Hey all
I've got some bitchin' to do about Apple here.....now first of all, don't get me wrong - I always have been and always will be a loyal Mac user - but Apple has been really pissin' me off lately! I (my family) recieved a new iMac for Christmas back in 1999. This was a top-o-the-line iMac DV SE (400MHz, 128MB RAM, etc...). Let me make this clear: I have NEVER been this disappointed with a product EVER before in my life! This new iMac came with a 1 year warrenty which, I believe, is standard on all Macs. The computer worked like a DREAM for the first 10 months. It was especially nice because I live in a tiny Wintel dominated community and I got to do lots of bragging over it's design and power. In early-mid November, the iMac just started shutting down at apparently random times. The random shutdowns got more and more frequent as time passed. We think it was a problem with overheating or something but we still haven't found out. On December 12th, it shutdown and refused to start up again. The first time i attempted to start it up after this there came a very static and choppy noise that sounded something like breaking glass. And that's it. We sent it to the nearest Apple retailer (900 km) for repairs (which, BTW, cost us $100 per trip). They only recieved it around Christmas and refused to repair it until after the holidays. We accepted this with no complaint because this was our first major problem with Apple. We tried to be very tolerant.
Around New Years, we got the computer back and it worked fine for about another month. Then BAM! Same problem as before. We had trouble trying to get the techs to repair it again because (technically) our warrenty had expired. We convinced them to do it anyways because we argued that the computer had never be REALLY fixed and still had the same problems. They fixed (supposedly) after about a month (April?), charged us another $100 for S&H, and sent it back to us. it worked fine for about 2 months, although my dad believed I was really behind every single crash with my 'evil' programs and stuff. It started shutting down randomly again only it was not very frequent (around May). We lived with it like this for a few months (not wanting to spend another $100) and got by with troubleshooting and the like. Then it got too much to bear so we sent it to them again (around July 2001) with much the same excuse as before. It cost us ANOTHER $100. This time, they found some very severe problems and needed many new parts like a new motherboard, CRT display, etc. They first had to do some careful negotiating with Apple to get them to send the parts free of charge. When the parts arrived, they were either the wrong ones or they didn't work at all. They continued getting new parts and trying to fix it. They finally got it to work. They tested it for about 3 weeks, found no problems, and sent it back to us around SEPTEMBER! During this time, my dad was offered several thousand dollar contracts to do digital animation work for a local college. He had to decline ALL of them because he had no way to do the work. The computer worked fine for a month but then had a problem with the HD which we could only fix by erasing the entire thing. We didn't have much of it backed up. We recovered from this one and the computer worked as if it were BETTER than new for a few more weeks. Then it broke again for the FINAL time (early-mid November). We contacted Apple DIRECTLY and made a few very reasonable demands (i.e. either FIX our computer and give us another 1 year warrently, give us a new computer with a 1 year warrenty, or feel the wrath of court. They said they couldn't fix our computer and they refused to give us a new iMac (probably because a lack of them) but did offer us a demo machine used at a store. With a 3 month warrenty. We said no. We would accept the demo machine but not without a 1 year warrenty. They said no. We wrote many letters, made many phone calls, and sent many emails. Apparently, they only recieved the ones they wanted to. Now here it is almost 2002 and we are still without a reasonably powerful Mac. The question I pose to you all is:
What the F#*& do you think we should do?
I think I should also note that the times which we had our iMac and it wasn't shutting down, it was having frequent crashes besides that. I spent countless hours troubleshooting and various other things. Yep well I'm done raving for now....if anyone want to know more about this incident or has similar experiences to relate, I would be more than happy to hear them =)
I've got some bitchin' to do about Apple here.....now first of all, don't get me wrong - I always have been and always will be a loyal Mac user - but Apple has been really pissin' me off lately! I (my family) recieved a new iMac for Christmas back in 1999. This was a top-o-the-line iMac DV SE (400MHz, 128MB RAM, etc...). Let me make this clear: I have NEVER been this disappointed with a product EVER before in my life! This new iMac came with a 1 year warrenty which, I believe, is standard on all Macs. The computer worked like a DREAM for the first 10 months. It was especially nice because I live in a tiny Wintel dominated community and I got to do lots of bragging over it's design and power. In early-mid November, the iMac just started shutting down at apparently random times. The random shutdowns got more and more frequent as time passed. We think it was a problem with overheating or something but we still haven't found out. On December 12th, it shutdown and refused to start up again. The first time i attempted to start it up after this there came a very static and choppy noise that sounded something like breaking glass. And that's it. We sent it to the nearest Apple retailer (900 km) for repairs (which, BTW, cost us $100 per trip). They only recieved it around Christmas and refused to repair it until after the holidays. We accepted this with no complaint because this was our first major problem with Apple. We tried to be very tolerant.
Around New Years, we got the computer back and it worked fine for about another month. Then BAM! Same problem as before. We had trouble trying to get the techs to repair it again because (technically) our warrenty had expired. We convinced them to do it anyways because we argued that the computer had never be REALLY fixed and still had the same problems. They fixed (supposedly) after about a month (April?), charged us another $100 for S&H, and sent it back to us. it worked fine for about 2 months, although my dad believed I was really behind every single crash with my 'evil' programs and stuff. It started shutting down randomly again only it was not very frequent (around May). We lived with it like this for a few months (not wanting to spend another $100) and got by with troubleshooting and the like. Then it got too much to bear so we sent it to them again (around July 2001) with much the same excuse as before. It cost us ANOTHER $100. This time, they found some very severe problems and needed many new parts like a new motherboard, CRT display, etc. They first had to do some careful negotiating with Apple to get them to send the parts free of charge. When the parts arrived, they were either the wrong ones or they didn't work at all. They continued getting new parts and trying to fix it. They finally got it to work. They tested it for about 3 weeks, found no problems, and sent it back to us around SEPTEMBER! During this time, my dad was offered several thousand dollar contracts to do digital animation work for a local college. He had to decline ALL of them because he had no way to do the work. The computer worked fine for a month but then had a problem with the HD which we could only fix by erasing the entire thing. We didn't have much of it backed up. We recovered from this one and the computer worked as if it were BETTER than new for a few more weeks. Then it broke again for the FINAL time (early-mid November). We contacted Apple DIRECTLY and made a few very reasonable demands (i.e. either FIX our computer and give us another 1 year warrently, give us a new computer with a 1 year warrenty, or feel the wrath of court. They said they couldn't fix our computer and they refused to give us a new iMac (probably because a lack of them) but did offer us a demo machine used at a store. With a 3 month warrenty. We said no. We would accept the demo machine but not without a 1 year warrenty. They said no. We wrote many letters, made many phone calls, and sent many emails. Apparently, they only recieved the ones they wanted to. Now here it is almost 2002 and we are still without a reasonably powerful Mac. The question I pose to you all is:
What the F#*& do you think we should do?
I think I should also note that the times which we had our iMac and it wasn't shutting down, it was having frequent crashes besides that. I spent countless hours troubleshooting and various other things. Yep well I'm done raving for now....if anyone want to know more about this incident or has similar experiences to relate, I would be more than happy to hear them =)
