The "Official" IFL90 Shipping/Waiting Thread

Got a notification from PowerNotebooks today, tracking information says I'll have my Sager NP2090 TOMORROW!!!! I have no class on friday, so i'll be sittin at home all day so they don't miss me. Can't wait! First thing I think i'll do is wipe 64 bit and put 32 on, is that a good plan?

Bifman out

 

Still patiently waiting for mine, but I'm getting more sad the longer I wait Everyone is getting theirs. I order from Xoticpc the barebone on Aug11 and my friend ordered a Sager from them after me and got his already. I guess I have to be more patient. But I am excited as well! I have all my parts sitting on my desk and ready to be installed =)

 

Ordered mine the 20th, recieving it on the 11th, pretty stoked, 3 weeks isnt a bad wait at all compared to so many other people. Sager np2090 from xotic with wsxga, t7500, 4 gigs of ram and no tv tuner or bluetooth. huzzah..

 

Has anyone received an email from Xotic yet about the shippment they got in last week? I was told on the phone I'd get my laptop in this shipment, but still haven't received an email notice. Just wondering if anyone else has.

 

I got an e-mail on August 19th saying quote:

"your system is going to be shipped out of this recent shipment that
just arrived It will take 3-6 business days to build and test and we
will email once it ships"

On August 27th:

"We are waiting on a small delay of Intel Processors. We are
expected to ship as soon as they arrive in 2-3 days and test the notebok.
We will email as soon as it ships. We appreciate your patience."

I then called over labor day (September 1st?) weekend and left an e-mail message wondering what was up with my notebook and I received no reply. I ended up calling about 2 days after the employees supposedly came back from vacation and was told my laptop was canceled! On double check I was told my order was not canceled I had just switched from the NP2090 to IFL90 and it would be a short wait longer. I called back last Friday (still no replys to my e-mails) and was told that my laptop "might" have shipped but they weren't sure because they don't get tracking numbers the same day PCs ship. I call back on Monday and I was told that my PC was in the "testing" phase and should be shipped by Tuesday and I'd receive a tracking number then.

Well... it's Wednesday and I've heard no word. I'm obviously pretty fed up with the whole process up to this point and I feel like calling is only going to cause more stress. I keep telling myself that I've waited this long and it's going to be coming within the week so why would I cancel? I'm just not sure how long I can keep convincing myself that's the way to go.

I know xoticpc is supposed to be super awesome 5000 so I guess I'm one of the unlucky few.

 

I ordered on the 22nd of August, and I was told chances are it will be a few more weeks at PNB, I am calling again tomorrow to check in with things....

I don't get how they can have delays on every shipment for several months in a row. Things need to be straightened out

 

I hear ya man. I ordered at the end of July and I'm still waiting. Hopefully my Mobo (Or whatever is failing. Beleave its the mobo... 2rd freaking one. And its ASUS) dosn't fry on my desktop before it gets here. I don't blame PNB. Its just supply is low and demand is high on this thing. Looks like the Video Card itself is back ordered on new orders now, as both types of screens are on backorder.
--Below here is rattleing on...-- (At least I put a note in before I have you read the crap)
At least I have all my data backed up to my external as I'll eather send my Mobo in or emediatly start messing with Gentoo or Slax, then start adding whichever I like to the laptop in dual boot. Figure out wine for WoW and Steam and switch that to my main OS.

Gah I talk to much.

 

Well, it arrived yesterday. I haven't even ripped open the package yet since I've been going to school at 7:30 am and coming back at 10 pm. I figure I'll be finally opening it up at around 10pm PST today and maybe post some impressions.

It's strange though... I didn't receive any notice that the laptop was shipped.

 

Did the status ever change on Xotic's webpage or did it just show up?

Edit: So I just called to check on mine and they said they were just finalizing testing so it should ship either today or Monday. Yay

 

I did not order mine from PowerNotebooks, but it arrived Tuesday. I have been flexing it for the last few days and am pretty happy with my purchase.

 

Well, i ordered on august 17th from xotic, with litterally no changes to the base (T7300 cpu only), and last week they told me it would ship before the end of this week.

Now yesterday they tell me that it will be going into testing "soon" and will ship in 2-5 days. Then i see people on here who ordered in freaking SEPTEMBER getting their laptops. Is anyone else pissed that the orders are apparently being filled in a random manner? is there some secret password i need to say to get my system, which really is just a base system, filled?

Does being in canada make me less important? ;_;

 

Seems like around the industry there are supply problems. I think maybe with 15.4" displays of 1440 x 900 and more pronounced with the 1680 X 1050 displays. Also seems to be fluctuating supply on the 512MB variant of the 8600M GT? I'll go to a configurator and they will have the 512 version available one day for an applicable model, and the next day you can only configure the same model with the 256MB variant, or the estimated ship date window has moved far to the right.

Has anyone been told by Xotic or PNB that they are having supply issues with models or components and that that is the reason for the delay?
- Vr/Zeux.

 

Hey buddy, you are lucky you are getting it this soon, I ordered from PNB on July 3rd and I still havent got mine.
And Yes, the actual manufacturer over in China or wherever had a die break for some component of the computer so expect even more delays. I heard around 4-6 weeks if you ordered recently...

 

Rofl. I ordered mine on JUNE 13th. And still haven't gotten it

Thanks for all the hard work Compal!

 

I ordered mine on the 11th of may and received it on the 15th of june.

 

I was reading Xotic forums and Justin seems to have stopped answering the past day or 2's posts. PNB's forums are not updated. People simply want more frequent updates from the resellers, period.

I've learned that Xotic at least has a way to know where your purchase is in the process. PNB says they will send you an email the day after it ships. The point is, 'when' will it ship? What's holding things up? Where is 'my' purchase in this mix? In all cases, resellers, remember, you have our money, we purchased a product and depend on you to keep us informed. Most of us can handle the delays if we know why.

It blows me away reading Xotic's forums when people who have paid feel obligated to say, "sorry for bothering you, but would you be able to give another update when ..." Why do people think they are bothering the reseller after paying $1-2K+??

The people waiting are patient and willing to understand that there are delays. But they are customers and expect reasonable and frequent updates on the websites of their reseller and in this infamous thread, "The "Official" IFL90 Shipping/Waiting Thread".

Maybe I am off the wall here but when I give someone a lot of money, I want to know 'what up' with it as often as possible until I have some return for my money. It's good business, no? I have been waiting also. Call me weird?

 

I agreed with you Windance, we should be informed of any problems. Especially because this model seems to be so troublesome.

I can be patient, but I like to know that progress is being made. I don't like to hear about steps backwards, which seems to keep happening.

 

The problem is that the resellers may not know much more about any production delays in the Compal factory in Taiwan than we do. I can't speak for the resellers since I'm obviously not a reseller of the IFL-90s, but when I was waiting for my NP2090, I was in the same boat as all of you guys. Whenever I wanted a nice update on my order, I called the sales number for PNB and Donald was extremely helpful in updating me on my status. Maybe I was just fortunate or lucky to know with relative knowledge regarding my purchase, but honestly speaking, these delays are the resultant of production stalls in the factory. I would rather have correct infrequent information than possible incorrect or downright wrong information that was pushed on because people wanted some closure.

Just my two cents.

 

I hear calling helps.

 

We have tried to make it clear to everyone that this model has been experiencing significant shortages. We have been getting small shipments from time to time as has Sager. We have both been getting them shipped as fast as we can.

If anyone wants to know a "current status" they can call or email, but for us to blast an email notification that simply says the same thing over and over ("We are still waiting for enough to come in to fill your order") would be considered spam and unnecessary by many...so apparently we are danged if we do and danged if we don't.

What we do is notify when the status changes as opposed to notifying "no change". Therefore if you don't hear anything it means there hasn't been any change to your order status. We will email your shipping notification with your UPS tracking number the next business day after it ships.

We are truly sorry that this model has been delayed so long...it hasn't been fun for us either. However when you consider how long you will have this laptop I think you will realize that waiting for what you want is worth it. The inconvenience of the long wait will soon be replaced with many years ownership of the best specifications out there right now.

Now for the good news The wait is just about over for everyone...don't lose patience now!

 

That's true. Not all customers want the same kind of feedback from the companies they deal with. It's hard to please everyone. Some will say that the customer could specify the level of notification they want when they fill out their order but I can see how that could cause management problems on the vendor's end.

Being too eager to contact a customer is a real danger. There's a company my wife does business with that has been calling us upwards of five times a day. We've never answered because we did not recognize the number and their ID is non-descriptive ("Toll Free Number"!). They've never left a message on our answering machine so they can't be calling for something important. Once I found out who they were (by googling), I took steps to make it stop but "there may be some delay" (quoting the CSR). My wife is not terribly attached to their product so I think I can easily convince her to just stop buying from them. (We have not had that discussion yet.) That overeager company is about to lose revenue because they are just too eager to talk to their customers.

 

Oh for God's sake! We're not talking about phone soliciting here. These guys already took our money and by doing so entered into a contract. The information we want is about 'how our money is being used', not phone calls at dinner to sell us Cornflakes. All I ask for is a simple update from time to time regarding an agreement we made, "we got your cash up front, and you got .... nothing". Some of us just want an 'idea', a 'hint', of when we will get 'something'.

Yes, Donald and others are correct, I for one do not want the same news over and over. I want something useful. Yet, I'm no more clear today 'why' one reseller experiences an unexplained shortage that another reseller says is in abundance, but then announces something else is not available that the first reseller has recently said is not the problem. Go figure? I would like explanations like that.

There are so many contradictions being unanswered that I also have begun wondering what the heck is going on here. I have made calls, I have read these posts, I have been waiting, and waiting while others appear to have received their purchase before me and all I want to know is, 'what up?"

09-15-2007, 05:45 AM

Other Canadians would probably like to know, does it? In between taking more orders during this delay time, maybe a question like that can be answered.

Is it?

09-15-2007, 11:22 AM

Is that the reason why a week or so ago, PNB and Xotic both changed their backorder time to 4-6 weeks? Someone else said it was a fire at a plant in China? Do the resellers know? Being in business, I sure as hell know about my products and at least the reasons my distributors hand me for delays, true or not. But I am not getting a sense these guys are sharing what they know which may be nothing, or everything to make us more comfortable and hopeful.

09-15-2007, 06:32 AM

And yes, there are other posts saying they ordered and received the lappy the same week. I understand that variances in customization, Sager vs. PowerPro versions, when ordered, what reseller, etc. all have some impact on when any individual will be shipped their laptop. But READ the 93 pages of posts here and you get a feel of something weird.

What would be more fun, actually sending us a laptop, or wishing that customers would demand less of your phone time so you can take more orders?

Party line? Propaganda? I won't know that until I get it, eh?

Once again, an example of what I have been saying. WHY do you believe that the wait is "just about over" when only a few days ago, the wait for your website was "4-6 weeks" and same for Justin's? You said you are danged if you do or don't give us this, or that info ... All I am suggesting is that you give us a reasonable explanation for the discrepancies being posted in shipping and receiving times by those customers you can identify as yours, and something that explains the extreme reversal from 4-6 weeks a few days ago to "the wait is just about over for everyone...don't lose patience now!" Because you know as well as I do that if 'we' lose patience', YOU lose orders and money.

Anyway, I think what pisses me off the most is the attitude that the resellers are doing us a favor or something. THIS IS A BUSINESS for them despite the fact that Donald chooses to suggest that Jesus is his partner or something. "We serve Him and you" is posted on his website. That's nice.
The Jesus guys are the ones who ONLY take a wire transfer for their money UP FRONT and actually have a web page justifying why "we should trust them" blah, blah. They also post on their website why they give no other deals or breaks because 'everyone' gets the same every day discount, or something like that. Xotic does it differently and between the two, at least appears more charitable overall. The point again is this, BOTH are in business and anything they make us believe about them is marketing, good or bad.

So, it looks like I've turned this into a different thread ... "which reseller"? Truth is, all I am doing is pointing out a few things. Both resellers are fantastic overall. They DO answer phones, something you just won't see buying from a local store. They DO offer configurations. They are probably both heck of a nice guys. Both have demonstrated a dedication to quality and service as seen in reseller ratings.

But, BOTH are business people wanting YOUR business. They DO want you to believe that one or the other has a little edge on service, or some other aspect of the sale and deal. That's why one in fact points you to more than one rater of his service, the other makes mention of "why use us", etc. In my opinion, you talk with whomever and decide, they are both excellent resellers. And, there are others as well. I haven't had the opportunity to speak with them.

WE are the customers. WE make MONEY for these guys. And believe me, they are not doing us ANY favors by taking it as fast as they can. They are doing BUSINESS and nothing more or less. How well they do it is in the attitude you can see here, on the phone, on their websites and in the ratings sites.

Regardless of the delays outside of their control, we are not indebted to them, they have our money and are indebted to us. We should not have to be embarrassed to post our frustrations and say, "sorry to bother you but uhm, like dude, you got my $2,600.00 and erm, I was just wondering when I will see a return on it?" THEY should give specific information when available that isn't contradictory and if is, give a reasonable explanation for the turn around. And if anyone should be humble, it should be them.

All they hold is your money. Personally, I am confused what they are even doing with it. Yes, they need it to buy the parts, to put your purchase into production. But if the parts aren't available and they know this, then why not take a down payment in good "faith" and when your lappy is next in line and 'really' ready, then take the rest of the money. Then, if there is some unforseen delay, they deal with you one on one. Or is that too much work and would decrease profits and not be "fun"? Would you fork over $16,000 to $20K up front to a car dealer who says, "I'll email you when the customizations are done to your new car and you can drive it off the lot"?

In conclusion, it seems that the way people do business is changing. Customers are taking more and more to get what they want and forget that their money is the strongest part of the financial equation, the real power.

I always remember that in my business, my customers are the reason I AM in business. I consider them intelligent, and partners in the deals we make. I keep them entirely in the loop. Sort of old fashioned but my Dad taught me strong ethics, good business skills and they work for me.

Well, I sure hope this laptop is worth it and as Donald said, "the inconvenience of the long wait will soon be replaced with many years ownership of the best specifications out there right now." Because people, as a customer, with respect, I for one will let them know if that isn't true and hold them to their return policy. That's it from me on this.

I guess the wait is over?

 

Ok, so your argument is that somehow your reseller is not giving you the service you want. Here's an easy solution to show your reseller your displeasure: put your money where your mouth is and cancel your order. Everything else is just posturing. (This is an opinion I expressed back in July that I'm pulling out of mothballs just for this occasion. At the time I initially expressed this opinion, I was among those who had been waiting for weeks for his IFL90 to show up.)

For sure, you should not apologize for asking for a status report but here's the thing. The way to get information about your order is to send an email to your reseller or pick up the phone and call. Every time I've done that with PNB, Donald told me what he could.

Again, if you are unhappy with the way your reseller is doing business, your recourse is to cancel your order.

 

I'm agreeing with Donald and Lemur. It's been a long wait for my laptop, but it's the one I want. I don't think I've complained much, since I know I can cancel any time. It's IMPOSSIBLE for Donald and Justin and all the other resellers to please everyone.

I shoot Donald e-mails about once a week (I'm probably getting on the annoying side ) And he always lets me know what he can about my order, and that's all the service I need.

Do you expect them to tell you 4 times a week in automated e-mails that they STILL have no idea when they are getting a shipment in? They just don't know. It's in no way the reseller's fault on this one, it's how Compal is deciding to ship the few notebooks that they are getting into the US.

 

lemur,

As stated, perhaps I have been contradictory as well. Justin and Donald are probably fine people, never met them. My rantings have been in response to 93 pages of frustration, unanswered questions posted in my last, and a general dissertation on business in general 'these days' as related to notebooks.

There are 3 of us who in our house who bought this notebook, 'almost' the same configuration at about the same time. The last of us recieved it first. Por que?

From aeauvian: "I shoot Donald e-mails about once a week (I'm probably getting on the annoying side)"
Again, how can you be annoying someone who is holding at least $1K+ of your money??

Lemur, my argument is about service in general. There were probably 10 other points I made; from what is being done with our money while we wait, to why we needed to pay up front when they cannot use the money to buy parts until they are available. See previous post. But you didn't touch on them, and no need, just offering my observations on two resellers 'behavior'. And yes, of the 3 of us at my house, 1 went to another reseller and did cancel. No posturing there.

All I am doing is ranting while we wait, and comparing my business approach to those of the resellers. All of them cannot deliver right now for reasons, some we know, some we speculate about, and some answers we were given. Was there a die cast broken at the China plant, was it a fire? Is it 3-4 weeks, 4-6 weeks, does Canada make a difference to Xotic as well as we know it does to PNB, and is there better news to come as indicated by PNB today? Dunno .... guess I need to annoy them with another email. Would be easier to see it here.

Perhaps in all of my words and the reaction to them, is some wisdom for new purchasers to consider. Dunno, but again, I guess the wait is soon over as it sounded earlier from PNB, and therefore Xotic as well? And you did make a great point, if we want 'this' lappy, we gotta wait, period. But wait for which reseller is becoming my question overall. If I ask it again, perhaps it becomes a new (old) thread as I suggested, "which reseller".

 

I guess that I am in a few different positions on this one, but it is certainly an interesting train of thought.

One against the customer, and this is a smug, Monday-morning quarter-backing kind of statement, the people who chose to go this route assumed a certain risk in delivery when they placed this order. By that, I do not mean that every time you place an order online you should accept that you may never get what you ordered, or at least not get it on time, although I guess that at face value, that is always a true possibility.

(this is the smug part)...before I ordered mine, I pulled the thread on several vendors, various components and configurations. One thing that set off alarms was that the estimated ship dates on Dell's with the 256MB version of the 8600M GT were three weeks out, which seemed longer than that company's norm. Additionally, whenever I manipulated the screen resolution, the ship date would move to the right.

So then I looked at Pro-star and Sager. Pro-Star's site showed a shipping date 6 days after receipt of order. I was a little shaky in believing that they could deliver in 6 days what was taking Dell 3 weeks+. So before placing my order I called both Pro-Star and Sager, and neither company was willing to commit to a firm shipping date over the phone, and further indicated that the shipping date on the site was "happy path", one that could only be met if there was a chassis and all of the necessary components in-house and not already reserved for another customer when your order was received. Pro-Star indicated that the supply chain problem for them was due to a problem with their OEM having difficulty getting a hold of or producing lots of the higher resolution screens. Sager did not indicate which component was causing their supplier problems, but did say that they were not even certain at the time if they could deliver units within anything less than a 30 day timeline.

With my confidence thus shaken, I was not willing to dip into a tier lower (if that is the correct perspective), and try out anyone like iBuyPower or CyberPowerPC, at least not direct. I pulled the trigger on an off-the-shelf, in-the-box solution which was configured by iBuyPower, but sold aftermarket. This meant that if the vendor had units in stock, it was simply a matter of sending the box to a shipper and getting it moving. I pulled the thread and evaluated the risk in custom ordering a unit, and chose to go with a pre-configured unit to ensure that there was no question in my shipping timeline. Before the IFL-90 became available at the vendor, I had made the same evaluation, and had made the decision that to dispense with this risk I was even willing to spend more money in order to eliminate that risk.

Now my needs are slightly different. I travel a lot and often at the drop of a hat. Quite frankly, if I was in some of your guys' situation, I would be going absolutely ape-poo over my money being expended for something that was not meeting my time-table. (End Smugness).

To throw some weight behind the customer's rant, though, I do not concur with Donald's perspective.

"If anyone wants to know a "current status" they can call or email, but for us to blast an email notification that simply says the same thing over and over ("We are still waiting for enough to come in to fill your order") would be considered spam and unnecessary by many...so apparently we are danged if we do and danged if we don't."

I did not order from them, so I do not know what the process is, but what I would expect as a customer is an estimated ship date, and then an update with an explanation as to why, if the estimated ship date moved to the right. If it's a supply chain problem, and all of the parts are not in-house for a given unit 10-days prior to its ship date, I guess I would expect an email to go out moving the est. ship date two weeks to the right. So the customer should only be seeing the "SPAM" every two weeks if we're not on schedule. Silence is unacceptable, and I should not trip over the fact that there is a delay in my order because I was the one who picked up the phone and called. I know I would be fired from my job if the only reason that a customer knew that they were not getting their product on time was because they happened to ask me the question.

"However when you consider how long you will have this laptop I think you will realize that waiting for what you want is worth it. The inconvenience of the long wait will soon be replaced with many years ownership of the best specifications out there right now."

I can understand this belief from the point of view of the provider, but it falls apart when viewed from the customer's perspective. Now, that is only, maybe, specific to my gadget-lust, but I will probably only be in this laptop for about 18-24 months. Regardless of that timeline (aggressive, I will admit), waiting for a product to be released to market is understandable; waiting for sufficient stock of a product to become available so that you can go into a store and pick it up, or order it off-the-shelf online, is reasonable. Being told a product will ship by a certain date, with a reasonable amount of slip, and then being told, more than once, that the ESD has slipped, and then only when prodded for a status, seems to be more akin to a bait-and-switch, especially if the person's charge/debit card is charged at the time of order placement, not when the order ships (not sure if that is the case here). The "inconvenience of the long wait" also does not get replaced by the "years of ownership". Computers and electronics are almost as perishable as fresh fruit; the obsolescence clock was ticking on the IFL-90 a long time ago, and, as with a grad degree in Finance, I have always enumerated the time-value of money on anything I buy.

Here's just a swag: if WinDance paid $2600 for his unit, and will be in it for 3 years (36 months) before he feels he has maximized his return on investment of the unit, then his unit is depreciating at a rate of $72.22 per month ($54.17 if you feel the 3 years in a laptop is ridiculous and stretch it to 4 years). (I used $2600 on account a' WD citing this number. I then went to PNB and configured roughly the same configuration I got, and it came out to $1648, shipping included. I did add the 1680 X 1050 screen, since I assume this is what most people are ordering. That makes the math come out to $45.77/month depreciation for 3 years, $34.33/month for four years).

So my understanding is that there are some customers in this thread that have had their units on order for going on two months now? I would certainly be banging on the table for a $145 refund, at a minimum.

Now I guess I have torqued everyone off in my attempt to present two sides of view. At the end, I reckon the customers who have nothing to show for their cost of order but a purchase order printout seem to be entitled to some bennies from the provider. It also seems like the delays have slipped beyond the reasonable man's expectation for some. A slight delay is part of the inherent risk of ordering online, but it seems like this situation, regardless of who is culpable, has gone far askew. It is the responsibility of the vendor closest to the customer to provide relief, up to and including reparations, for any inconvenience that the customer endures. Then PNB or XPC or whoever has to go back to the OEM vendor with their contracts guys and rake them over the coals over the cost they had to bear in order to make up for the OEM shortfall.

Likewise, the customer's should bear some of the burden by stretching their normal online order timeline expectations for having made the decision to take the plunge and early adopt a product that has to be customized or tailored with after-market internal components. In order to have my requirements for delivery and convenience met, I had to go with a unit that likely does not look as nice as some of the ones you are getting, due to the lower screen resolution. But I made the choice to give up that technical specification in order to dispense with any hassle or risk in having my product delivered on time. I placed my order at 4:40pm on a Friday and it showed up at 7pm on Tuesday.

I guess that as far as canceling an order now, people have to decide whether or not they have already invested so much time and patience that they should just ride it out. I do not know or believe that either side of this knot is in the absolute right. It is just one of those quirky situations that computer enthusiasts and their vendors have to untie. Hope it all works out for everyone.

OK, no, I can not leave off with that attempt at peace-making. At the end of the day, I fall mostly on the side with the customers, the ones out on the extreme edges of the order-to-delivery timeline, at least. The real business question to be asked here, the one I think PNB and XPC (and any other vendors) have to ask is to evaluate how much of their business model is dependent on return customers. It is feasible that it is not overly dependent, that the customer base is a constantly rotating base of ever-changing individuals. Or it could be like the automotive industry, where dealers and manufacturers alike depend on the guy who bought the Ford coming back 4 or 5 years later and trading it in for another Ford.

I really do hope this works out well for everyone, though. Best of luck.
- Vr/Z.

 

Well, one of the main things I could find to respond to all the feedback here is that I really like the idea of a estimated ship date. If it got adjusted, that would be perfectly fine, but then at least everyone would know where they stand.

 

anyone read all of Zeuxidamas' post? It's like a 4 page essay... Anyway I too would appreciate a ESD. I mean, as blatantly horrible as Dell's ESDs are, at least it's something tangible to hope for. "Phase 3: Sent to Production" means absolutely nothing and simply forces me to send repeated emails asking if I can expect a laptop before college starts.

 

Yes, actually, I read it and it was much better written than my rantings and dissertations, and more balanced. Probably of all the posts in this 93 page thread, Zeuxidamas' is the most balanced and worthwhile read in view of his not being a part of the waiting process.

Not what I actually paid, but otherwise, it works for the 'swag'.

The problem now is that every configuration has been delayed.

Not much more I can add.

So, the good news is that the estimated shipping date is 'just about'? Have I missed something?

One more time ...

Yep, that'll do it! The reseller that would do that would lose little and gain my respect and business for life.

 

so for all that typing and quoting and disserting and ranting, all you're looking for is a $145 refund?

 

Nope, they're not even looking for that, it was merely an example of a way a business could try to placate it's customers.

They... well, we in truth, are just looking for some answers and less ambiguity on the part of the resellers. anything else would simply be a perk but is completely unnecessary so long as we get the bare minimum.

 

Yeah. It always comes to the refund, or free stuff.

It's a double edged sword for these guys. If they give ship dates and they turn out to be wrong (as they have been, since Compal has been having trouble with the shipments), people get angry. No ESD? People get angry. These guys can't please every one of you, it's IMPOSSIBLE.

If you are worried about 145$, cancel your order and order another type of lappy that's 145$ cheaper. You are in no way entitled to money for waiting, when it's NOT Xotic/PNB's fault. You aren't entitled to ANYTHING other than what they are giving you, the service you paid for. They can't walk over to Compal's office (or boat over, I should say) and demand laptops. They have orders with Compal, and Compal is the one screwing up. So tell me, in what way did the resellers mess ANYTHING here up, and how is it in any way their fault?

Have you ever looked at this thread before you posted in it? I have. In fact, I seem to recall me STARTING the thread. Wow, amazing isn't it? And imagine that, I've actually read the whole thing too!

There's nothing weird. All the people that ordered theirs near the same date are getting them in ABOUT the same general order. Sagers are a different reseller, PNB is a different reseller, and Xotic is a different reseller. Of course there will be variances in the three, and AMONG the three because of the level of customization of orders.

I don't think Xotic and PNB have awesome reseller ratings for absolutely no reason, do you?

If you don't feel comfortable, or think you are getting screwed, cancel, and get your refund. Don't whine about it, it won't get you anywhere.

 

well said, but the fact of the matter is that this is not a cut and dried, black and white sort of problem. sure, xotic and pnb are providing the service and competitive pricing, but like aeauvian pointed out, they have no control over manufacturing issues. in terms of the customer, these resellers are doing nothing to prevent you from taking your business elsewhere; it's not like they're taking your money and running. if you are truly unhappy and disenchanted, cancel, get your refund, and buy out of a store or something. personally, i'm prepared to give xotic a couple of weeks to sort things out and make me happy. i've been pleased with their customer service so far and the pricing can't be beat so i see no reason to take it as a personal affront that they haven't delivered quite yet. at some point, i'll cut my losses and go elsewhere, but again, they have not personally attacked my person, so i see no reason to attack their method of business. we have entered into a simple contract where i fork over a couple grand and they provide me with a well-equipped laptop. if i am not satisfied at any point, i will simply terminate said contract and xotic will lose my business. it's just, at the end of the day, it's not a life and death matter and in the grand scheme of things, a couple grand (which is by no means lost forever) just doesn't register enough for me to expend so much energy complaining and moaning. perhaps i'm just not quite as cynical as some, but that's just my method of approaching this.

 

My take on the matter is that no amount of whining or moaning won't make the laptop come any sooner. In my month of waiting for my laptop, I've tried to look at the positive side of the issue; I find the convenience of having representatives from both Powernotebooks.com and XoticPC (and recently, Eurocom), quite exceptional. I don't see reps from companies like Dell or HP, because frankly, you're just a statistic to them. The fact that the Compal, Sager, and Clevo resellers post in this forum about any updates on shipping or new laptop technology warrants praise, in my opinion. I've had this NP2090 for a month now and honestly, looking back, the wait period was unavoidable, but not irreparable.

Sure, the laptop's been delayed, and some unfortunate people (like aeauvian) have been waiting a long time for their laptop, which is very unfortunate. HOWEVER I just cannot see how closure or satisfaction can be established among all people who order. Hell, there are those who just don't like ordering online because online stores take time to deliver a product as opposed to brick-and-mortar, where you just pick it up.

Unfortunately, I doubt there's anything any of us can do to honestly speed up the shipping problem, in the end of the day, your ordered laptop is wherever it's at in the current moment, and will come to you.

 

Again, guys, I am not in this to personally affront anyone. For me it's just an interesting train of conversation. I already have my IFL-90, so I'm not sweating PNB and XPC.

I have to disagree that a reseller is not at fault for supply chain problems and failing to deliver to a customer. The chain of culpability rolls from the customer backwards. While it may not be a vendor's fault and they are getting screwed by their supplier, it is also not the customer's fault, and it's not supposed to be passed on to them. Any company contracts with their suppliers and bears the burden of their own performance and that of their suppliers.

Last year my company delivered a fathometer with an incorrect outline and installation drawing. I didn't put the drawing in the box, and I didn't change the mounting assembly, my OEM supplier did, but the customer receiving it had nothing to do with that. My project had to eat the cost of correcting the problem for the customer and then I had to deal with the OEM afterwards. We shipped a sound surveillance system that was supposed to include the microphones in the box. They were not in there. We had to fix the problem, and then address the OEM afterwards, so I ate the cost of getting my customer microphones as quickly as possible. This year I had a magnetic compass get hung up in customs getting out of Europe. It was not my fault, it was not even the OEM's fault; it was a European Union snag snag. But it was my job to fix it, since I was in the pipeline nearest to the customer. The fact that the OEM was not directly culpable or performing poorly changed how I dealt with the OEM supplier, not how I dealt with the customer. You choose a supplier, you are accountable for a supplier, and their performance in as much as it impacts your ability to deliver in accordance with the stipulations of your contract.

I am amazed that there is a feeling that the customer is not "owed" anything, other than the hardware due, and that the timeline of delivery is not considered part of the product that was paid for. Not because it is an impossible perspective to conceive of, just that I can not remember ever hearing a customer feel that way. Same for there not being any concern over the expenditure of $2k and not being worried about the time lost while that capital is tied up waiting for product delivery. I am pretty extravagant in my expenditures, but $2k would definitely have me wrapped around the axle. i am interested to know if the two posters I guess sort of kind of taking the side of the vendors are return customers who have ordered from the two vendors before? It would just be interesting to know if that return customer effect I talked about has any impact on your points of view?

I've been here before, where you are thinking about canceling. The sux of it is the lost time in getting the money refunded electronically and having to order something else and potentially go through the same thing. Like I said, it would be a tough choice to make.

Anyway, guys, I'm not raking these two vendors over the coals. I like to study this industry as much from a business aspect as much as I enjoy using the technology itself. I'm just interested to hear the different points of view, some of which I have never heard before, and I appreciate you all not taking it personally and making this overly confrontational. Thanks.
- Vr/Zeux.

 

Syntax summed it up quite articulately. Unfortunately, I'm sure there will be customers who end up unhappy in some way and may have to resort to other solutions, but that's the nature of doing business. Nobody's perfect.

 

You make some valid points, Zeuxidamas, your debates are healthy to the thread.

However, regarding the supplier-reseller issue, I don't know if it is the best way to describe how "blame" is associated. The situation is that people have ordered a laptop and now are waiting for it because the laptops are either being made, are being delayed (the rumor mill has it that there was a fire in the Compal factory ) or isn't being shipped to customers for whatever reason. I think it's safe to say that the resellers aren't sitting on IFL-90 stocks and withholding the goods, so I think the latter scenario is likely mothballed.

However, the nature of the laptop and computing industry is to bring out the newest goods as soon as possible, and in this market, that means advertising models that haven't quite been made at the time of first advertisement, which means, any orders done in the immediate time vicinity would be pre-orders. The Compal, Clevo, and Sager resellers have adopted this market strategy in order to stay competitive with bigger name brand such as Dell, as they also advertise their newer generation models featuring DX10 graphics and the Santa Rosa chips. If I recall correctly, I don't think the Inspiron 1520 had a good track record of timely shipments, much like what the IFL-90s been undergoing now.

See some similarities? My point being, is that because of the nature of the computer market industry touting the latest and greatest, and coupled with the fact that Compal is the only manufacturer of 15.4" laptops for the resellers that sport technology to stay competitive with computers like, say, the Inspiron 1520, and that any delay on the supplier front is simply unavoidable and unfortunate, however unwilling. :GEEK:

I'm just hoping for some of those that are unfortunate enough to still be waiting for their IFL-90s after giving resellers their hard earned money that I don't think looking for who the blame is the best strategy for gaining some closure on your situation. Even while I was in the waiting camp for the IFL-90, I simply couldn't sympathize with people who demanded some kind of compensation or reparation because of hiccups in production that really can't be undone and not delay final shipment.

 

Thanks, Syntax, I see your point. As I started my diatribe a few posts ago, I do think that it was the customer that originally stuck their head in this sweater and allowed themselves to get pregnant. The current situ is certainly not one where "blame" can be applied universally to one party or another. I know that at least initially, there were some vendors who marked these items as pre-orders, which should have set an expectation that there would be a wait.

I am also not saying that, universally everyone is owed some level of re- compensation. I raked Microsoft over the coals and demanded some retribution for my 360 debacle, but only when the situation became extreme, and anyone that I discussed it with I declared that re-compensation was not the automatic be-all end-all response to customers. The best companies, I think, are ones that determine a way to make things up to the customer that do not impact the company's bottom line directly, but make the customer feel better about their experience. One of these guys could extend the warranty by an extra 6 months to a year, which is a cost that would not be realized until the out years and would cost them nothing in the bottom line of their earnings reportings at the end of this fiscal year. Not saying that is the right fix, but just a quick thought after 30 seconds of consideration.

I could agree with getting a free pass if these were entered and clearly identified as pre-orders. I think things would settle out if the vendors applied some out-of-box thinking like I suggested above and come up with some way to appease disgruntled customers in a way that would not cause a huge hit to themselves as well.

For the customers that are fed-up, there are other options out there, some of which are off-the-shelf solutions with no hang-ups on time for production and assembly, so there is an out if you are willing to do the research and jump ship. You of course lose out on the time you've already invested.

Thanks a lot to all who have kept this thread copacetic.
- Vr/Zeux.

 

Unless there are clear clauses about performance in the contract, you're on thin ice when you are asking for compensation for delays. If any costumer on this forum has entered in a contract with a reseller that contains such clauses, I'd like to know about them. In the absence of such clauses, the customer *can* (and probably should) express their displeasure to the reseller if delays happen and they can threaten cancellation if they don't get compensation but they should not expect anybody to agree with them that they have a god-given right (or even a legal right) to getting any compensation. Oh, and any threat should be followed up on. Otherwise (all together now): it's posturing.

Very nice. No one else is obligated to manage their business the way your company does. I wonder what kind of contract you have with your customers because there's no place I order online that will say that their delivery dates or shipping dates are anything else than *estimates*.

It depends what you mean by "owed". If you mean *legally* owed, I'd like to see the legalese that supports that claim. If you mean "owed in the sense that my own personal view of the universe is Truth", well you can witness the results of that kind of argument right here in this thread.

Just to make this clear: I'm neither on the side of the customer nor on the side of the vendor. I'm on the side of people putting their money where their mouth is. If someone is unhappy, they have to argue *to their vendor* not to other members of the forum. (We can't do anything can we?) If they are really fed up, then they *must* cancel their order. In my opinion, crying, shouting, getting blue and the face and not following up with the only real action which matters, cancellation, demonstrates that the customer, at the end of the day, just wants what the vendor is selling *so much* that he is willing to put up with whatever the vendor is doing wrong. If there is no cancellation, then the vendor does not *need* to change his business methods, now does he?

I ordered from PNB. I had to wait about 5 weeks for my laptop. I'm happy with the way PNB treated me during my wait. Am I going to order from PNB again? At this point, yes. Am I going to order a Compal again? I'm not so sure given the stupid delays. That's my opinion now. However, the most important thing for me is how well the laptop is going to hold up for the next 3 years. If it craps out after 1.5 years, you can be sure I'm going to return to Dell. If it still performs great after 3 years, PNB will certainly be at the top of my list of resellers and Compal may be forgiven for the delays.

 

Anyway... lol...

I just got my UPS tracking number! yay! Right now it's expected to be here Friday, hopefully it will be sooner. My order status on Xotic's page is still set at Pre-order though. Ordered June 21st. 89 days so far. 3 months exactly if it gets here Friday. I'm just glad it's coming.

EDIT: They just updated my status to Shipped. Yay.

 

Lemur, hopefully my posts did not come off the wrong way. Once I've been tapping away for more than 10 minutes, I may start to leave out the "in my opinion" "my thoughts are" my position on the topic is" by-lines that I usually run with, but those are certainly always my sentiments.

I certainly do not think "that my own personal view of the universe is Truth".

It has been an interesting hijack, and it was cool to see the different opinions that I was unaware were so prevalent. Hopefully everyone still waiting will get their IFL's soon.
- Vr/Zeux.

 

With all due respect, speak for yourself. Anything else would be good business. I am unwilling to be forced to accept the bare minimum, I expect a whole package. That's the difference between people. Some pay their doctor and accept anything the doctor says, others pay their doctor and expect their doctor to be a partner in their health care and work 'for' them. People here do not seem to expect a win-win experience, complete satisfaction, for the reseller AND foremost, themselves as customers. The reseller wins when you are satisfied and returns to purchase again from them. You win when you get your purchase in a reasonable time as possible, an/or you are compensated for your waiting time because you chose to do business with that dealer who appreciates your business regardless of who is to blame for the delay.

This is NOT about blame, it is about business. As it is now, the reseller wins your profits while you wait, losing time, and hardship for the multitude of reasons posted. People are not whining but rather, expressing genuine regrets, by students or others who simply wanted this laptop and were willing to trust that reseller to make them happy. Its not easy to say after waiting 3 weeks, "I'll just cancel and go buy store bought". Waiting is also an 'investment'. You keep hoping, you get a bone tossed out like the other day by Donald, and you decide, whats another few days?

09-17-2007, 09:35 AM

One of you said I didn't read all of the posts, and then went on to say I didn't recognize the high ratings of these resellers. Apparently you didn't read all of my posts or you would have seen that I DO take into account the high reseller ratings and have said that both resellers mentioned in this thread are overall, "fantastic" per the ratings. Having never bought a PC/Laptop on line before, I am simply saying that excellent by the standards applied in the ratings, and displayed throughout these posts may not be acceptable to me as 'excellent' when compared to my usual business experiences.

So, where does this leave my family. As I mentioned previously, we ordered three IFL90's at about the same time, about a week apart. The last one ordered actually came first. One we cancelled and the other we have been waiting for now about 4 weeks.

So, after a lot of thought, I phoned the local 'guy' a few days ago who built my desktop and asked if he built laptops. He said he could put together an Asus C90 in less than a week. When I asked him about Compal, he said he would look into it. He has been a small reseller of desktops for 15+ years, and lappies about 8-9 years or so, and today, he called me explaining a great deal about the Compal delays. True as Donald and Justin said, Compal is simply unable to deliver enough product to meet the demands of the on-line reseller's voluminous order base. There was no fire, no plant shutdown.

Being a smaller respected dealer, he will have my IFL90 ready in less than 10 days. He has already earned my repeat business, third PC he has built for me, my respect for compete satisfaction and he accepted only 1/3 down until I receive my lappy. When he built our super desktop and it was delayed beyond his control by 9 days, he adjusted the price and threw in the DVD. He understood that our older PC at that time was not meeting our business needs; and, he wanted us to be happy by building what we required and not forcing us to run out and buy something in a box. His business is built on more than customer satisfaction. He made us feel he was a partner in our own business and helped us anticipate our needs and took it personally when he did not meet them. He also wins buy making money on our purchase and the 10-20 others we sent to him.

Granted, he is local and I am lucky to have remembered him after moving 45 miles away and not seeing him for more than a year. My point is simply that waiting is part of the equation and he understands that. I thought I would never say this, NEVER ... but "time is money". For students who's needs required this IFL90, they suffer by waiting, and they would equally suffer buying something less than what will get them through 3-4 years of school if they cancel now.

Is it so hard for the resellers to want to make us a little happier? Not something for 'free', but something that says, "your business matters to us". I see all sorts of responses about legal obligations, and how they have already been met. Forget the lawyer talk. Let's just do good 'old fashioned business'. Make the customer happy and make some money too. The dealers chose to sell Compal and their supplier Compal is not meeting their needs. That problem should not be passed on to us. It should be passed back to Compal by the resellers. I don't want to know my car mechanics problems when there is a delay in the repair, I want my car back so I can get to work. Of course, I chose a guy who loves my buiness on my old car, and gets lots of it unfortunately. But he is more than fair when delays occur, more than a bag of popcorn and free coffee in the waiting room. He adjusts the price or fullfills my satisfaction some other way.

Pre-orders should have remained in play as when this all began, with a strong statement by the resellers to the customers that there would be NO estimated shipping time offered at time of pre-order in view of serious delays. Given that, we would have had a better basis for decision making. I may still have chosen to wait, or more likely not.

The $145.00 was only one idea, not mine. The better idea was to extend the warranty by the amount of time delayed. Or something similar, to throw in the DVD or ...? Anyway, my family will have our 2nd IFL90 soon, one from an on-line reseller and one locally from a reseller who will get my return business. I only wish I had thought of him sooner.

 

Just one comment and one question:

Comment...your local reseller is wrong in a way about the fire. It was not in the Compal factory, it was in the factory that makes the cases for Compal...the shell itself, not what goes in it. Further, I am not aware of anyone ever mentioning a plant shutdown.

Question...you didn't mention what screen resolution you are getting. The WXGA screens just came in by the hundreds so if you look elsewhere in this forum you will see that everyone is getting theirs now. The WSXGA+ screens are still very scarce, but a few are coming in. So am I correct in assuming that you bought the WXGA screen?

 

I still don't see the point of your long-winded posts. None of what you say affects any of the rest of us waiting for our Compals/Sagers. So you have a smaller reseller to turn to who can provide you with "better service". Great and hooray for you. But what about the dozens if not hundreds of the rest of us who are waiting? As far as I know, I don't have anybody to turn to like that.

From all your posts, all of which I've read (not Zeux's, sorry ), all I've been able to take away from it is that you basically want a rebate, something free, some kind of giveaway. If that's all you really want I say take it up with your reseller be it Sager, PNB, Xotic or whomever. Nobody on these forums beyond contacting Donald and Justin and Mr. Eurocom (is that all?) can give you anything beyond personal experience and a good word here or there.

Personally, sure I would love a $200 rebate or a free Dvd burner or whatever. Sure I'm unhappy that there's no trackable ETA on the websites. But otherwise I've had a great experience with Xotic's customer service; they've been prompt and frank, if a bit short. I'm not willing to wait 2 months for a laptop and if I don't get one in the next two weeks, I'm taking my business elsewhere. I've said that already and it's simple as that.

So, in the end, what I've gleaned from your posts is that you want a rebate, some free hardware, a carrot if you will to keep you "happy". I see no huge overriding "point" that needs to be made. Someone prove me wrong.

 

I do appreciate your imput into this debate, it keeps the situation balanced and fair.

However I do have to disagree with you on what you believe constitutes "excellent" customer satisfaction. Many of us who have ordered the IFL-90 laptop (including me) have experienced delays because of the low amount of shipments/production delays/market distribution/whatever. However, despite all the waiting many of us had to undergo (personally, I went through one month of waiting for my laptop), many of us are still very satisfied. Why? Because we got excellent support and customer service in the purchase and the duration of the wait. If you check the ResellerRatings page for Powernotebooks, you'll notice that there still are "Very Satisfied" ratings coming in for the company (be sure to take note in those who talk about the NP2090). If, as you said, these delays would compromise the customer satisfaction (and believe me, I'm with you in that waiting for a product ordered sucks), why do companies like PNB and Xotic still continue to get good customer ratings?

The wait associated with the laptop is a bummer, especially with Fall terms for college coming up (I personally had to go the first week of my summer sessions without the laptop ), however, the wait is quickly forgotten once the laptop is received on the most part. Many customers, including myself, saw that the wait associated with the laptop can't really be avoided, no matter what, and because of the nature of the laptop industry regarding the infancy and the instability of very new technology, and coupled with the fact that pre-orders were filled for the new laptop, many of which before their respective laptops were even conceived, a wait was inevitable, and any conceivable delay would obviously reverberate to the customer, however unwilling.

My point is that despite the wait associated with the laptop, many people felt that the customer service and the support given by the excellent Sager resellers was still of high quality and excellence; the remarks on Reseller Ratings in part shed some light on their satisfaction with their laptops.

Obviously, I can't possibly speak for everyone on this board, but in a personal standpoint, I believe I'm one of these people in saying that the delays that came with the NP2090 was understandable and, when happenstance occurs, unavoidable. We value the support and the information that the Sager resellers have given us in trying to help get us by in waiting for our laptops.

Hey, you could've gotten a Dell. The 1520s didn't exactly have the best track record for timely shipments either. Maybe a free printer is in order.

 

I agree with everything Syntax Error writes. I notice you like putting smilies at the ends of your paragraphs. Gives a sort of subtle tone to what you've just written. I like it; maybe I should start doing it...

 

An interesting question is this:

For those of you who may not know, the Canadian dollar is currently on Par with the American, infact its .00074 cents ABOVE the american dollar.

What does this mean? It means that for those of us in canada, we payed an extra $2-300 back in july or august, which no longer applies.

The question is, should those of us who's laptops have not yet shipped, recieve this disparity back in cash given the new economic standing + 1-2 month wait times?

 

No. Absolutely not.

You cannot hold a business responsible for monetary matters completely out of their control. Xotic, PNB, etc. have absolutely no hand or control over the fluctuations in global currency.

If that $200 or $300 means that much to you, cancel and reorder.

Again, I don't see the reasoning behind the veiled hostility toward these resellers at times. If I am interpreting things wrong, please correct me, but all I'm taking away from this is that people somehow feel they have been wronged due to delays. As far as I can tell, Xotic, PNB, etc. are not holding either the notebooks or your money hostage; they are fulfilling orders as quickly as possible. There is no trickery involved.

I'm sure everyone would love some money back or free stuff, but the fact of the matter is, these reseller's pricing is very competitive (i.e. they don't charge $300 for 4GB RAM etc.). They already have a cash rebate in place and you can always ask about a student discount or otherwise.

I don't want to come off as some kind of pro-business neocon. It's just, although I realize the customer is always right and possesses the ultimate power (their own money), these companies are being run by people as well and they deserve some credit/slack/rights as well. I've had nothing but a good experience. That's my take.

 

Mine is shipped! estimated delivery date is this tuesday, the 25th.

Oh, and I was a bit confused about the upgrade mentioned, but yes, I ordered the 2.0 Ghz processor and it says it shipped with the 2.2ghz.

Even if i did get a little antsy, I agreed with thelazyone and will state that I have had nothing but the best support from PNB, it isn't really their fault if the manufacturer isn't on the ball. Actually if you think about the whole situation, shouldn't the resellers be a bit angry with the manufacturer?

 

I will try to respond one last time to thelazyone22, Syntax Error, and Donald as soon as I find the time to wrap up my arguments cogently. My local reseller will have all the parts or whatever he does, and I want to go over and watch him put it together. BTW, I asked him to look at his various lists of other offline resellers around the country and if he is willing to disclose, I'll be happy to send names to anyone. As I said, my guy is primarily an Asus dealer but he belongs to some association of resellers or something like that. Donald/Justin, I will do so in the spirit of free enterprise.

Until I have the time to wrap up my points, maybe tomorrow, I'll leave with this for now. Please understand, I DO agree with you to an extent that 'some' of the delay is out of the control of the resellers. And, I recognize that some of you have had great experiences in the past with PNB/Xotic/others ... And, throughout this wait, most of you are getting great support while waiting. So did I.

But that wasn't what my point is about. Somehow, it isn't getting through and as I said, when time is available, I will give it one more effort just for the fun of it. The gist I have maintained all along is not about past experiences. My rants relate only to this one experience, waiting for the IFL90 and the long delay, something I 'hope' is a much a unique experience for the resellers as it is for us the customers. I say unique because if waiting has been the standard in the past as well, then I cannot imagine why anyone would return for more of the same. Therefore, the core of my lunatic ravings is about their response to this unique experience, for them, and for us, and how I believe it should go differently by holding the resellers responsible for 'some' of the delays, to the point, how they have handled it. (There, even I can use a smilie!)