States in the USA have gambling laws, that are strictly enforced. But, Leave the USA set up shop in a few other countries on their website servers, you can set up, be profitable, and invite US residents to gamble 24/7. It's legal. Also... the ways of advertising vary from one Country to the next. So is freedom of speech, what women can and can not do. That's how that Iraq website is able to keep setting up online. Another case in point is The laws of when a child is a child, and when is that child a adult? In a few countries a child is a child till they are 21 years old, others it's 19. For some it's 12 years old! In the USA a child is a adult at different ages too. some it's 18 others it's 19. May even still be some that still have the 21 rule here as well.

I guess I am trying to point out, that unless the world can agree on what the laws will be online, That includes each of the USA States. Set a one rule laws that fits all. we will still have those that will get away with the BS they fling at everyone. Right now I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for that to happen. It's a complex subject to deal with. So, for now we continue on with what ever laws are set forth for the Country we live in, and the State too if we have one. Selling online is profitable, even for the criminals, and the sleaze balls. They know exactly what they are doing wrong. They wasn't born yesterday...they sure are really counting on you being born yesterday.