By My Experiences

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The companies which have provided me with unqualified support OR no support after several requests.

Tyan - no replies to email, long distance call, no help,
chased down rep @comdex, no help (good web support now)
Creative Labs/SoundBlaster - replied but no help
Norton - Replied to each request but off topic or irrelevant
MicroShaft - Need I say more ?
Motherboard SuperStore(MSSI) - Ordered a Tyan MB with AMI bios, received it with Award. Called and rep said I could flash bios to AMI but failed to mention doing so would void my warranty (luckily I caught it)
Hewlett-Packard - Bought a Pavillion 6735, they cannot or will not tell me what MB is in this model, had no idea what modem properties, just the name. Several unqualified tech encounters

AND NOW, to disprove "the good we do, they never remember"
GREAT PRODUCTS AND GREAT SUPPORT/SERVICE

Maxtor - Toll free (US) support, knowledgable techs, no quibble warranty replacement, discounted upgrade program, web and global support
Logitech - Great products, knowledgable techs, no-hassle replacement, web and global support

Gee, I'm feeling much better now 🙂)
 
Keep an open mind on Microsloth. They're changing the way they do things and it may not be bad. Of course the reason they're doing it IS bad, but that's off-topic.

I recently had occasion to launch a support e-mail on XP and the results were amazing, to say the least. In less than 24 hours I had an e-mail request for more info and less than 4 hours after that, I had the resolution. I didn't answer their 'let us know if this helps' e-mail, so I had the person involved AND their supervisor e-mailing me to make sure the answer helped.

Now, that may not be world-class support, but it's several light-years ahead of the kind of support they USED to provide. Maybe this total switch to XP core is a good thing after all!
 
Aye, they did. They contacted me twice with a question about how well their answer had satisifed the question and twice more (original tech and then his supervisor) when I didn't send back an answer within 24 hours. They don't seem to want to let any problems go unsolved AND they want to know that customers are satisfied with their help.

Now, this is a massive change in their attitude and (seemingly) their capability to really care if something gets fixed. Works for me :)
 
Read my posts in the HP forums for exactly why you got poor support. I used to work for their third-party support provider, and I met two HP employees in my 8 months there. I can't say I miss the place.

As for why they wouldn't tell you what mobo was in the box: It's proprietary. HP designs their own, and contracts out the fabrication. The chipset was probably whatever was cheapest (but still stable under testing) on the market. The same goes for the modem--it was just some generic winmodem they bought in lots of 25,000 or so. There's not much about those modems you can change, except via drivers, and that's all in the GUI.

Some techs (myself included) would go so far as to strip as many of those units down as possible (well, as many as they'd give us) so we knew exactly what hardware was in there, and could at least direct you to reference sites for further information.

Having been a support guy for a brief time, I would like to say something in their defense. A lot of techies out there assume these guys are A+, MCSE with a double-major in electrical engineering and digital design. For the most part, they're college-aged guys just getting into the scene. Don't call HP or Compaq wanting to know how to install Linux on a machine sold with Windows ME or what modem string you should use for your ISP or how to reassign the drive letter for your system drive in Windows 2000. They probably know nothing of Linux, they don't support your ISP, and the latter requires registry editing, which isn't something I would want to explain over the phone. If you want to do any of those things and don't know how, figure it out for yourself. It's much more rewarding.

You've got to realize that phone and e-mail support techs probably make less money than anybody else in the tech business except the grunt in IT whose job it is to run around blowing the dust out of everyone's power supply. Typically, their hands are tied as to what they can tell you, and what they can help you with. Yes, some of them are incompetent and shouldn't be working there, but they'll probably be fired in a month, so there's no point getting mad or TELLING them they're incompetent. Just hang up, call back, and hope you get someone who knows what in the world he's doing this time.

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| WILL WORK FOR HARDWARE |
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Were you not also timed on each call you took? I've heard a lot of these third-party support lines monitor their techs closely. They have to have their call times below a specified average... which in a lot of cases results in bad advice. You can't help every person with every problem in 10 minutes or less... it's time these managers got their head out of their collective asses and realized that support takes time.

<font color=red> If you design software that is fool-proof, only a fool will want to use it. </font color=red>
 
Aye, I agree... time is money. However, a happy customer is worth a hell of a lot more to you than 2 hours of a tech's time. Remember, a happy customer is a repeat customer... and keeping a customer happy sometimes requires just a little more than 10 minutes.

<font color=red> If you design software that is fool-proof, only a fool will want to use it. </font color=red>
 
Ah but with large corporations if you spare more than 10 mins making one customer happy you are pissing off more than just that one. It's a numbers game.

<b><font color=green>Lizards</b></font color=green> for <b>THGC</b> Mascot!!!
 
I'll give ya that one... now explain that to an irrate customer who is fed up talking to tech support... heh.

<font color=red> If you design software that is fool-proof, only a fool will want to use it. </font color=red>
 
That's me!!! They usually put me on hold for an hour and then just cut you off. You get pissed and go on to a different company. You lose some to make the majority happy.

<b><font color=green>Lizards</b></font color=green> for <b>THGC</b> Mascot!!!
 
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