Clamshell warranty repairs

[RJLadd]

Ok, I give in. After resisting for months, I see a C860 in my future, to finally replace my trusty HandEra 330. I\'m an old school Unix developer, so the software part doesn\'t worry me too much. Having at least a limited ability to develop Linux s/w using a pocket device is very appealing.

I know of several places that sell the C860: K on eBay, Dynamism, Japan-Direct, Conics, Amazon JP, Mercantile Computer, ShirtPocket,  etc.

Ghu forbid that a Z should need service, but ghu is a fickle diety. Amazon obviously does not handle any repairs, warranty or not. K disappears sometimes. Dynamism has good service, and charges a lot for it. ShirtPocket is in the UK, and I\'m in the upper left corner of the US; sending it to the UK to be sent to Japan seems almost Monty Pythonish.

Of those (few, I hope) folks here who have sent their Zs back for service, where did you buy the Z? Where did you send it for service? How good was the service? Has anyone sent a Z back for non-warranty service? Will any of the dealers assist in getting non-warranty service (which ones)?

K has good prices, and seems to provide quick shipping, but the disappearing act is worrisome. If I buy from K, need service, and can\'t contact him, what are the options?

I\'ve wandered around these forums, but don\'t see many mentions of actual experiences with service support.


Thanks

[Miami_Bob]

Dynamism sent me an RMA by email within hours of my call to them. Have not sent the unit back yet because I\'m \"breaking in\" the replacement that I ordered. No Zaurus withdrawal for this guy!

[shinRaiden]

Howdy, I\'m up here in the PACNW as well. I got mine from japan-direct, and it got here in about a week (routes through SFO). I haven\'t had any problems at all that haven\'t been a) recoverable and  my own fault. I\'ve seen posts that say that while the service turn-around time may be a bit longer with JD, they are just as reliable. I had a question on the order contents, and I got an answer next business day.

[RJLadd]

I sent email / left voicemail for most of the vendors I know about, and/or heard privately from a couple of people.

Japan-Direct said that the repair plus shipping cost is usually more than the cost of a new Z, so they apparently don\'t provide any kind of service support after the warranty period.

I\'m told that Dynamism\'s service is good, but only for Zs bought from them. No service at all for Zs bought elsewhere. This is second hand info, though.

No info about or from the other vendors yet.

[RJLadd]

Got a response from Conics. The phrasing is not entirely clear, but it may be that they don\'t assist with Zs after the warranty period. They say that anyone can send one to the Sharp Japan service center, as long as it has a Japanese return address.

I also tried Sharp USA. They claim that as long as one has the warranty card and sales receipt, it can be sent to the service center in Japan; no Japanese return address required. They also say that it is the policy of the Japanese service center to have English speakers available. OTOH, the people I talked to were in the US (unless they were in India :-), and may not have perfect info.

Living the Pacific Northwest, in the worst case I can probably find someone with a friend/relative in Japan.

[waalkman]

...and I\'m in the upper left corner of the US...

Alaska?

Keep in mind that I\'m a product of the public school system, but I\'m pretty sure that the upper left corner is where we left it.

Of those (few, I hope) folks here who have sent their Zs back for service, where did you buy the Z? Where did you send it for service? How good was the service? Has anyone sent a Z back for non-warranty service? Will any of the dealers assist in getting non-warranty service (which ones)?

I haven\'t had to send mine back, but judging by some of the responses, I feel much better about using Dyna. Hopefully, that\'s one hundred bucks that I\'ve completely wasted.


John

[Miami_Bob]

but I\'m pretty sure that the upper left corner is where we left it.

Always forgetting were I left things like that, myself. Never can find \'em again when you need \'em. Early onset CRS syndrome (G).

[jchung]

I bought my c700 from someone off ebay when it first came out.. about a few months ago, due to my stupidity, i broke the display on it.
Unfortunately I dont have any type of warranty and now i have an expensive paper weight
I know my case is rare, most likely you will not need warranty on your unit..but i do suggest getting warranty for the unit.

[Miami_Bob]

I bought my c700 from someone off ebay when it first came out.. about a few months ago, due to my stupidity, i broke the display on it.  
Unfortunately I dont have any type of warranty and now i have an expensive paper weight

Ouch! Hopefully you can find a busted C700 with a good screen for sale.

Luck to you, friend.

[_Psycho]

I have been tried to find a busted c7x0 device with a working screen without luck. I Guess the screen it always what peoples broke anyway. Too har dot find :/

[rgrep]

I have just received my Zaurus back from a Dynamism warranty repair.

One of the reasons I chose to buy my C760 from Dynamism was their 1-year warranty and \"FedEx Warranty Rescue\" service.  I didn\'t realise at the time however that the warranty rescue only applies to US/Canda customers and only when Dynamism ask you to send your unit directly to Japan rather than to their office in Chicago.

Regardless of that, I got very good service from them.  Of course I had to pay the shipping to them but the unit was FedEx\'d back 4-5 weeks after they received it (I am in New Zealand afterall so I don\'t mind the delay).

My Zaurus had a faulty charging circuit and they sent it on to Sharp Japan for repair.

Matt

[RJLadd]

A shiny, new, SL-c860 arrived from K last Thursday (June 24).

The USPS screwed things up. I placed the order on June 19. The EMS tracking website showed the package getting on a plane in Japan on June 20, but the USPS site did not show it getting off again in San Francisco. The USPS folks were very unhelpful, bordering on rude, when I called to find out what had happened. K started a trace from his end on the 22rd, and on the 23rd, the package magically appeared on the USPS tracking site. It was delivered on the 24th. The USPS carrier apparently signed for it himself, and left it in my mailbox (1/4 mile from my house).

None of this was K's fault; the USPS managed it on their own. However, when I saw the shipping label, I noticed that it was underinsured. I had asked K to send it insured, but I didn't explicitly say "fully insured". I wasn't charged any customs fees, but I had to wonder who would cover the loss if the package vanished. K did not respond to my email asking about that.

I decided to buy it from K mostly because Dynamism is $180 ($850 / $670 = 1.27) more expensive, and that seemed like too high a margin. If it fails during the warranty, Sharp USA claims I can send it to Sharp JP myself. Even if that's not true, I'm pretty sure I can find people either in the Japan office of the company I work for, or otherwise in the Seattle area, who can help with the shipping.

If I manage to brick it, I may regret the decision, but as a old timer systems software engineer, I think the odds are in my favor.

In the meantime...having started writing software in the card punch / paper tape days, it is almost unbelivably cool to be writing shell scripts / Perl / C / C++ on a handheld *nix device.

Not to start a war (ok, not much chance of that here :-), but I had occasion to look at the Sony clamshell today. It felt like a cheap toy compared to the c860.

Next...there's just a few tweaks I want to make to Opie...

[Miami_Bob]

In the meantime...having started writing software in the card punch / paper tape days, it is almost unbelivably cool to be writing shell scripts / Perl / C / C++ on a handheld *nix device.

Brings back memories of patching paper tape and playing "52 pickup" with the punch card deck (G). What blows my mind is having more computing power in the palm of one hand than there was aboard the ships that landed men on the moon.

Shivers up the spine.

[SharpEnd]

I just received my c860 back from Dynamism this morning, after a repair.
It had to be sent to Sharp Japan, as the SD Card slot retention mechanism
failed and it wouldn't hold the card.  Total time without my Z was a day or
two short of 4 weeks, but at least they were able to facilitate the repair.
If I had bought from eBay or a Japanese source, this may likely have
not been possible.  For me, it was worth the extra $100 or so to buy
from Dynamism.  The 4 weeks wait was very painful, though...

[jchung]

I bought my c700 from someone off ebay when it first came out.. about a few months ago, due to my stupidity, i broke the display on it.  
Unfortunately I dont have any type of warranty and now i have an expensive paper weight

Ouch! Hopefully you can find a busted C700 with a good screen for sale.

Luck to you, friend.

I recently bought a c760 with a bad NAND flash problem..

I've been trying to get the c760 to reflash but no success so far.  

If I cant get the c760 to work then I will have a new screen for my c700.. I guess that's better than no c7x0 (my 5500 is still good, but after having a c7x0 you just cant go back..)