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Ask a Repair Shop

philip.yurchuk.com

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Re: Ask a Repair Shop

#121

Post by liquidcool »

inthewoods wrote: post #45

My experience is the opposite. Spoke with two system integrators regarding an implementation of a marketing automation tool. In both cases, the proposed lead on the project made statements that I knew were incorrect regarding the software. We also had a challenging requirement that was not part of any out-of-the-box solution and was told by both that it wasn't possible with one of the vendors we were considering. Sim…

Author here, great feedback, thanks.

My ultimate goal would be, if possible, to ask one of the SI's professional services developers out to lunch and pick their brain in an informal setting. Someone who has been there for a couple years and has seen some things and is ready to talk.

One of the challenges with the SI model is because people go to the vendor, they give you a lot of business and help keep payroll going, so you never want to badmouth them in public. But you don't have to badmouth anyone to say, "We think for your needs, this is the best solution." Problem is, you're not allowed to say even that when the lead comes from the vendor.

Perhaps the best question is, "Who has the best developer experience?" IMHO, that's the best sign of a quality product. Granted, still might not have the features you need out of the box like a bigger, older vendor. You need to weigh all pros and cons.

Re: Ask a Repair Shop

#122

Post by kqr »

dexterdog wrote: post #41
richdougherty wrote: post #32

I did this when I was choosing a laptop. I called up a few laptop repair shops. It as so helpful! They could tell me what was junk and what was OK. I also do something like this this when choosing a new ISP. I call the support line instead of the sales line. Somehow ISPs can answer sales enquiries instantly while support calls take 45 minutes to answer. This strategy has led me to use some of the smaller (slightly mo…

Hard to do with laptops if you prefer the newer ones. They don't have much of a track record when I usually buy one.

Not only that. There are so many models out there that even if they have been around for a while, the small group of people you manage to ask does not make up a statistically reliable dataset.

Buying laptops is really scary that way. Half the time you get some shit yuo have to outlive, and the other half it's fairly decent. Only once or twice have I heard people hit the jackpot.

Re: Ask a Repair Shop

#123

Post by kqr »

basseq wrote: post #109
inthewoods wrote: post #45

My experience is the opposite. Spoke with two system integrators regarding an implementation of a marketing automation tool. In both cases, the proposed lead on the project made statements that I knew were incorrect regarding the software. We also had a challenging requirement that was not part of any out-of-the-box solution and was told by both that it wasn't possible with one of the vendors we were considering. Sim…

Worth noting that you can hire consultants—often SIs—to help you with software selection: to answer the question of what software is best for you. Most companies don't want to pay that cost, so ask SIs to make recommendations in their RFPs for implementation services. Not only are you going to get bias from pitching the software they're best positioned to implement, but the requirements gathering process is never as…

> ask SIs to make recommendations in their RFPs for implementation services. Not only are you going to get bias from pitching the software they're best positioned to implement, but the requirements gathering process is never as good because a) companies won't share as much during a competitive procurement and b) SIs won't invest the time to do all that work for free.

I mean I'm sure there is solid economy theoretic reasoning in favour of RFPs in general but I've never understood why anyone would want to do things that way.

The way I hear it, you're basically saying, "Hey, from a group of people who are willing to work for free – I'll pick the one willing to cut the most corners!" Quality just cannot arise from that kind of process.

Re: Ask a Repair Shop

#124

Post by kqr »

Pxtl wrote: post #110
ekianjo wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I would love to be able to buy more simple, well made things Problem is, if we are a minority of folks thinking this way, it won't make sense financially for manufacturers. What's happening with the buy-and-dispose generation is that nobody really cares about quality anymore - which is why the market is going in this way.

Minority or majority, to me the problem is the impossibility of determining what's quality anymore. "buy the expensive one" gets you plastic crap with more frills. "buy a trusted brand" doesnt' work when all the infinite brands - even formerly reputable ones like GE - are now just stickers for Chinese factories.

Impossibilty is a strong word. Sure, there are no standards bodies rating the quality of a product (those that exist tend to rate it as a "pass/fail" sort of thing.) But there's this thing called the internet where for any item you can think about you can find a tiny group of people obsessed about that item and ask them. It's the modern day "ask a repair shop"!

Re: Ask a Repair Shop

#125

Post by kqr »

gorkonsine wrote: post #112
Nition wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish there was like a rating system for how well-built appliances are. I guess the poor man's version of that is looking at how long the manufacturer's warranty is.

Well these days, with Amazon, that's what the reviews are for. I've passed on lots of purchases because I looked at the reviews and saw too many negative ones, and bought other things after seeing almost all glowing reviews. A bad-quality product can lead to poor reviews, and this can affect sales. Manufacturers' warranties are only so useful; a lot of companies make you jump through hoops to actually make use of the…

I'd like to point out an addition to this. Always read the negative reviews. Don't just count them. I put much more weight on the negative reviews than the positive ones. You can frequently tell if the bad experience is due to a user error or if it's a systematic fault in the product.

If a product has 70% negative reviews, of which 90% are operator error, I'll probably still prefer that product to the one with only 30% negative reviews where only 30% are operator error.

Re: Ask a Repair Shop

#126

Post by kqr »

busterarm wrote: post #7

This reminds me so much of my experiences working in a computer repair shop ~15 years ago. Funniest thing about it is that as a sales rep I sucked, but once I got moved into repair, I was absolutely destroying our sales team in sales often by 4x their best rep without even trying. There were a couple of Black Fridays where the store made all computer sales take place at the repair center because of it.

> Funniest thing about it is that as a sales rep I sucked, but once I got moved into repair, I was absolutely destroying our sales team in sales often by 4x their best rep without even trying.

I find this incredibly interesting because it's telling us something about how to make people perform at their best. I believe I'm the same way regarding making pitches from a repair bench.

Do you know why it happened that way to you? I'd share my hypothesis but I don't want to prime you.

Re: Ask a Repair Shop

#127

Post by kqr »

jaclaz wrote: post #37
cyphar wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that companies (especially Apple) are explicitly trying to make their devices harder to repair -- which is the reason for the whole Right-to-Repair movement[1]. If you want to see how much dodgy stuff repair shops have to go through to figure out how to fix Apple products, check out the channels of Louis Rossman[2] and Jessa Jones[3]. [1]: http://ifixit.org/right [2]: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC…

Apple aside, there is anyway an issue with a broken market for spares and repairs. A single data point: I recently went shopping for a replacement pump for a (professional) dishwasher, and while I was at it I was looking for a spare "programmer" (which is an electromechanic thingy, a motor with reduction gears and three cams that operate switches at a given timing). I was given an estimate from the local repair shop…

> the actual factory is no more than 150 km away from where I live (but of course they don't sell directly).

You probably tried this already, but in case you didn't: see if you track down and speak directly to one of the people on the factory floor. Ask them if there's any chance they have a unit lying around that's been used for demonstration purposes, testing, or maybe there's a cosmetic fault that made it unshippable, whatever. When things are used or manufactured at an industrial scale, individual units tend to end up in storage rooms and gather dust.

However, you have to be aware that the employee would probably have to jump through some hoops to help you (talk to their manager, ensure the right people are compensated, assist with physical delivery and so on), so

1. You may have to badger them a lot to get it done. Not because they don't want to help, but because if you're not showing initiative, they'll do more important things with their time.

2. And this should probably go without saying but they won't be sales people. You'll owe them, not the other way around!

Re: Ask a Repair Shop

#128

Post by kqr »

cyphar wrote: post #30
w458cmau wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you think though that this is Apple actively trying to reduce your ability to repair, or is it that they pursue other goals and the ability to repair is waaay down on the list? I would assume, from experience in large corporations, that it is the latter.

It's intentional. They do not provide schematics to anyone outside of Apple and FOXCONN. They only provide diagnostics tools to "authorised repair shops" (which actually don't repair devices). They provide no information to repair shops on where they might be able to buy replacement chips (aside from searching the chip name on AliExpress). It's not as though they don't know how to repair devices, there is mountains o…

Ugh. This makes me so sad. I was very close to buying a Fairphone 2 or something for its repairability, but I ended up getting a recent Samsung model anyway because it beats the crap out of everything else in almost all categories – especially ones I value highly, like nonexistent shutter lag, weather sealing, battery life and such.

But they're also very anti-tinker, from what I understand. The more I read about stuff like this, the more I'm thinking about rooting my phone just because I want to be in control. I hate handing over my security and system maintenance to a large corporation who barely has my interests in mind. However, rooting a recent Samsung phone is a one-way operation and they can detect it and refuse service under warranty in some jurisdictions. I don't know what to do!

Re: Ask a Repair Shop

#129

Post by busterarm »

kqr wrote: post #126
busterarm wrote: post #7

This reminds me so much of my experiences working in a computer repair shop ~15 years ago. Funniest thing about it is that as a sales rep I sucked, but once I got moved into repair, I was absolutely destroying our sales team in sales often by 4x their best rep without even trying. There were a couple of Black Fridays where the store made all computer sales take place at the repair center because of it.

> Funniest thing about it is that as a sales rep I sucked, but once I got moved into repair, I was absolutely destroying our sales team in sales often by 4x their best rep without even trying. I find this incredibly interesting because it's telling us something about how to make people perform at their best. I believe I'm the same way regarding making pitches from a repair bench. Do you know why it happened that way…

My goals were different and I wasn't worried about making sales anymore, just telling them what I thought was best for them.

I wasn't expected to sell anymore either, so my approach to dealing with people in the store could be different too.

Re: Ask a Repair Shop

#130

Post by liquidcool »

cr0sh wrote: post #100
liquidcool wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A friend asked me the same, so here's my info. It is dated, and you're best calling a repair shop before buying, but likely still some nuggets of truth here. Big trend is consolidation in the industry. Whirlpool, Maytag, and Kitchenaid are all the same company now. For dishwashers (and I got this info recently), repairman said they all have the same motor and core components, which is the most important. They differ…

> Big trend is consolidation in the industry. Whirlpool, Maytag, and Kitchenaid are all the same company now. You might be indirectly referencing this site (and article): https://recraigslist.com/2015/10/they-used-to-last-50-years/ (ffs - just saw this link was posted below) ...which essentially says the same thing, but in more detail. > For washing machines, the guy said Another thing: Stay away from front loaders (…

Hadn't seen that article, but will take a look.

Friend sold Kirby vacuums and had a very high opinion of them, but of course they are extremely expensive, something like $1,500.

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