g7kse.co.uk

I’m glad to say that my shiney new Advent netbook is back in my hands. none of the previous troubles seem to have followed it and after tapping away on the keys for a number of hours there is still only the small problem of me being a poor typist that causes the problems.

There’s plenty of reviews about these devices floating around so you don’t need me to tell you if its worth buying. Needless to say you can guess the answer quite quickly.

Another worthy mention is PC World who had one waiting for me and a handy 10% off without too much pressing. Many thanks

Having spent the last 10 minutes on the phone pressing #1 for failures to deliver and #3 for staff who aren’t able to do anything i have found out that instead of replacing my long long Advent 4211 they have refunded me. Trouble is I need one for next week and I leave on Saturday. So, how to get out of the problem

‘Can you reserve me one at the store nearest where I am going to be?’

‘Yes’ says the oppo ‘ For 24 hours’

‘Unfortunately I’m not going to be there until Saturday’ I say ‘ Can you hold it until then. It just needs a note on it saying when I’ll be picking it up’.

‘Sorry, computer says no’ replies the increasingly ambivalent oppo

‘Where does that leave me, bearing in mind you lot have caused this’ Says the slightly irate customer (ex customer?)

‘You’ll have to ring back Friday’ she says

‘What happens if there isn’t one there?’ I ask

‘Dunno’ she says ‘ They’ll phone you if there isn’t one’

‘Can I have there number to check on Saturday morning, the store is 300 miles away from me’

‘Sorry, they don’t have phones’

‘Thanks’ I say. Without Pee Cee and without any trust in another company that could have easily done something nice like’ Don’t worry sir, we’ll deliver one to you by Friday morning. I’m very sorry for our muck up and here have a ‘Yorkie’ bar for being patient with us, we do actually have your money after all’. Still thats progress in the online world……lesson learnt, the smaller the outlet the more likely they are of wanting to keep you as a customer.

Humbug!

It’s been a sad few hours without it but now that the Advent has gone back for a replacement I really know how much it will be missed. Only 7 days or so to get a new one but even after typing out over 200 words onto it over the weekend I’ve found that apart from the more frequent typing mistakes the machine is just perfect for my needs.

It came with XP pre-installed which was a bit of a bummer as I like my Ubuntu. Seeing as I had no choice and really it’s for my wife I thought it should stay as a XP machine. This means that it it can potentialy run Ham Radio Deluxe, something thats been missing out of my life since I went all Linux

So I tried it very breifly with PSK31 and it worked a treat. Although the screen is minute there is just enough room to make a QSO. Yes a bigger screeen will do the job nicely but for the time being it’s just what the doctor ordered.

Software installed

Open Office – Of course, remove the nasty MS works and install possible the best open source app in the world…save only

Firefox3 – need I say more

BBC iPlayer – Never thought I would use it until I went away for a week

Good Sync – Snychronising Pen drives, web site….the lot