Apple Tech Support STINKS!

[gastroboy]

We are doubly blessed here in Australia, if you think you have it bad there, come down under.
My G4 was bad out of the box it crashed 5 mins after I got it and kept crashing till I couldn't boot up off the HD. With no floppy drive, no networking on the OS CD and no booting up off the external Firewire drive I was up sh*t creek (otherwise known as the Apple experience) without a paddle.
After tremendous trouble contacting Apple (they had an old disconnected number on the warrantee card) I got slow, surly bad advice after bad advice.
In the end I was forced to take it to my Apple Centre who charged me $99, "not under warrantee because it was a software problem".
Apple had the cheek to "survey" me afterwards as to whether I would buy from them again (think they wanted to know if they had totally burnt me off and was worth persisting with me or not).
I have friends who relish blaming ME if I site problems with Apple so I was gratified when one of them bought a dud G4 Cube only to have to return it 5 times to Apple, who kept denying anything was wrong even tho he went in and proved the fault to them.
In the end they never fixed it after having it for months and my friend just stuck it under his desk as a bad deal.
Another friend had a bad CD door on her iBook,and had lots of trouble returning it (Apple insisted it be shipped, not taken to a repair centre). It was lost in transit and Apple didn't own up for months. They finally offered her a new machine but no new warrantee to make up for the 3 months she had been without a computer.
Now ask me: Why am I not buying another Mac (ignoring the high prices and technology lag)?
Ever noticed how Mac users are getting older and no new younger ones taking their place?

[xaqintosh]

wha? I'm only 13 and I'm a die-hard mac-fan. and I have been since I was 6. in fact a lot if not most members here at this forum are under 25.

[gastroboy]

Originally posted by xaqintosh
wha? I'm only 13 and I'm a die-hard mac-fan. and I have been since I was 6. in fact a lot if not most members here at this forum are under 25.

Good for you! Are you in the States? Because the story isn't the same out here. Support for Apple was stronger here than in the States before the big Apple meltdown. Since then we have been virtually abandoned whilst Apple gazes at its Nth American navel.
Heck Apple can't even get the date right for non-USA users let alone A4 paper sizes as a default in Print. Their international support gets worse and worse.
Anyone know if they have fixed right to left text support in OSX or got Korean to work properly yet?

[xaqintosh]

Yes I am in the states.

[dixonbm]

Originally posted by gastroboy
Ever noticed how Mac users are getting older and no new younger ones taking their place?

I'm 22 and have been a mac fanatic since my first computer in 1991. I've been grooming both of my little brothers as well....9 and 12.

[gastroboy]

Originally posted by dixonbm


I'm 22 and have been a mac fanatic since my first computer in 1991. I've been grooming both of my little brothers as well....9 and 12.

Yes but you are in Tennessee.
Apple cast off its most loyal followers when it retreated to home base USA and has treated us (international users) like second class citizens ever since. Progressively making life harder and more expensive every year.
I am tired of being shown what American users are offered and what "reasonable prices" they are in the USA. We are suposed to pretend that somehow this applies to us here?
Apple has burnt a lot of bridges (and users along with them). The only reason we are still on Macs is we bought them a while ago and haven't got around to making replacement decisions.
People bag Quark which has acted similarly, but Apple comes a close second for desultory customer support.
How do you spell hubris? A-P-P-L-E!