I received replies from Australian and European Verbatim. What do you think about them?
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Sorry for the delayed response. Our office here in Victoria had been affected by floods over the weekend and we've been busy cleaning up the office.
I have read through your query. You have made some valid points and here are a couple answers to help you clarify your situation.
The problem you described with the firmware update only affects NCQ (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NCQ) which is applicable using a SATA or eSATA connection. It is not used when connected via a USB enclosure and therefore no risk of data loss is present.
We cannot provide testing softwares for legal reasons. If there is a problem with your drive, you will have to send it in to us where we complete testing in our lab. Using a drive via USB interface does not allow all the access that a SATA connection would allow with softwares such as "ESTOOL v 3.01". This is a constraint that all external USB drives will have.
Verbatim warranty doesn't cover data loss. You may read our policy on our website here:
http://www.verbatim.com.au/en_AU/suppor ... e/view/451 All our drives are partitioned and aligned correctly from the factory. The drives are formatted as FAT32 because this is the most compatible format. We do not provide additional formatting software.
Regarding the warranty issue, the product sold in the US is not the same as ours. We sell the same product as they do in Europe and offer the same warranty as them - 2 years. This warranty time limit is given to us from our manufacturers.
I hope this has clarified your situation.
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Thank you for your comments. This message has been passed onto our product managers and will be looked upon.
Unfortunately, we are unable to provide the service and support that you've requested. Our current products and services have been addressed by our product managers to determine the best possible way to provide the best service for our customers.
There are countless reasons why we have restrictions to our warranty policies. If any of them are to be rid, there most certainly will be loopholes that certain customers may take advantage of, thereby possibly causing further issues that may hinder us from providing the best customer service response we can.
If you're unhappy with our product, you may return it for a refund and purchase a separate product that may include the requested softwares and doesn't void the warranty if opened.
Regarding the differences between the US product and the warranty questions, we don't have details of their specific differences, but we only offer for sale the product that carries the 2 year warranty - as detailed by our manufacturers.
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Dear Customer,
Thank you for this e-mail. Your reference number is **********.
Please quote this reference on all future correspondence with us.
Please note that we are technical support/repair centre and we do provide technical support, do the troubleshooting with the customers and test non working devices here.
There can be any of the following hard disks inside Verbatim enclosure:
Hitachi, Seagate, Samsung, Toshiba, WD.
Please provide us with the following information:
- the model no. of the drive, located at the back of the drive and starting with 475xx/476xx/53xxx
- its serial number, located on the same label as the model no.
- its date and place of purchase/a copy of proof of purchase
- the version of operating system you are using
- a detailed description of the fault
- any error message
- if the drive works with a different connection cable
- if the drive works on a different PC
- if the drive works with any of the USB port
- if the light is on
Verbatim is not responsible for loss of data
and we do not provide Data Recovery service.
Please note that if they have to open the drive physically, its warranty will be cancelled.
The Verbatim external hard drives are pre-formatted to FAT32.
Each customer can re-format the hard drive.
Best Regards,
Verbatim Euro Support
Dutec Limited
Company Registered in Ireland No: 307480
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Dear Customer,
Please provide us with the following information:
- a screen shots of any error message
- if the external hard drive works with your computer
- if the external hard drive works with a different computer
Best Regards,
Verbatim Euro Support
Dutec Limited
Company Registered in Ireland No: 307480
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I have an impression that the European support did not read carefully my message at all.