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The War of the Providers!
Posted on August 17, 2010 by Brian under Reviews, Shopping, Wishlist.
Ok, let me start at the beginning.
Several weeks ago (before I left for Germany) my wife decided that she wanted the HTC HD2 that T-Mobile had just released. Unlike me, she did not do her research and find out if the phone was worth the buy. She has liked Windows phones since her first one and she refused to change even though all of the Windows phones that she has owned have failed her in some way.
So we looked and looked and suddenly like a beacon from heaven, Wal-Mart has the HD2 on sale for $50.00! Ching took this as a sign from God that she was meant to have this phone, ok not really but you could see the gears working in her head. I caved and let my baby have what she wanted. I did provide a small protest and point out that all of her other windows phones were crap, she replied with “but this one is different”. So, we made the buy and off we went. She was happy, I was happy that she was happy and for the next few days she set everything up and it looked like all was well.
I get back from Germany and my wife says “Something is wrong with my phone”. I knew this was going to happen. We look at it and then decide to call T-Mo for support. Their first reaction, “let’s do a factory reset, that usually fixes the problem”. I was not keen on this idea. They did this with one of my wife’s other Window’s phones and it screwed it up. We had to reload the whole OS, this was not a good idea. I protested a little but the tech assured me that this was the only solution. I reset the phone and the problem went away. However, a dozen other problems sprung up. After a little over a day, we realized that we were still in the buyers remorse period and we took the phone back, reversed the upgrade and moved on.
We cut to this Sunday. I convinced my wife to stop by the T-Mo store and take a look at the new Vibrant. It’s the latest and greatest that Samsung has produced and is shaping up to be the baddest on the market. The wife absolutely loved it. She was impressed with all of it’s features and was impressed with it’s operation. We left the store and she said. Lets see if we can get it cheaper than 199.99.
This is a great idea since We have been with them since 2000, ever since they were Voicestream. I have never wanted to cancel my service. Hell, everyone I know and talk to is on T-Mobile service. So I called and told them that I was interested in that phone. They quoted me the price and I said. “I’m not on a contract, I get a 12% discount through my company on Verizion, I should just go there”. Like the rep is supposed to I get sent to the retention department.
This rep asks me what I am looking for and I repeat the speech. I basically said, “I am not interested in special rate plans or discounts on service. I simply want a phone cheaper than what I can get from any other provider or from walking down to Wal-Mart” (Wal-Mart currently has the Vibrant for $150.00). She say, “let me see what I can do”. She comes back a few minutes later and says “I can give you that phone for $149.99 on each line but only if that phone stays in service for 30 days. Basically you will pay full price up front and then we will give you the $50.00 after 30 days to each line. Plus, I will lower your Data plan by $10.00 dollars per line for the life time of the account”. I sat there in silence. The rep did not listen to anything I had said. I had already told her about Wal-Mart. I had already told her that I could get two droids for free and that I was not asking for free, I was just asking for something better. Shortly after that, She began to argue with me about the merits of getting the data discount. I advised her that I was just going to go to Verizion (which I still think I am going to do) and she proceeded to tell me how much more it was going to cost me. She did not know that I already looked at the plans, calculated the costs and found that after the 12% discount I was going to actually save $5.00 a month. I pointed this out to her and she just sat in silence. After that I just told her to never mind, I would call back when I had another service provider. Instead of offering me something better, she said “OK, have a nice day” and disconnected.
I know they can offer better, I have a friend that just got one for $99.00 through T-Mo, and he didn’t even have to do anything. I don’t understand what their problem is. I know what they can offer, I know what I can get. Why do they have to play these stupid games with me over this crap.
I think tomorrow I will escalate to a supervisor. I am tired of all of these silly reindeer games. If I cant get satisfaction then it’s time for a change. If they are going to make me pay over $100.00 for a phone then I am going to go someplace else.
Stay tuned tomorrow boys and girls when I reveal who is the best service provider and who sucks big…Ok, I got a little carried away there. But seriously, Stay tuned, there is more.
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Geek-o-rama!
Posted on July 28, 2010 by Brian under Movies.
Ladies and Gentlemen, Boys and Girls! Welcome to the nastiest, most ghetto movie theater in the city of Wichita! NORTHROCK CINEMA!
Tonight we got to go to the Northrock Theaters and watch “Scott Pilgrim vs. the World”. This was a funny and campy indie comic that ended up being turned into a movie. All in all, the movie was not that bad. It had some great music, some actors that I thought I would never see in a movie like this and the comic book overlay throughout the movie was kinda funny. If you’re a gamer, there are a ton of gaming references to go along with all of the outrageous fighting.
The funny thing, after all of the fights, everyone just acted like it was an everyday thing. I would not have gone out of my way to see it if it was not for the free ticket that we got from a friend. If you want my opinion (and I know you do), I would just wait for it on Netflix.
As for the theater, well… That place needs to be burned to the ground. I mean it. It’s a dump and it really needs to be burned to the ground, for health reasons… Really!
We sat in their biggest theater and my first impression was “Did I really used to come here regularly?” They had light bulbs burned out, the seats were all torn up and the place smelled like cigarette smoke. I asked Ching “Why do the seats smell like smoke?” She said, “Probably because people HAVE smoked in here.” It was a very disturbing place for a germophobe like myself.
I give the movie 3 out of 5 stars. It was fun. You didn’t have to think too much and I didn’t fall asleep. I give the theater -5 stars, for its disturbing, nasty and probably haunting typhoidic experience.
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The T-Mo Nightmare.
Posted on July 20, 2010 by Brian under Life.
I can’t believe I am beating Ching to a post but it’s probably because I am still up at midnight. I can’t sleep because I am so angry at this whole situation.
Let me start at the beginning.
Yesterday, we were at Ronnie’s B-Day at Boeing Lake and Ching was doing her usual picture taking and she kept getting a message that said “Log into server” it asked for a log in and password as well as a domain. We really didn’t think much about it and kept on with our day.
Today we went to my Parents house for dinner and it happened again. Ching decided that she would call T-Mo for tech support. This was a mistake. After several minutes on the phone and being escalated up to the HD2 support team (which is a joke) they decided that we needed to have a factory reset done. I was not in favor of this but they assured me that it would fix the problem. They also assured me that after the factory reset that everything would go back to normal.
After the factory reset was done I let the rep go and we started resetting all of the programs that Ching had on her phone. This is when we realized that she was missing a few things. First we noticed that she was missing the Swype that was preloaded. We decided to head to the T-Mo store and see if it could be reloaded, this was a bust as the store was closed. Then we headed to Wal-Mart and got a few things for some friends. We worked on the phone some more and found more and more that was wrong with the factory reset.
I asked Ching if she wanted to just exchange the phone. She said that was a great idea and we got the receipt and box and I ran up to Wal-Mart for the exchange. I got there and they advised me that they were out of stock. I thought to myself, could this day get any worse. I went back home and on the way I called T-Mo, I wanted to know when the buyers remorse was up. I was told that today was the last day, they asked me some questions and I advised them of the situation. They told me that it should not be acting that way and that it should definitely be returned. They told me that they could send me one for the same price if I could get it returned and the contract canceled. I ran back up to Wal-Mart and I was told that there was NO ONE in the store that could cancel that contract. Not even the manager was trained on this service, he advised me that I would need to come back tomorrow and speak to the electronics manager and see if there was something that she could do. While the manager was talking to me the electronics attendant was calling other stores to see if there was someone there that could help. He got a guy at the west side store and the attendant asked him if he could do the cancelation. The attendant said “yes, but I am leaving in 2 minutes and I am not staying”. That was my only chance.
I came back home and decided to call HTC. I figured if anyone could help, they could. They spoke with me and I learned that the Swipe program is not one of there loads, it is apparently loaded after they are built and then packaged by T-Mobile.
We continued to use the phone only to find more and more problems. I am not sure how I can fix this phone or if I can. At the moment Ching wants to just cancel the service all together and get an iPhone. I am not really keen on this idea. I am not a fan of the AT&T service and I am not a fan of the iPhone. I am trying to talk her into a Droid phone instead of the iPhone or another windows phone.
At the moment our plan is to just try to see if we can get the contract canceled. I know they have done remorse exceptions before and I am hopeful that we can get the contract canceled. If not then the only other option is to get the phone exchanged. We have 2 weeks left to get the phone exchanged through Wal-Mart. If we can’t get it exchanged then the only other option is to cancel service.
I hoe it does not come to that. We have a great rate plan that we will never get back again if we cancel. I really done want to loose it and AT&T does not have the unlimited data package any more. This concerns me because Ching is a data hog. They only offer 2Gig and I have a feeling that Ching will go through that in less than a month.
I am trying to convince her to just wait out the contract, as she pointed out, 2 years will go by fast. If worse comes to worse and she just will not use the phone then I will take the HD2 and give her back the Touch Pro 2 until the contract is over. Then we will seriously look at another provider.
Until then, I will not get a good night sleep until Ching is happy.
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My Perfect Future
Posted on July 10, 2010 by Brian under Life, Travel.
In my limited, yet varied travels, I have noticed that there is a wide variety of technological differences in the world. I find it hard to believe that in this day and age, there is not some form of uniformity across the board.
For example, I first started to notice the technological differences when I went to Jamaica. They had English TV but it was limited and not very good. I know what you are thinking, if you are in Jamaica, you better not be watching TV and I totally agree. However, think of those people that travel there for business that are not there for the sites. Those poor bastards have to come back from a long day of negotiations or selling and have limited or no means of relaxing. You have to agree, that TV is one of many form of relaxation. I also took note of the internet speeds. It slays me that we still have places in the world that have no broadband internet access.
Now before you all start tearing me apart, I am not counting those countries that are underdeveloped or under privileged. I understand that there are places in this world that still don’t have electricity.
I continued to take note when I first went to Germany. There they have government run television that is rolled into your taxes. Of those channels, only 1 is in English, the rest are all in German or Dubbed in German. I was told that it used to not be that way. At one point most re-televised American programs were just subtitled. However, in recent years, there are more and more shows that are dubbed. You would think that Germany and Other European countries would jump on the Uniformity band wagon because it would give them a leg up on the tourist industry. Just think of the brochures, advertising to the tourist “American TV, Never miss any of your favorite shows”.
The same goes for the internet. They have it here in Germany, but its very spotty, underpowered and unreliable. You pay 4 to 20 Euros a day depending on where you are in the country to get this kind of service. It’s so poor that you can not run applications like Skype or Google Talk. If you do get it to work its not very good and you drop connection often.
And forget about streaming. Besides the poor internet access, there is the licensing agreement. It amazes me that the networks are not trying to push there products across the seas. I mean BBC has made it to America but CBS, FOX, NBC and any number of other stations, including HBO, MAX, SHO and the other cable movie channels are nowhere here. It’s a prime market; most of these people (especially the younger ones) eat up anything American. They have music stations that play nothing but American music but no Television or streaming sites.
In my perfect future, it would not matter where you went, you would have the same options available to you. The same services that you get in New York are available in the Netherlands. If you jump to Japan, you have the same feature as Johannesburg.
I just feel that the companies are missing out on a global industry and they could be making not only more money, but improving the life of so many by exposing them to American standards that should be available to everyone.
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Attendorn Germany, Day 1
Posted on July 7, 2010 by Brian under Life, Travel.
Today is the first day of my trip to Attendorn Germany. This is my second time coming over here so I am a little more familiar with the surroundings. Plus, I have two of my coworkers with me this time, Chad Molen and Jordon Rose.
I am not a big fan of coming to Germany, the TV sucks, hardly anyone speaks English in this little town (the larger cities have more English speaking people) the food is not all that great (except the Turkish place, it’s always great), the hotels are not that good (it’s 80 degrees and the hotel we are in has no AC) and it’s difficult to get anywhere. Chad likes it here and this is Jordon’s first time so he is stoked no matter what.
There is not much to say about the flight, it was long and boring and because I didn’t have Ching to lay my head on, I could not sleep on the flight. I don’t think the burly Coast Guard guy sitting next to me would have liked me snuggling up to him on the flight. It could have gotten awkward. I just got up from a lengthy 5 hour nap. I think I’m going to regret that later.
We got off the plane and headed out to where we were supposed to meet the driver that Viega got for us. After an hour we decided to call Katrin (the lady here in Germany that made all of our arrangements) and find out what happened. We learned a few minutes later that the driver got into a car crash on the way over here, not sure how that happened or if the guy is OK but they said they were going to send another driver to pick us up. After about an hour we wandered outside to see our driver looking for us. We made our way over to his car and off we went.
Now things get interesting. We started our drive out of Frankfurt pretty normal. Then, about 30 to 45 minutes into the 2 hour drive, Jordon fell asleep and Chad and I talked about various things. I had been watching out the front window and I noticed that the driver kept swerving very close to the center line and a few times came very close to other cars as he passed. Remember this is on the Autobahn, so we are doing speeds close to if not more than 100 mph. I decide that I am going to watch our driver in the rear view mirror for a few minutes. At the angle the mirror is at and my position in the car, I can see his eyes perfectly. I start to notice that the guy has the cruise control on and he is falling asleep at the wheel. I immediately point this out to Chad and he said that he had noticed it as well. For the remainder of the drive we tried desperately to make as much noise as possible to keep this guy awake. At one point, we actually thought we were all going to die. We came so close to a semi truck that even Chad turned a little white at that point. Jordon was asleep and woke up to Chad and I screaming and wanted to know what was going on. Our driver spoke no English nor understood what we were saying so we told Jordon the brief horror story. He chuckled and I think tried to suppress his concern. A crash on the Autobahn is a serious thing and I kept telling Chad, “I do not want to die in a foreign country.” He chuckled and said, “I don’t want to die period.” It was then that we decided that we were going to talk to Katrin and ensure that we do not get that driver for the return trip. Hopefully, we won’t get the one that wrecked either. Maybe we can get one of our Viega friends to take us next Friday.
Anyway, thank goodness we made it to the hotel safe and sound and we got checked in. We put our luggage up and I had previously convinced the guys that we should go to the Turkish place and get grub. I got my douner and they got the same with Fries. After that I came back to my room and got my internet access set up (I insisted on having a room with wireless access, it’s a must for communication) and checked my email, Facebook and Twitter. Then I set out to take a short nap that turned into 5 hours.
That pretty much sums it all up. I am in my room now, blogging, which I rarely do. And waiting for the guys to wake up so we can get dinner, I think we are going to go to the Pub on the corner, they server burgers and there is a Big Screen for Jordon to watch soccer on. I guess Germany is playing tonight so we have to show our support for our company’s home team. I doubt I will stay for the whole game. I think my plans involve coming back to the room and going to bed. I have a long day ahead of me and a lot to learn, so I want to be on my game tomorrow, not thinking of sleeping.
I will write more tomorrow but I doubt it will be this lengthy or exciting. I miss my wife and family terribly.
Love you all, see you soon.
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