Gateway's Horrible Customer Service for Plasma T.V.'s

You see that a lot, people trying to make where the parts were made vs.
where the box was assembled as being one and the same. I understood
your message and what the actual meaning of BUILT means as most people
that have capabilities of dimensional thought would.

You are right about local builds (white boxes) being the way to go.
After I gave up on Gateway, Dell and all the other scam artists, I went
the white box route also. I asked around and found that there were 4
highly reputable builders local to my local. After settling on one, I
have had him build three systems for me to date. Of the three, one had
a few problems of which he immediately took care of personally. Like
you said, he's the one who built the system so he's the best one to
service the system because his reputation rides on this plus, he speaks
English and lives just down the road.

Community thinking also dictates that the profits he makes on each
system are mostly spent right back in the community thus adding to a
strong and viable local economy. Even though my last system cost
around $150 more than what Gateway would have charged for a system
assembled with comparable parts, $80 of that $150 would have gone into
shipping the GW system here and for the $70 left of the difference, I
think local, face to face, English speaking support from a neighbor
that actually has a service minded clue is well worth that extra $70.

This whole thing comes down to supporting the merchants of your own
community when possible. And I'm not talking about that Wal-Mart
thing either. They wanted to move into our community and our city said
fine, we want 30% of the store profits spent right back here in this
community. And that doesn't include the minimum wage salaries for
the 15-20 local people that they will employ. Hell, we can come up
with Minimum wage positions in our area all day long so we don't need
Wal-Mart coming in here and offering what we can already establish.
Well, we don't have a Wal-Mart here (grin). Actually, we have two
department stores that have been here since the 30's (that's
1930's for the young'uns on here). The people working in them make
more than what Wal-Mart said they would pay. They offer just about
everything Wal-Mart has and their prices are not that much more when
compared to Wal-Mart prices. My wife did a check on this one day. She
priced 33 items at one of our local department stores and then priced
the same items at the Wal-Mart 30 miles down the road. Those 33 items
listed for $124 at the local Department store while Wal-Mart had the
same 33 items for $118. She would end up paying just $6 more to do
business with a local establishment who's entire profits of that $124
would most likely have been injected right back into the local
community where the profits in Wal-Mart's $118 would have gone to
DirtWater BoonDog or wherever they send their money to.

People, People, PEOPLE.... Find a reputable local white box builder
and do your business with them. Keep you money in your own community
and get a bonus.... Support from the same planet that you live on.
Send these conglomerates that have sold you and your country out back
to hell where they were spawned.

NIK

*** Email Address is a Spam Dump so don't use it ***










Shooter wrote:
> On Tue, 03 May 2005 18:11:25 GMT, "Tweek"
> <> wrote:
>
> >With current PC manufacturers, there are no computers at all
actually
> >manufactured in America. They might be assembled here, but the
components in
> >them are all manufactured overseas.
>
> We all know that the components are made out of country as we all
know
> the wording "manufactured in America" means assembled in America,
thus
> my meaning that Gateway does not make the computers it tries to make
> the public believe it does.
>
> However, one can buy a system made in America (made meaning assembled
> as it does to most people). My last two systems were made in America
> (assembled in America for those not understanding the meaning). Its
> called white boxing and most cities have reputable white box builders
> (assemblers to those not trying to complicate the issue). Those two
> last systems have the same length of support "Claimed" by the
> conglomerates but is actually given and is given not only by someone
> in my own country, speaking my own language but living in the same
> town I live in. Actually, my support comes from the actual person
> that built my system (assembled to those that don't understand the
> actual meaning of the topic).
>
> Now, as far as laptops and TV's, there are no white box builders
> (assemblers to those without a clue to the topic) in most towns if
any
> so one has no choice but to buy systems built (assembled for funnies)
> out of country.
>
> The only thing actually Built, Assembled, Manufactured, etc. in
> America are the commercials made by these conglomerates which tries
to
> make the sheep think their products was actually built (assembled for
> those trying to confuse the topic) in America. Gateway use to run an
> Ad a couple of years back that showed an assembly line with Americans
> on it with bright white smiling teeth grinning to beat all while
> Building (assembling) systems for American consumption. Word had it
> that they got busted for that ad and had to remove it from the air
> because at that time, gateway was no longer doing anything in America
> but running sales phone banks. That is when the infamous ad showing
> herds of idiots running through fields of green delivering cow boxes
> full of Taiwanese built (assembled for the challenged) systems came
on
> the scene. I hear that Dell is also coming under fire for that
> commercial showing some idiot in bed calling Dell support and talking
> to what is evidently an north American dialect speaking person that
> looks an awful lot like a North American. Call Dell support and see
> what you actually get.
>
> If anyone wants a system built in America (no matter where the "Guts"
> comes from), then support your local white box builder. You also get
> local support from a person that actually has a clue as to how a
> computer works that not only lives on your side of the world but
> probably lives in your same town. My last two have been such and I
> haven't regretted it since.

I agree with you and I certainly wasn't defending the big boys. I just
started a computer repair shop and I build systems for people. There are
lots of people who don't mind paying more for someone to hand assemble a
machine, test it and tweak it for the best performance. They understand the
value in getting to pick the brand of every part in the machine and knowing
exactly what they are getting. The problem with some shops like mine is they
try to compete with Best Buy on price and that results in using crappy parts
like pcchips mainboards and $10 "450Watt" power supplies. Customers also
have to be very careful who they choose. There are plenty of people doing
what I do that don't know what they are doing. I had a customer recently
that had another shop work on their machine. It turns out that this
particular 'tech' did not know how to properly format and restore a machine.
He told the customer he had to format his drive but when I looked at the
machine, all the spyware and viruses that were causing the problems were
still there. The scariest part is that it was an HP machine. When you boot
the the recovery disk, one of the two options is 'press F to format drive
and recover'. The worst part about the whole thing for the customer is that
he was charged $110 for the work and when he took it back, they wanted
another $55 to fix the problem they never fixed in the first place.
One of the things I was concerned about when building a machine is not
really being able to offer any kind of phone support. It turns out that most
of the manufacturers phone support is so bad that it is like not having it
at all. I have found that people don't mind bringing it in when they know it
will be fixed right.
As far as Gateway goes, back before they bought Emachines, their (desktop)
machines were assembled here in the US. One of the facilites was in Hampton,
VA and I forget where the other one was. I don't know about now, but the
Gateways in the retail stores are obviously Emachine cases with a different
bezel. I think that I read somewhere that when Gateway bought them,
Emachines only had something like 300 employees here in the US. It is
obvious that none of those 300 even touch an emachine computer before it
gets to a store. In the late 90's they had something like 25,000 employees
and now they are down to 1,900 including the people that came with
emachines.

"Shooter" <fhasfdjh@AlkjdaF@com> wrote in message
news:...
> On Tue, 03 May 2005 18:11:25 GMT, "Tweek"
> <> wrote:
>
>>With current PC manufacturers, there are no computers at all actually
>>manufactured in America. They might be assembled here, but the components
>>in
>>them are all manufactured overseas.
>
> We all know that the components are made out of country as we all know
> the wording "manufactured in America" means assembled in America, thus
> my meaning that Gateway does not make the computers it tries to make
> the public believe it does.
>
> However, one can buy a system made in America (made meaning assembled
> as it does to most people). My last two systems were made in America
> (assembled in America for those not understanding the meaning). Its
> called white boxing and most cities have reputable white box builders
> (assemblers to those not trying to complicate the issue). Those two
> last systems have the same length of support "Claimed" by the
> conglomerates but is actually given and is given not only by someone
> in my own country, speaking my own language but living in the same
> town I live in. Actually, my support comes from the actual person
> that built my system (assembled to those that don't understand the
> actual meaning of the topic).
>
> Now, as far as laptops and TV's, there are no white box builders
> (assemblers to those without a clue to the topic) in most towns if any
> so one has no choice but to buy systems built (assembled for funnies)
> out of country.
>
> The only thing actually Built, Assembled, Manufactured, etc. in
> America are the commercials made by these conglomerates which tries to
> make the sheep think their products was actually built (assembled for
> those trying to confuse the topic) in America. Gateway use to run an
> Ad a couple of years back that showed an assembly line with Americans
> on it with bright white smiling teeth grinning to beat all while
> Building (assembling) systems for American consumption. Word had it
> that they got busted for that ad and had to remove it from the air
> because at that time, gateway was no longer doing anything in America
> but running sales phone banks. That is when the infamous ad showing
> herds of idiots running through fields of green delivering cow boxes
> full of Taiwanese built (assembled for the challenged) systems came on
> the scene. I hear that Dell is also coming under fire for that
> commercial showing some idiot in bed calling Dell support and talking
> to what is evidently an north American dialect speaking person that
> looks an awful lot like a North American. Call Dell support and see
> what you actually get.
>
> If anyone wants a system built in America (no matter where the "Guts"
> comes from), then support your local white box builder. You also get
> local support from a person that actually has a clue as to how a
> computer works that not only lives on your side of the world but
> probably lives in your same town. My last two have been such and I
> haven't regretted it since.

On Wed, 04 May 2005 18:05:08 GMT, "Tweek"
<> wrote:

>I just started a computer repair shop and I build systems for people.

And if all goes well and the sheep wise up, you should do a booming
business. Actually, enough of the sheep do seem to be wising up from
reports on the downward slide of the big conglomerates like Gateway
that seem to think stamping their "American" name on Taiwanese
built/assembled junk is fooling anyone any more.

>There are lots of people who don't mind paying more for someone to hand
>assemble a machine, test it and tweak it for the best performance. They
>understand the value in getting to pick the brand of every part in the
>machine and knowing exactly what they are getting.

Of which I am now one after being one of the sheep myself for so many
years. You forgot to mention local support from the ACTUAL people
that built the system also. That was the big selling point for me
going White Box.

>The problem with some shops like mine is they try to compete with Best Buy
>on price and that results in using crappy parts

And they will be the shops that never last more than a year. They get
no return business and a bad rep to follow. When I decided to wise up
and go White Box, I simply asked people in the community who they
trusted building for them and who supported what they built. No
matter which town you live in, the answer will always be no more than
a hand full number of White Box Builders that always seem to get
everyone's "thumbs up". They get that because they build quality
boxes and support what they build. They are the ones that have been
around the longest.

The one I chose, from recommendations, has been in business since the
8088 days. He offers the same support that the conglomerates offer on
paper but the difference is that he actually follows through with the
service by actually giving you service. He has a real name and face
unlike Ob'Dule that works for GW and he actually knows about computers
unlike Ob'Dule that reads canned tech messages off a computer screen.
Unlike Gateway Ob'Dule, his future business rides on his reputation
which in turn rides on the quality of his systems and the level of
support he actually provides on his systems. Gateway Ob'Dule could
give a big Rat's Ass as long as he gets his 35 cent/hour wage to take
home to his 10 children living in a mud bungalow each day.

>As far as Gateway goes, back before they bought Emachines, their (desktop)
>machines were assembled here in the US. One of the facilites was in Hampton,
>VA and I forget where the other one was. I don't know about now, but the
>Gateways in the retail stores are obviously Emachine cases with a different
>bezel. I think that I read somewhere that when Gateway bought them,
>Emachines only had something like 300 employees here in the US. It is
>obvious that none of those 300 even touch an emachine computer before it
>gets to a store. In the late 90's they had something like 25,000 employees
>and now they are down to 1,900 including the people that came with
>emachines.

From what I have read, those few employees left in North America are
your North American Sales Force, your Marketing Force and Finances
(time and pay bean counters). Everything else is China, Taiwan and
Mexico for Parts.... Taiwan for Assembly.... and India for what they
claim to be something that resembles "support" (Ob'Dule on the other
end of a Can & String acting as if he knows something about one of
these fancy new contraptions called a puter).


Good luck with your White Box Business. All you got to do is offer a
solid box that you will personally support. Its that simple. That's
all most people really want... someone that will be there for them
when they need them. As far as the people wanting a $399 system....
send them to Gateway, Dell, Best Buy, etc. for a Taiwanese piece of
Crap. Guarantee you that after wasting that $399, they will be back
to you for a real system soon or later (if they wise up).

Regards,

On 4 May 2005 10:18:17 -0700, wrote:

>People, People, PEOPLE.... Find a reputable local white box builder
>and do your business with them. Keep you money in your own community
>and get a bonus.... Support from the same planet that you live on.
>Send these conglomerates that have sold you and your country out back
>to hell where they were spawned.

I think that says it all in a well wrapped up nut shell.

Regards,