Eye-sore

My replacement Panasonic AX100 projector has become faulty. I've only had it three months. I've returned it to Superfi today for repair. I also asked them to ask Panasonic to provide me with the option of a replacement or refund. It will be interesting to see what transpires with that request.

Regarding Superfi, I sent them an email detailing the problem and told them I would be in later today to return it. They made the effort to call me first thing this morning and tell me that their weekly shipment to headquarters was scheduled for 10am and if I got the projector in before that time it could be moved on straight-away. Splendid.

The fault is something to do with the iris mechanism. This controls the amount of light that is emitted from the projector and, according to the manual, contributes significantly to the life of the bulb. Well, the bulb's still going strong...

The most visible symptom is this: the projector turns itself off when you turn it on.

The "Self Check" option in the hidden / system menu places a red light next to the word "Iris".

Looking back now, I can see that I first had an inkling of a problem about a month ago. The picture suddenly lost life and vibrancy. I had been operating the projector on its "Normal" picture setting up to this point and now the picture was underwhelming. It was fixed by changing the picture mode to "Vivid Cinema" and I remained very happy.

A couple of weeks ago, I noticed a slight discolouration of the picture on my browser window (which is predominantly white). The left edge of the picture was pink, the right edge blue. As time went on, this got worse and was joined by the bottom half of the picture being tinged grey. While playing games or watching movies, the discolouration was not noticable but, as I say, when using the computer it is distracting so.

About a week ago, the projector started misbehaving in the first couple of minutes after you switch it on. About thirty seconds to one minute after switching on, the image would suddenly go extremely dim for about half-a-second, then return to normal, then dim again, then return to normal and be fine until the projector was switched off.

A few days after this behaviour manifested itself, it started to switch itself off when turned on about one time in three. Now, it switches itself off every time.

I did manage a workaround however. You turn it on. It turns itself off. You can then hard switch it off using the power switch on the back. Wait a second or two for the light to go off and switch it back on. Power up and the projector will display a picture until you turn it off again. Then you'll have to do this again.

Good Superfi

Had a much nicer experience with Superfi this week than with the repair / replacement of my projector. I was having an issue with 1080p output of the PlayStation 3 with certain content (specifically, Gran Turismo HD Concept 2.0) whereby the picture would go blank for a second or two frequently. The issue doesn't occur on 720p or 1080i output (as set in the PS3 system menu).

My PS3 is plugged into a receiver and the projector is plugged into that. The problem doesn't occur when the projector is plugged directly into the PS3 and so the HDMI cable linking the PS3 and receiver was the obvious culprit. I was using a £10 HDMI cable bought off eBay which had functioned perfectly with an upscaling Denon DVD player at 1080p but which I figured was having dramas here. So I purchased a £50 QED HDMI cable from Superfi and explained the situation to them.

However, using this more expensive cable made no difference whatsoever (as it turns out the problem is reported on the web and is generally thought to be a PS3 HDCP quirk). Superfi agreed to take the cable back and refund the price without any hassle at all. Indeed, in this instance, dealing with them has been a distinct pleasure.

Every Orange cloud has... another Orange cloud attached to it.

Checked my bank account today to see if the Orange refund promised on the 16th February had materialised and was disappointed but not surprised to find it conspicuous by it's absence.

I contacted Orange billing support and spoke to a friendly lady named Catherine but, sadly, before she could conclude the call we were disconnected. Before the disconnection she revealed that the notes contained no record of the promised £9.99 refund and my account also did not show this refund. The £3.99 refund for the second outage was recorded in the notes but had not been applied to my account. The upshot of this was I was not going to get either refund. We were disconnected while I was on hold while Catherine went to consult her Team Leader.

After the disconnection, I called right back and got a guy called Bain (pronounced Ba-in). I explained to him the call I had just made and he confirmed for himself what Catherine had stated earlier. When he consulted his Team Leader he came back with the news that they would not be refunding me £9.99 as promised for the first outage but £3.74. He has stated that the combined refund (of just under £8) has now been applied to my account and is not just languishing in my notes. This refund should be part of my April 16th bill meaning that I will not be able to confirm the refund in my bank account until that Direct Debit goes through. As an example of how long that takes, an Orange Direct Debit was collected on March 2nd, over two weeks after the billing date. Therefore, I will not be able to see this refund in my bank account until the beginning of May.

There was no apology for not processing my refund. Bain refused to give me the name of the person I talked to on the 16th February (I wish I'd made a note of that aswell, now) mis-citing the Data Protection Act. There was no goodwill gesture toward the phone calls I had to make today which were caused not by technical gremlins but by someone's incompetence or negligence.

The real quality of a company is when things go wrong. Orange hasn't been dreadful but they haven't been good. Both outages were fixed within a week which, by all accounts, is positively gazelle-like for an ISP. The outage was fixed by capping my line speed to a lower rate than before I 'upgraded' my account (I was very happy at 2Mb speed, now I am at 1Mb speed). The promised refunds were not applied immediately and required further phone calls from me to get them.

My contract with Orange lasts until November this year but the ISP market is such ("up to 8Mb connection", they might as well say up to eleventy mcbillion squeegy-bytes) that switching may be a case of out of the frying pan...

Here endeth the moan.

Back on but also back in time

Internet connection was restored today and a further refund of £3.99 should be in my bank account in the middle of March (they never take three weeks to take money, of course, only to return it).

Disagreeably, though, my connection has gone back in time as far as speed is concerned. After a couple of hours use, Orange locked me to a 1mb broadband speed whereas before this two week period of disconnection and for the first couple of hours of this reconnection I had a broadband speed between 2 and 2.5mb (out of a potential 3.5mb).

I contacted Orange about this and got through straight away (which was terrific) and support operative Andrew told me he'd put through a speed increase request. He commented that the lower speed seems to have been necessary to get me back online and that I try reconnecting again in a couple of hours time to see if the request was successful.

You can see my new (lack of) speed measured here.

Well, we'll see if my service is restored to its former state.

Spoke too soon...

Well, my internet connection only lasted a couple of days. It returned Thursday morning and disappeared Sunday afternoon.

I have the same problem as before, slow flashing @ light and "PPP Server Down" error message from the Wireless and Talk router.

It took a very long time to get through to technical support this time, nearly 20 minutes, and I needed to get a little irate with the representative before she assured me she would not go through all the same protocols I had the week before (line test this, line test that) and that it would be bubbled up to the fault service personnel and should be repaired within 48 hours. However, I will be very pleasantly stunned if things are back within 48 hours. Here's hoping.

It could be worse. I happen to live near enough a wireless hot spot to be able to connect to check email and make this post, for example.

Apparently, one week is good

On the very day I posted that my projector seems to be okay (it has now gone up to 100 hour lamp life without problem) my internet connection died. Grief!

I have a Wanadoo branded Inventel wireless router under the Wireless and Talk brand (now operated by Orange). The error was "PPP server down". After six days and five phone calls, my connection is now restored.

However, a friend of mine told me he once had his (not Orange) internet connection disappear for over a month and there are a few other horror stories on the web about Orange technical support.

So I am glad to report that my problem was resolved within this reasonable time frame. It expired on a Thursday afternoon (when we had all that snow). I reported it on a Friday. It was restored about 2am the following Thursday.

Of the five times I called, I was only waiting for a very long time (about two-thirds of an episode of "Curb Your Enthusiasm"!) on one of them and you are informed that you are to be in for a long wait ahead of time. The other times were answered within a couple of minutes, once within about five minutes (again, a 'we are very busy' message was delivered first) and once instantly.

I ended up making sure I phoned during normal-ish working hours as I seemed to get northern English- or Scottish-accented support personnel and they consistently had access to the technical services required. When calling at more exotic times (I am a late-night person), I tended to get strongly Indian-accented support personnel whose access to the relevant technical services needed seemed to be much more erratic.

Upon calling today to process my refund, I was also pleased that they said they will arrange a refund of £9.99 which is double what I was expecting. I pay £19.99 a month and the service was out for nearly a week and so I would have been expecting a refund of about £5. The extra will comfortably pay for the charges on their 0870 technical support number (7 pence a minute).

So, overall, not too bad as far as speed and service and, providing they process it as stated over the phone, I am very happy with the refund. Yay!

Is poor customer service necessary?

It's probably been clear that I have been largely unhappy with Superfi Coventry's customer service. Superfi Coventry were consistently polite but were always passing the buck to Panasonic, their Nottingham headquarters or Superfi policy. Martin at Superfi Head Office, on the other hand, was active in resolving the situation and I felt confident in his desire to get the matter expedited. From my first contact with him, it took two weeks to receive a replacement projector in my hands. For comparison, within two weeks of returning the projector to Superfi Coventry, they had simply sent it to Nottingham Head Office but without any details of its provenance or even that it needed to be replaced because it was faulty (none of my emails were forwarded and mention of a fault was made on the appropriate paperwork).

Things going wrong, especially new technology items (and the Panasonic AX100 is not just a minor evolution, indeed, it's new size may shock owners of former models), is a circumstance that must happen with reasonable regularity. While there is natural disappointment at an item you have purchased being faulty it is how that situation is dealt with by the retailer that determines the quality of the customer's experience.

So what would have made me happy? I shall propose such a solution and leave it to you to determine whether it is unreasonable or financially undesirable from Superfi Coventry's point of view.

This is an overview of what happened:

1. December 1st: I ordered the projector.


2. December 8th: I received the projector.


3. December 16th: I reported the fault but told Superfi I would be placing the projector into Normal for fifty hours to see if that sorted it.


4. January 5th: I requested a replacement on January 5th, 28 days after receiving it.


5. January 8th: Superfi Coventry responded by saying they could not arrange a replacement because it was now more than 28 days since I had received it and Panasonic don't furnish replacements after 28 days. An interesting note here is that this is the only time in all my email correspondence with Superfi that they replied on a different day to when they received the email.


6. January 9th: I returned the projector to Superfi Coventry. They say that it will take about two weeks to be sorted.


7. January 10th: Superfi Coventry send the projector to Superfi Nottingham for processing but do not supply the email provenance and do not make it clear that a refund / replacement / repair is being waited for. The fault description on the repair job card says in its entirety: "see notes can you please call panosonic as they are aware of fault" [sic].


8. January 19th: I request an update from Superfi Coventry and they get in touch with Superfi Head Office and inform me that the projector is still sitting there awaiting collection by Panasonic. When asked to chase it, they suggest I call Superfi Head Office direct and give me the appropriate name and number. I call Superfi Head Office and he sounds genuinely surprised when I tell him it is faulty, that it has been faulty for nearly six weeks now and that I am waiting for a repair / replacement.


9. January 22nd: Superfi Head Office call me (a most pleasant surprise) to tell me that Panasonic have now picked up the projector and should be authorising a replacement. He'll call me when they confirm.


10. January 26th: Superfi Head Office call me and let me know Panasonic have authorised a replacement and that it will be at Superfi Coventry with their next delivery. Panasonic items arrive there on a Thursday.


11. February 1st: Superfi Head Office call me and let me know that the projector is at Superfi Coventry ready for collection. I make arrangements and collect it.

What I wanted to happen:

1. January 5th: I request a replacement projector. Superfi Coventry respond in their usual timely manner after making appropriate arrangements and tell me they'll call when it arrives and I can bring my faulty projector in and swap it for the replacement at the same time. This is especially nice because they know of my severely limiting health (I have told them about it on several of my emails) and that travelling to Superfi means making special arrangements and extra physical effort and pain.


2. Preferably January 8th or, acceptably, January 15th: Superfi Coventry call me to let me know that the replacement has arrived. I make arrangements and take the faulty one in and return home with a new one.

In general, I wanted Superfi Coventry to do the chasing. I wanted to leave this matter in their hands and for them to contact me when the situation was resolved.

I was happy when this was the circumstance with Superfi Head Office. It instilled confidence and a feeling that a satisfactory resolution was something they were actively working towards on my behalf.

Am I being unreasonable?

Panasonic AX100: Take Two

Martin from Superfi Head Office has rung to let me know I have a replacement projector ready at Superfi Coventry just as he said last week.

I hope this one works out all right but I'll only know in a couple of weeks as it took 8 days before the brightness flickering problem reared it's head before.

New projector on its way

Martin at Superfi Head Office confirmed today that Panasonic have authorised a replacement unit and that it should arrive at Superfi Coventry with their next Panasonic delivery. As the previous projector arrived on a Thursday I should get a phone call on the 1st February to confirm collection.

To be honest I think it is a bit of a poor show that the projector wasn't here this Thursday as Martin had arranged this on Monday but as long as it's here next Thursday I shall be adequately satisfied.

Let's just hope it works!

Superfi Nottingham get back to me

Superfi Head Office got back to me today without being chased. This is pleasing as this is what Martin said he would do. He said he would be trying to secure a replacement unit for me from Panasonic. Hopefully, the next call will be to tell me I can pick it up.

Panasonic Customer Support in single working day response shock!

A pleasant surprise in my Inbox today (Monday) as Jill Farrar from Panasonic customer support has replied to my Friday message confirming that Panasonic have picked up my projector from Superfi (at last). She also made the following pleasing comment:

It will now be brought to Panasonic for inspection, and we will try to expedite this for you.

Chasing the light: 'my' Panasonic AX100 projector remains in the ether

A mere six days after my previous customer support request from Panasonic (good these 24-hour replies, aren't they?), Panasonic reply with a "it's nothing to do with us" and "there's nothing wrong with our projector" e-mail. They state, quite rightly (as I understand the Sales of Goods Act 1974), that Superfi are the ones who authorise replacements, refunds and repairs because that is where I bought it. Yet Superfi Coventry keep shifting the blame to Panasonic for their tardy service. Superfi Coventry also claim no knowledge of their legal obligations with Jameela repeatedly stating "I don't know anything about that." Jameela being the store manager. Hmm.

I also contacted Superfi Coventry today to see if I would be able to get my projector back next week as they initially suggested. Would it surprise you to learn that the answer was "No"? In fact, my projector had been sitting in their service centre for seven working days "waiting for Panasonic to collect it."

However, they did give me their Head Office number and suggested I call them. A helpful chap named Martin answered and seemed surprised that the projector was faulty (which is odd) and that I had reported this fault over a month ago. I guess he hadn't seen that detailed sheet of fault information I placed with the projector as he was simply moving the projector directly to Panasonic. He was unable to contact the person at Panasonic he was looking for this afternoon and promised to get back to me on Monday.

The projector goes back

This is regarding my Panasonic AX100 with its fluctuating brightness problem also known as the Eco-Mode flicker. My blog entry.

Apparently Panasonic only swap out projectors within 28 days. Thanks to a four week delay by Panasonic's hilariously titled Customer Support department and a weekend-spanning delay by Superfi, I missed the 28 days. Despite having reported the problem 8 days after receiving the projector.

Still the projector has been returned to Superfi with an estimated resolution time of two weeks. That'll be the 23rd January 2007.

Amazingly, two days after returning the projector to Superfi, Panasonic Customer Support replied to my original email requesting, well, customer support. Here is what they wrote:

ISSUE RESOLUTION: Dear Mr Champion,

Thank you for your e-mail enquiry. Firstly, please accept my sincere apologies for the uncharacteristic delay in our response. Due to an unexpected increase in the number of contacts we have recently received, we have been unable to provide as speedy a response as we would normally.

If you still require assistance, I would be grateful if you would confirm.

Firstly, I believe my understanding of the term "issue resolution" may differ somewhat from Panasonic's.

Secondly, the response delay is not uncharacteristic from my standpoint. I also owned a Panasonic AE200 (which I was very very very happy with) but an enquiry regarding this projector took months to materialise. So long that I had forgotten I had asked them about it. So long that I had sold the projector.

Thirdly, I replied within minutes. This was on Wednesday, 11th January 2007. It is now Saturday and I still haven't heard. The Panasonic website says that they aim to reply to all customer support emails with 24 hours. They might aim. They miss.

Panasonic AX100E: brightness flicker problem

(Make sure you read the entire post.)

After a couple of years of saving and selling a load of stuff on eBay, I'm in the fortunate position of being able to purchase an HD projector. I've chosen a Panasonic AX100. Naturally, however, every silver lining has a cloud...

History

My previous projector was a Panasonic AE200. I got this as a replacement for a faulty AE100 and I was delighted with it from day one. However, the time was approaching to consider selling it before a new bulb purchase became urgent or buy a new bulb. Because it didn't support HD I decided to sell the projector and put the money toward a shiny new one.

Brightness Flicker Problem

Disagreeably, a week or so after getting the AX100 a nasty little gremlin raised his head in the form of a picture whose brightness alternated every couple of seconds when used in Eco-Mode.

Agreeably, a search of the web brought about a DIY solution:

• Put the projector in Normal mode for about fifty hours.
  

Splendidly simple. And, you know, it worked. I'm now happily using the projector in Eco-Mode for a further few days and all seems to be well. Terrific.

Except...

This didn't solve the problem permanently. About 50 hours bulb life later, the problem returned. It is less intrusive and more intermittent now but still there and still disappointing.