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Consumer Protection Alert: Like millions of other computer users, I've been showered with 3.5-inch diskettes for various on-line services -- Prodigy, CompuServe, and mostly America On Line.
Mostly, this has been a blessing. For at least a year, I haven't had to buy any diskettes. As soon as these critters arrive, I make a big X across the label and reformat them.
Then they serve in the sneaker net
we operate
around here to move stuff between computers. Last spring,
we tried to set up a real network with cables and
protocols, and ended up frying about $1800 worth of I/O
cards, SCSI controllers, monitors and the like. Safeware,
the computer insurance company,
covered the damage,
so that isn't the reason for this Consumer Protection
Alert.
It's the disks that come in the mail. I got a pair from CompuServe a fortnight ago with the latest and greatest version of WinCIM.
During a gullible moment late last year, I even installed an earlier version of WinCIM. It managed to trash the other programs I use for Internet connections, which meant I had to reinstall the latter.
So I thought I'd be smarter this time around, and not even bother trying to install version 2.01 of WinCIM. I'm sure it's a respectable virus-free program and all that, but who's got the time to determine which DLL was bashing the socket, or whatever?
I shoved one of the disks in a computer, told it to reformat so I'd have a new clean disk, and went off to refill my coffee. Upon my return, the disk was formatted. I removed it.
To be precise, I removed everything except the disk's metal slide, which remained inside the drive. We tried fetching it with tweezers and needle-nose pliers, but to no avail. This means I've got to devote an hour or two to tearing the machine open, removing the disk drive and shaking out the errant slide, if it will come out.
Perhaps I should just install a new drive and send the whole mess to CompuServe, along with a statement for my time and expenses, and a friendly caution:
You folks ought to check your suppliers to be sure
you're sending mechanically sound disks. I'm a nice guy and
I want only $100 an hour for my time repairing the damage
caused by your defective disk, along with inflated costs
for replacement parts.
One of these days, though, you'll get a notice from
someone who isn't a nice guy. He'll tell you that your
defective products caused the loss of a disk drive and the
attached computer at a critical time which led to his loss
of a major business deal and compromised his reputation for
reliability and delivering proposals and analyses on time.
He'll want millions.
I speak as a friend, and I just want about $150 for
my time and expenses.
I'll let you know if this
works.
Close examination of certain fine-print computer-supply
ads reveals on occasional classification of duplication
grade
next to the cheapest disks.
Not knowing what that meant, I called Brown Disk Co. in Colorado Springs.
It means the disks haven't been checked to see if
they'll work, because commercial disk-duplication machines
do that automatically and eject the disks that won't hold
data. There's usually about a one percent failure
rate.
But if you're buying several million disks to flood the world with software for your on-line service, you buy by price. A cent's difference adds up quickly.
Of course they buy the cheapest media they can,
the Brown Disk woman explained, because they don't care
if it works more than once. Typically, you load the
software onto your hard drive, and that's the last time you
ever touch that distribution disk.
But if you're not typical,
and you're a scrounge
artist who has, until lately, been quite grateful to these
companies for sending free disks that you can use for your
own purposes, then it's no surprise that you do run into
problems with these disks. They're the cheapest disks that
anybody could find. They're not built to stand up to any
sustained use. You will get bad sectors and broken cases
and snapped slides.
An examination of the office bad disk box
confirmed her statement. Almost all of them were from
America On Line, Prodigy and CompuServe. (As to why I
haven't thrown them out, I'm lazy. The drawer with the box
is closer than the trash can.)
Conversations with friends revealed similar problems
with the free disks that come in the mail. They're shoddy
merchandise, unfit for recycling.
So henceforth the free disks go to the landfill. And you'd think that companies would be more concerned about their reputation. When a disk falls apart, who's going to blame some slave-labor sweatshop in China when there's some other name on the label? And who's going to trust the name-brand company when it sends shoddy merchandise that falls apart inside your computer?
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