Cell Phone Data Cable Saga
One of my major gripes with my previous phone was the expense for the equipment and software to connect the phone to a PC. I didn't expect to use the phone to get Internet access; I merely wanted to maintain my address book on a full-size keyboard and make backups. The cradle and software was about $100, which I deemed absurd. In researching a new cell phone, the ability to sync the address book with a PC was nothing short of essential. My searching turned up two important resources: Gomadic and BitPim. Gomadic is a cable vendor and BitPim is a program to talk to connected phones.
Even before I had the phone, I spent a lot of time at Gomadic's site contemplating which cable kit would be ideal. I hadn't settled entirely on the phone or the urgency of getting it, so I held off ordering any cables. When I got the phone, I went home and ordered the Compact Cable Kit as quickly as I could click. Soon, I thought, I'll have the data cable, the car charger to leave in the glove compartment, and the wall-plug charger for the office.
I ordered on January 14, which meant my order wasn't processed until the 17th. Despite only traveling from Virginia, the box didn't arrive until the 21st. When I opened it, I found one cable and two bricks. Huh? I thought I'd ordered three cables! With this combo, I'd need the data cable to use either the wall brick or the car adapter. This was hardly what I had in mind.
Oh, well. I plugged the phone in, installed the drivers, installed BitPim, and got to work. Within very little time, I'd installed the Mutopia Project version of The Liberty Bell March as my ringer. Yay!
I showed Coworker Jay the discrepancy between the picture and the product. He suggested scrutinizing the text description. Hmm . . . the photo clearly didn't match the text. The photos on the web site had been swapped. The text for the Compact Kit matched what I'd been sent, but the picture matched the description of the Deluxe Kit. Amazingly, the enlarged pictures were both right, but the index page photos and main product description pages' photos were swapped. Argh!
I emailed Gomadic and informed them of the mistake, providing URLs for all of the erroneous pages. At the end, I mentioned that I wanted to send back the Compact Kit and order a Deluxe. Considering the Deluxe Kit is $5 more than the Compact, I would've been happy with "send us the Compact and we'll send you a Deluxe without charging you the extra $5 or the shipping". They emailed me back at the start of the next business day to tell me that they were sending me a Deluxe Kit, and to keep the Compact Kit. Whoa! They exceeded expectations by a wide margin. Thanks, Gomadic!
Even before I had the phone, I spent a lot of time at Gomadic's site contemplating which cable kit would be ideal. I hadn't settled entirely on the phone or the urgency of getting it, so I held off ordering any cables. When I got the phone, I went home and ordered the Compact Cable Kit as quickly as I could click. Soon, I thought, I'll have the data cable, the car charger to leave in the glove compartment, and the wall-plug charger for the office.
I ordered on January 14, which meant my order wasn't processed until the 17th. Despite only traveling from Virginia, the box didn't arrive until the 21st. When I opened it, I found one cable and two bricks. Huh? I thought I'd ordered three cables! With this combo, I'd need the data cable to use either the wall brick or the car adapter. This was hardly what I had in mind.
Oh, well. I plugged the phone in, installed the drivers, installed BitPim, and got to work. Within very little time, I'd installed the Mutopia Project version of The Liberty Bell March as my ringer. Yay!
I showed Coworker Jay the discrepancy between the picture and the product. He suggested scrutinizing the text description. Hmm . . . the photo clearly didn't match the text. The photos on the web site had been swapped. The text for the Compact Kit matched what I'd been sent, but the picture matched the description of the Deluxe Kit. Amazingly, the enlarged pictures were both right, but the index page photos and main product description pages' photos were swapped. Argh!
I emailed Gomadic and informed them of the mistake, providing URLs for all of the erroneous pages. At the end, I mentioned that I wanted to send back the Compact Kit and order a Deluxe. Considering the Deluxe Kit is $5 more than the Compact, I would've been happy with "send us the Compact and we'll send you a Deluxe without charging you the extra $5 or the shipping". They emailed me back at the start of the next business day to tell me that they were sending me a Deluxe Kit, and to keep the Compact Kit. Whoa! They exceeded expectations by a wide margin. Thanks, Gomadic!