Still using a mouse? How quaint! Suggest you take a peek at Wacom's Grapphire. This gives you a cordless mouse, a pressure sensitive cordless stylus and a pad about the same as the usual rodent play area. Cost is about the same as you paid for your Microsoft optical mouse. It's so much easier to use the stylus for CAD and graphical work (you can even use the other end as an eraser just like a real pencil). However likely you will find, like me, that you never actually use the mouse in any program of any sort after the first 10 minutes familiarisation with the stylus. Downside: I assume there is a slight resources overhead, using a mouse on other computers is a nuisance. Happy New Year Mike -----Original Message----- From: TechNet [mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf Of Brian Ellis Sent: Sunday, January 06, 2002 8:20 AM To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Re: [TN] TOO MUCH? Earl As you bring up the subject, allow me to recount another Microsoft service glitch. A little over two years ago, Microsoft brought out the Intellimouse Explorer, an optical mouse which worked on a new idea. I bought two of these rodents and was delighted with their performance: a zillion times better than those things whose balls rotated, especially for precision work like CAD (in the distant past, I used the MouseSystems optical mice, but they never made the jump into Win32). After about a year, one of them stopped working reliably, followed by the other, a couple of months later. As Microsoft has zero service for where I live, I phoned the only number remotely relevant that I could find (an intercontinental call to Ireland). After being passed from Ireland to England to Germany, in all 45 minutes, I was told that they would replace them, with a tacit admission that there was a systematic fault. Of course, nothing happened. An e-mail with their reference number elicited no response. I've been waiting now for over a year with two rodents. Fed up, I decided to have a look at them myself. On taking one of them apart, I found the cable went from a plug on the PCB up the side and around the top edge and, on reaching the centre, made a sharp 90° turn to come out. There is no strain relief of any sort at this point. My diagnosis was simple: one of the wires broke at this point from the constant flexing in normal use. It would have been simple to avoid, by an elastomeric sleeve which would prevent flexing on the sharp right-angled bend. Of course, someone should have known that such a sharp bend was bad practice, anyway. I decided on some simple surgery to repair the caudal dislocation. Careful use of a scalpel showed where the intervertebral disc had slipped, causing damage to the central nervous system and I cut it back to a cm above the point: I then rejoined the nerves by fusing them with a tin lead alloy to where they entered the brain, eliminating the plug and socket. This worked fine. I did the same with the other, but with an improvement: I heat-shrank some sleeving over the cable past the bend and gouged a wider path for it with a Swiss Army Knife. The first one suffered from a caudal dislocation again after a few months, but the second one is still working. I was recently in a large computer supermarket and had a look at the mice. The same, excellent, model is on sale still. I carefully examined it. Have Microsoft improved it at where the tail leaves the animal's body? You must be joking! It is EXACTLY the same as it was two years earlier. Can you buy replacement cables? Not on your nelly! (Most people with a small cross-head screwdriver could change it in ten minutes, given instructions.) OK, I paid only 75 bucks each for them, but that's a small price to lose their reputation for hardware, just as much I offer them 0/10 for their software. I found that Logitech were now offering an equivalent. It looked as if the cable on them was slightly better supported at the exit, but I suspect that it, too, went through a sharp bend. Unfortunately, the Logitech cable was far too rigid for a mouse, so I didn't buy one. Logitech also offer an optical wireless mouse, but I fear that this would not be a real answer, as my desk is always cluttered and I fear the line of sight would constantly be interrupted (and it was hellishly expensive). So, Earl, your story about X-boxes does not surprise me. Microsoft have never been good at customer relations and I don't suppose that they ever will be as long as William Gates Jr wishes to fill his pockets with spondulacks, in preference to spending 1% of his fortune to ensure that his customers were happy. Or, perhaps, the gentleman in question realises that it would be a damn sight more than 1% to repair all his customer relations. A few months ago, he was interviewed by the BBC economist, Paddy O'Connell, who tried on three occasions to get him to apologise for the tort he had caused Microsoft users in the past through faults on Windows systems. In each case, Bill adroitly side-stepped the issue with a clever non sequitur, while not denying that the faults existed. I believe that he must be a world leader in amorality. Brian Earl Moon wrote: > > Ok folks, > > I think it's obvious to some who care, and I hope some do, I tend to go a > little off the deep end with this quality thing. I abhor poor quality > anything. Used to be, maybe still is, an auto parts lifetime warranty sucked > because you had to take the alternator, or whatever, back every month, if > fortunate, and get another. Though the replacement part was "free," just the > replacement effort alone, for me, was worth more than the damn part. Well, I > got sick and tired of it and changed the whole industry single handed. > Believe that? I doubt it. > > With nothing happening on this site I'm reaching deep to stir the pot this > time while being bored out of my mind here in Michigan. Hell, it ain't even > snowing but the temps about nothing. Well, you're probably getting as tired > of my rants as I am writing them, but consider the following: > > SEATTLE (AP) - Hundreds of people who bought Microsoft's hot new Xbox gaming > console over the holidays received defective systems, and some said they had > to wait weeks and endure shoddy customer service before their systems were > fixed. > > While analysts say the number of flawed consoles is probably too small to > spell serious production troubles, they caution that the long repair times > may harm the software giant in its first major foray into hardware. > > John Kreis bought an Xbox the day it came out. But the 31-year-old Chicago > man's $300 system stopped working almost immediately. Kreis said it took a > month of aggravation with Xbox customer service before he got a replacement. > > ``The whole thing that was so frustrating (was) just the fact that still to > this day I'm waiting for a call back just to explain to me what happened,'' > he said. > > The Associated Press spoke with about a dozen Xbox users who complained of a > game system that never worked or worked for a few hours or days before > freezing up. Most called the customer service response poor. > > ``I'm taking my Christmas decorations down and (my son) hasn't gotten to > play with his Christmas toys yet,'' Debbie Mason, of Uniontown, Pa., said > Thursday. > > She had just been told in her ninth call to customer service that, despite > an earlier promise that the system would be sent back that day, it turned > out to be broken again. > > Microsoft sales and marketing director John O'Rourke said fewer than 1 > percent of the Microsoft units - 10,000 units in this case - have proven > faulty. Analysts say that's in line with the industry standard, and > competitor Nintendo reported a comparable rate for its new GameCube. > > But analyst Rob Enderle of Giga Information Systems warned that a company's > response to those customers who do have problems often is more important > than how many units actually break. > > ``If 200 people have a really bad experience and they're vocal, then the > impression is the product's bad,'' he said. > > During the Christmas season, Enderle added, any return that takes more than > a week is ``a horribly long time.'' > > For Microsoft, which shipped about 1.5 million Xboxes over the holidays, the > stakes are high. With the highly regarded Xbox, the company is battling > Nintendo and Sony in a hyper-competitive game console market. > > Microsoft already has been plagued with rumors of problems at its Mexican > production plant after it delayed its U.S. launch date by a week - to Nov. > 15 - and pushed back its Japan launch as well. > > The company has denied any major problems. > > Plenty of people who bought defective Xboxes got decent customer service. > Marc Patri, 49, said in an e-mail that his Xbox was repaired and returned > within five days - which O'Rourke called the time it should take a unit to > get repaired. > > Microsoft uses outside companies, including San Antonio, Texas-based > Harte-Hanks Inc. and Sykes Enterprises in Tampa, Fla., to handle its Xbox > customer service. Xbox repairs are handled by Solectron Corp. of Milpitas, > Calif. > > A spokesman for Harte-Hanks declined to comment. The other companies did not > respond to calls seeking comment. > > Microsoft has seen no pattern of specific problems, said O'Rourke, and heard > of no major delays with repairs. > > Kreis said it took nearly two weeks before he even received an empty box to > send his faulty Xbox back for repair. > > And he got conflicting answers: At one point, customer service couldn't find > his records. Another representative told him he would get a new unit rather > than have his old one repaired. Another agent told him they never send new > units out. > > Still later, someone called him and asked him how he was enjoying his new > Xbox - which he'd never received. > > Finally, on Dec. 10, the repaired Xbox came back. > > ``I'll be loyal for a while,'' said Kreis. ``But I'm hoping I never have to > call support again, that's for sure.'' > > Any reactions? I mean, is 1% acceptable or what about the rest of the BS > these people put on us, or are we to blame for wanting untested stuff before > its time? What about the SUV tire thing? Does any of this really matter? > > MoonMan > > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------- > Technet Mail List provided as a free service by IPC using LISTSERV 1.8d > To unsubscribe, send a message to [log in to unmask] with following text in > the BODY (NOT the subject field): SIGNOFF Technet > To temporarily halt delivery of Technet send e-mail to [log in to unmask]: SET Technet NOMAIL > To recieve ONE mailing per day of all the posts: send e-mail to [log in to unmask]: SET Technet Digest > Search previous postings at: www.ipc.org > On-Line Resources & Databases > E-mail Archives > Please visit IPC web site (http://www.ipc.org/html/forum.htm) for additional > information, or contact Keach Sasamori at [log in to unmask] or 847-509-9700 ext.5315 > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ----- Technet Mail List provided as a free service by IPC using LISTSERV 1.8d To unsubscribe, send a message to [log in to unmask] with following text in the BODY (NOT the subject field): SIGNOFF Technet To temporarily halt delivery of Technet send e-mail to [log in to unmask]: SET Technet NOMAIL To recieve ONE mailing per day of all the posts: send e-mail to [log in to unmask]: SET Technet Digest Search previous postings at: www.ipc.org > On-Line Resources & Databases > E-mail Archives Please visit IPC web site (http://www.ipc.org/html/forum.htm) for additional information, or contact Keach Sasamori at [log in to unmask] or 847-509-9700 ext.5315 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ----- --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Technet Mail List provided as a free service by IPC using LISTSERV 1.8d To unsubscribe, send a message to [log in to unmask] with following text in the BODY (NOT the subject field): SIGNOFF Technet To temporarily halt delivery of Technet send e-mail to [log in to unmask]: SET Technet NOMAIL To recieve ONE mailing per day of all the posts: send e-mail to [log in to unmask]: SET Technet Digest Search previous postings at: www.ipc.org > On-Line Resources & Databases > E-mail Archives Please visit IPC web site (http://www.ipc.org/html/forum.htm) for additional information, or contact Keach Sasamori at [log in to unmask] or 847-509-9700 ext.5315 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------