result of a call to PCMW

Finally, its monday so I made a call to PCMW to clear up a few things.
First the bad news: The 100 bucks student discount is not valid due to the 4th of july sale. This is almost a deal breaker for me as the discounted price would have made up for their marketing flaws.
Then the wtf news: I asked about the 1333 ram that they are advertising and I told them I thought the intel chipset could only allow 1066, and he said that they did bios stuff to it that made it work... w/e
(quick research on wikipedia showed that montevina DOES support 1333??? I need some clearification here, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centrino#Montevina_platform_.282008.29)
And then they confirmed some stuff: They have a 570tu already that they did testing with (hence the "bios things") and they will ship in about 14 days. Which checks out as its after intels launch.
My caller was also pretty nice, but there was a pretty long wait time before someone picked up... which is kinda unexpected.
Right now my thing is, if 1333 ram is indeed supported natively by intel, then I'll probably go with PCMW. If not, I'll do the "preorder" thing with one of the sager resellers and see what kind of ace they've got up their sleeves as justin seems to be dropping some pretty obvious hints... unless I'm reading those smilies wrong.

 

Go for the alienware

I'm still considering PCMW but i've never heard of them and their site just makes me want to think twice..

 

OK, first off, dont listen to Tolkannn. Im not being a fan boy, but anyone who buys an m15x deserves to be parted to their money when there is the M860tu to choose from otherwise.



they said over a month ago that they had an es model with both the 9800m GTX and quad core running in it at stable levels (they are so full of BS)

I really think that they shoud try and understand that people purchasing from their company are not stupid little people that know nothing.

 

Lol, sorry bud, I don't think the alienware is even an option with my budget. And the alienware forum kinda scares me too.

 

The AW would be the worst choice you could ever make.Stay away from it if you don`t want to be sorry soon.

 

Awww I like alienware

Oh well

But again about PCMW how long has it been around? Im considering that too

I haven't bought the M15x yet

 

I've got my suspicions about this chipset. I noticed the 1333 DDR3 too and began wondering. From my research, I believe that overclocking of the CPU will be far more supported in this revision, due to the new chipset and its relations to the desktop counterparts. All things that could be done by BIOS. And now that I hear that PCMW has some "BIOS" trick up their sleeve... confirms my suspicions even more. Do you think they are overclocking the FSB to 1333? That would be very impressive. Unless the FSB was that high, would not the 1333 ddr3 be rendered useless compared to 1066?

 

P.S.: I can't find the website could someone give it, I've tried google

 

www.pcmicroworks.com

I think everything pcmw say has a higher percentage of being the opposite, so we will not see 1333mhz in the system.
This is only speculation though (maybe even the manual is wrong) so i wont state it as fact, otherwise i would be just the same as these deluded pcmw people.

 

let me clear it up. centrino 2 do support 1333 ram, it depends on the mobo manufactures choose. in this particular case, m860tu only support 1033 ram. PCMW do not know what are they talking about. look at 5793 they are selling, they claim it is using 800 ram.

 

Thanks Heliosvector

 

If the RAM was factory OCed that high, then more power to them as long as they provide stability. Even if its the same exact ram as w/e 1066 xotic and such will use, it will be faster. so I'm not getting where the "useless" comes from.
@tolkann, you can also try the clevo guide up top in the stickies.
if you haven't ordered your alienware yet, I highly recommend you to reconsider. Waste of money on that flashy crap, and soon to be a waste of time as you try to get them to fix stuff up for you after a breaks within a week.

 

emike said that the 1333 would be "useless" compared to 1066, and I didn't understand that as it would provide a performance boost.

 

what he means is that ram is never a bottleneck in performance, so you wont really reach close to the need of using 1066mhz let alone 1333mhz. he didnt mean anything mean by it. CPU is barely a bottleneck anymore, its usually the graphics cards that hold everything up if holding it up at all.

you wont notice the 20% difference

 

I mean that if the FSB is only at 1066, running 1333 DDR3 would not provide a benefit over running 1066 DDR3, unless you planned on OC'ing the FSB; in that case you would have stable memory to at least 1333MHz from the FSB OC

 

Montevina supports 1333, m860tu mobo supports only up to 1066. So what PCMW was telling you was CS talk to keep you interested.

 

Is there a source on the 860tu already?

 

Regarding the RAM, several resellers did (and are doing) the same thing with the NP5793/M570RU_U, as Nirvana mentioned.

The Santa Rosa chipset in the M570RU_U only supports a maximum speed of 667 MHz, even though the FSB of the processor is 800 MHz. When 800 MHz memory was released, several resellers started offering it anyway, either hoping no one would think to ask, or offering promises of "BIOS wizardry" that somehow made it work at the full 800 MHz. In reality, the 800 MHz memory simply downclocks to 667 MHz, just as the 1,333 MHz memory will downclock to 1,066 MHz.

 

Sujinge this is what PCMW has been doing for the past month and a half regarding the m860tu release.

 

I was asking if there was a source on the 860tu since you seem to have some info on this.

 

It was part of the original specs released a while back

 

the picture of the big poster board?

 

Wikepedia is not always right because anyone can add anything they want to. The bit about the new Intel PM/GM45 chipset supporting DDR3/1333MHz memory was added on May 23rd by someone with the IP address 82.55.94.19 which is from somewhere in Amsterdam...and this has not been stated or confirmed by Intel. Our best information at this time is the chipset has a 1066MHz front side bus and will only support up to DDR3/1066MHz memory, which is all that any Clevo model BIOS will support.

Now, as for doing BIOS stuff to allow the chipset to support DDR3/1333MHz memory let me point out there are only two ways that can happen:

1. You would have to have the source code from Phoenix to modify the BIOS, which requires a license from Phoenix. Not only does PCMW not have that license, neither does Sager, Pro-Star or Eurocom. Trust me...it is WAY too expensive for any of them to be interested in purchasing it. Clevo is the only one in the "chain" with the Phoenix license and the source code.

2. You would have to reverse engineer it (that is Hack it) and that would be a violation of the Phoenix copyright. Now even IF PCMW had the skills necessary to do it, that would be a pretty bold and risky thing to do, and anyone who knowingly bought a computer with a reverse engineered BIOS would sadly be an accomplice to the copyright violation. So, now anyone who has read this and continues to buy such a computer would indeed become that accomplice.

At this point Clevo is the only one that controls the BIOS on their laptops, and DDR3/1333MHz memory is not an option.

 

Paladin is right all the times.So take the post above seriously.

 

PCMW hasn't done anything to modify any BIOS to enable 1333. I bought an m57RU from them (they call it the "Horizon"), and they advertised specs w/RAM @ 800, when it can (and DOES) only run @ 667. They throw 800 chips in there, just to say it has 800 RAM, but of course it downclocks. The same will be true of the 1333. The chips themselves will be capable of 1333, but not in that system, which will downclock them to 1066.

I learned that after I ordered, and went ahead and kept my machine. It works great, and I've had no problems w/PCMW on sales and support. They've been helpful and done all they said they would and even more. But the marketing is shady at best, and in the future, I'd go w/Xotic or PowerNotebooks any day.

 

I have deleted some posts (even quoted posts) as it is untrue and slanderous to the company. We dont want to mislead anyone or start such rumours.

 

Okay, I'm sorry I'll play nice from now on.

But I would, on a very factual and serious basis, like to respond to the high and mighty post of Paladin's.

You are now and have many times past, placed posts about these contractual agreements that PCMW has broken in their business practices. I just wanted to make sure that you know something.

When you get setup through an MSP (Merchant Services Provider) to accept credit cards such as Visa and Mastercard, even if that MSP is PayPal, you are required to sign a contract. Whether you realize it or not, that contract states that no discounts or incentives can be given to customers who use other methods of payment besides cc's.

If someone were to notify Visa or Mastercard, you would be contacted and ordered to either stop offering such discounts or lose your priviledges to accept credit cards. Period. There are no exceptions to these rules. Visa and Mastercard are VERY strict about them.

As someone who has worked in the MSP industry I can tell you that if you want to continue to talk about how irresponsible some other company acts about their business dealings you need to reconsider your discount policy, and either knock down the price for everyone or be less competetive.

I always try to keep my mouth shut about these things and let bygones be bygones, but there has been to much anamosity about PCMW and their buyers lately, much of it fueled by statements that you have made, and quite frankly I'm disgusted with it.

 

Sounds like a threat of revenge if I've ever heard one.

 

Donald, I usually agree with what you say but here I don't. Are you speaking from the point of view of ethics or from the point of view of legality, or both?

1. Ethically, I do not think the simple act of modding a BIOS is unethical for I am an ardent believer in free (as in "free speech") software. I fully realize that this means that acts I consider to be ethically unproblematic are illegal.

On the other hand, I think it is fair to void the warranty if a laptop breaks after the BIOS is modded. Also, I should say that if a reseller alters a BIOS in ways not sanctioned by the BIOS maker or the laptop maker and does not inform customers of that fact, that's unethical on the part of the reseller.

2. Legally, I think you are bringing up a non-issue. While it is not impossible to demonstrate that someone who received a modded BIOS is an accomplice, the evidence required to make such demonstration is high and would have to be made in each and every individual case. For sure a reseller who is in violation of contracts, copyrights or patents could be severely hit by a legal action but it is pretty darn unlikely that the customers would be the direct target of such action. First because I think targeting the customers would be unsuccessful but also because I think even if there were a chance that the action could possibly be successful, the effort involved and the inevitable loss of good will would not be worth it.

 

Yeah, I know what bios can and can not do, thats why I filed it under "wtf news". But thanks for the confirmation on the 1333 thing.

 

greyreap, have you seen this new thread yet? http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=270105

Now, for your totally false comments about our merchant agreement I would suggest that if you say you are going to play nice then you should do so. All your rant does here is demonstrate your lack of knowledge about our merchant agreement, and merchant agreements in general.

Just so you know, our cash discount is not only not prohibited by our merchant agreement, we submitted it for review at the time we signed the agreement and received, in writing, an approval of its use.

 

From what O have read of Paladin,he always tells the truth and also went to hep a guy who bought a laptop from Sager.

 

And PCMW also offers a cash discount too if you read the OP. Not sure if THEY are doing it legit though.

 

Okay, let me clarify. MSP's will say anything (just like PCMW) to get and keep your business. But forget I even mentioned MSP's. I am talking about Visa and Mastercard themselves, with whom you signed a contract through your MSP.

If you don't want to take my word for it, Google it.

I was the guy who set these things up, laid out the contract for the Merchant, and all that good stuff. I know how this works.

So before you challenge me on this any further, I suggest you do some checking with Visa themselves, because what I was just reading spoke not only of cancellation of service, but of huge fines for companies that offered such cash discounts.

Here's the link btw http://www.unfaircreditcardfees.com/uploads/Oil_Express_41607.pdf

 

greyreap, what part of this did you not understand?

"Just so you know, our cash discount is not only not prohibited by our merchant agreement, we submitted it for review at the time we signed the agreement and received, in writing, an approval of its use."

For heaven's sake man, read your own PDF to which you linked. "Visa wants him to use the words “standard,” “regular,” or “normal” to label his credit card price" and "“Visa rules allow merchants to offer a cash discount but they cannot add a surcharge or a higher price than the price advertised,”

Have you noticed that we are in total compliance with this requirement?

 

Since I tend to like long, boring documents, I went and looked for the underlying documentation regarding credit-card payment processing and contractual limitations imposed on a merchant's ability to offer different prices for cash transactions and for credit transactions.

Lo and behold, I found the following:

• Rules for Visa Merchants:Card Acceptance and Chargeback Management Guidelines, and
  [*]Mastercard Merchant Rules Manual.

All I can say is, perhaps you made a wise career move. The Rules for Visa Merchants:Card Acceptance and Chargeback Management Guidelines state, on page 10 thereof, as follows:

(Emphasis added)

The Mastercard Merchant Rules Manual states as follows, on page 2-22, under section 9.12.2:

and on page 6-16 under section 7.2.3:

More generally, the whole point of the Visa and Mastercard rules is to ensure that purchasers using their payment cards are not charged a premium to use a Visa card or a Mastercard, but the rules do not prohibit a Merchant from giving a cash-paying customer a discount down from the standard full price charged by the Merchant, undoubtedly implicitly acknowledging that, from the Merchant's perspective, a credit transaction at full price is the economic equivalent of a cash transaction at 97% of full price given that the credit card processing fee a Merchant must generally pay to have a credit card transaction cleared is typically 3% of the gross amount of the charge being cleared, as well as the fact that, in many business transactions, a Merchant will sometimes give a discount on the price of Good A if the customer also buys Good B at the same time.

Based on the relevant Visa and Mastercard rules, both xoticpc and powernotebooks appear to be in full compliance with the required cash-discount policies; namely, both clearly state on their websites a "regular" full price for the computers they sell, and then provide the customer with the option to get a discount off of that "regular" full price if the customer chooses to pay via cash or certain cash equivalents (which, typically, are non-cash payment methods under which the payor, not the payee, bears the cost of the processing/clearing fees, such as a wire transfer from the payor's bank).

As such, your criticism is unwarranted.

 

I tried to give you more rep, but apparently there is only so much rep I can give to shyster today - according to the forum bigbrother.

Petrov.

 

bravo shyster for yet again slamming the law down. lol. no but seriously you are the NBR lawyer from hence forth in my opinion.

 

Yes the all knowing two have spoken.

The problem with your lofty reply there Shyster is that the only provision they give for their discount is a cash equivalent aka not a credit card, and further more no provision is made for debit cards.

Either way it's in Visa's hands now.

It's not me who is the judge, or (unless Donald hires you) you who is the lawyer.

 

Shyster you are going to represent me in court....

 

minkang does that impy that you will be soon breaking the law?!?

 

Shyster1
even if we order from xoticpc with a Mastercard were still eligible for the cash-discount?

 

I don't know if this has been pointed out b/c I'm too lazy to read the whole thread, but...

The reason Donald can offer a cash discount is because when you opt to use a bank wire transfer you are NOT using your credit card.

When you DO use your credit card with PowerNotebooks or XoticPC, the reseller is charged a service fee from the credit card company (be it Mastercard, VISA etc). When you DON'T use your credit card, they are not charged a fee and thus can discount the customer.

Edit: Am I right about this?

 

Doubt I'll ever reach the title of "all knowing", however I did purchase a product from PCMW not too long ago...you can read about it here...

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?p=3485698#post3485698

After reading all this stuff, I guess I am lucky I at least received something for my $$ (So I guess maybe it was Karma that directed me to google check out). I have yet to receive so much as a "thanks", a "we appreciate your business" or a "kiss my a@@" from PCMW for my $1600 purchase from them and am now WAY past the date of purchase/reception.

In the end, I have decided to sit on the sidelines and watch what happens with the new releases before I purchase from anyone (ie, heat, available options, etc.). As for the BBB comparisons...I believe there is a proverb somewhere about a leopard not changing its spots or some such. After reading all this, I am pretty sure I'm done with PCMW until they are a little more forthcoming about their business practices.

I do thank all you folks who take the time to do the tedious research and post without emotion.

 

Yes... hence the term " Cash discount"...

I think your explanation of the reasoning is exactly right.

 

Yes, that is the logical reason why they "can" offer a discount on their services.

But we are talking about the legal reasons why they can or cannot.

Logic and law are often very far separated.

Although I will say this, unless you just weren't very wise in choosing your service provider the difference that you offer in price (3%) is about twice the percentage you "should" expect to pay for your processing services per transaction. So you really are hurting yourself with potential buyers who have to or strongly desire to use a credit card for payment, especially since your prices always seem to come in slightly higher than Xotic's. That slight variation can be the difference of the best deal in this case.

 

greyreap, I am sorry but you are wrong again.

1. A merchant who can have the customer standing in front of them and swipe their card gets a better rate than an Online retailer that cannot.

2. If you were to carefully check Sager pricing between Xoticpc and PowerNotebooks.com you will find out that it is the same, as is the cash discount amount.

3. There is absolutely nothing wrong with our Regular pricing and our Cash Discounted pricing. The fact that you felt the need to "report" it to VISA is interesting, but I can assure you that our pricing methods have been approved in writing by Nova.

 

I'm not quite sure I get what you're aiming at, so let me try to paraphrase:

you're saying that the problem with my statement that the relevant rules of Visa and Mastercard permit merchants to give discounts off the normal or regular full price to customers who pay in cash is in error because "they" - by which I take you to mean PNB and/or Xoticpc - only offer a discount to people who pay for their computers using certain cash equivalents, and that furthermore, the same "they" do not give that discount to customers who use debit cards, is that correct?

Assuming that it is, I am afraid that I cannot agree. As a first matter, on the issue of debit cards, as stated on page 61 of the Mastercard Merchant Rules Manual, under section 17.C.3(a), merchants cannot be obligated to accept debit cards if they do not wish to do so. As such, the lack of a discount provision for debit cards may be entirely irrelevant if the merchants in question - PNB and Xoticpc - don't accept them in the first place.

Second, even if one of the merchants in question does accept debit cards, that fact alone does not ipso facto require that merchant to give the cash discount price to a customer who tenders payment with a debit card. Nothing that I can find in either the Visa or Mastercard rules requires that a merchant treat a "debit card" as "cash" for all transaction purposes. Further, since neither set of rules defines the term "cash," that term would be construed by the courts according to its "plain meaning" as informed by the relevant industry custom and the course of dealing between the parties in question. See, e.g., Nat'l Diamond Syndicate, Inc. v. United Parcel Service, 897 F.2d 253 (7th Cir. 1990)(discussing the meaning of "cash" in an agreement between the parties pursuant to which defendant would collect "cash only" upon delivery).

As summarized in that case, "cash" generally includes coin, specie, paper money, bank deposits and certain readily negotiable paper (as checks, drafts, notes, bearer bonds, coupons [edit: meaning interest coupons affixed to a bond, not grocery store coupons]), cashier's checks, and certified checks, in addition to currency, i.e., legal tender, although the precise contours of the definition vary depending on the context, the jurisdiction, and the particular matter. Interestingly, Vermont, for example, does not appear to include a debit-card within the meaning of the term "cash" for purposes of that state's version of the UCC.

On the basis of what I've been able to find, then, there is no reason to suppose that a merchant must necessarily treat payment by debit-card as a "cash" transaction for all purposes under the sun. That means that, absent some provision in a customized merchant agreement, a merchant that accepted debit cards could limit the scope of its cash discount to those forms of payment that are generally treated as "cash" for most commercial purposes, including wire transfers (which should come under the heading of "bank deposits"), cashier's checks, and the like.

Further, the issue alluded to in that rather rhetoric-laden article you linked to, an which that is much better explicated by the Notice released by the CA Department of Food and Agriculture, was a problem that arose because of the automated payment systems peculiar to California gas-stations (apparently some of the most over-regulated poor souls in the Universe) which would treat a debit card as either cash or credit depending on whether a PIN had to be entered to complete the transaction. Visa was miffed at the station owners because, by California law, they could only list their prices as "credit" or "cash" which was confusing Visa's debit-card customers because they weren't using a denominated "credit card," so why were they being charged the credit price? Visa's issue with the station owners was that Visa wanted them to change the word "credit" to something like "regular price" or "standard price" or "full price" so that Visa's customers wouldn't think that the denominated "credit" price only applied to gasoline bought via a credit card. That particular issue is not necessarily germane here because, quite obviously, we're not dealing with California gas-stations.

So, at bottom, the term "cash" as used in the Visa and Mastercard rules would almost certainly be interpreted by a court to include such payment methods as wire transfers, cashier's checks, and the like, and so far as I can tell, there is nothing that would obligate a merchant who accepts debit cards to treat payment made by debit card as qualifying for the cash discount offered for payments made by "cash."

 

*boggle*

Seriously, people are actually considering trying to sick companies on each other here now? Is there a vendetta here? Or did grey not actually do that?
Anyway..

It does seem obvious to me about cash discounts though -- aside form the fact Shyster dug up the goods -- pretty much every electronics retailer offers cash discounts. If it were not kocher, do you think they would all be doing it?

Anyway, wow.

Some.folks.need.chill

jeff