On one hand, I wish I hadn`t started tracking the pricing info for the M528. On the other hand, I think its been important at highlighting customers opinion to the resellers. For example, when the first reseller price was released, the tech blogs and potential customers reacted very negatively. Not surprising at that price! And then, just days ago, the reaction turned positive as Expansys added the M528 to its catalogue at a teasingly good 550 Euros.
Today though, I`m wishing that the resellers would get their acts together because I’ve received a response to my `is that price correct and does it include 3G` query. You guessed it. The price does not include 3G which changes the equation completely. Now we`re looking at a device that simply isn’t a MID anymore. What makes Gigabyte and resellers think that people are going to want a MID that only works in WIfi hotspots and where is the 3G version? A modified description at Expansys leads us to believe that the 3G is now user upgradeable but I don`t see any upgrade options.
"LAN/Wireless LAN – 802.11b/g via SDIO I/F, HSDPA available through mini card module (available separately)" (ref)
I`ve sent a query email to the UK marketing people but as its past 6pm there as I write this, I don`t expect to see an answer until Tuesday.
OK this changes everything, I have an order for this unit, but without the 3G option I may need to cancel it. Chippy do you know what type of card is it a mini standard card like in most computers?
This is very bad news. I also have an order and I will cancel it too. No 3G no deal.
canceling….
The Nokia N820 and Sony Mylo all claim to be MID and both have no 3G, piss me off. This M528 is different though as it can run XP so I can easily add a USB modem where there is no WiFi. Therefore, this is still the best MID.
Sigh :( No 3G – no deal. I wonder how much they will be charging for the optional 3G upgrade? And is there room for that inside the device or is it going to add to the dimensions of the device?
Aigo MIDs are on eBay for better price, they too don’t have the 3G
Guys you should *not* cancel your orders! It is Expansys LEGAL requirment to supply you with what they have originially indicated!!!
No they aren’t. Not if they haven’t taken any money from your credit card (which they haven’t).
Their terms and conditions will fully cover internet mistakes too.
Well technically if the buyer has done everything as in accepting conditions and provided the CC info, and the only reason the card hasn’t been charged it would be an agreement. Yes obviously Expansys can play a big corporate guy and care less about what they initially promised, but frankly I could care less if they support UMPCportal or not, if they have had a posted price and customers have agreed and provided their CC info they should just provide the product as indicated or expect to be be avoided in the future!
It’s unfortunate that “small guy” companies that can barely do such things (financially) end up doing so more often than “big guys” who could afford such. Since it’s really a result of them not managing their own “big” enterprise by the right hand not really know what the left is doing.
Yeah I’m sure they can hide behind the “fine print” but that wouldn’t be what a respectable company should be doing. It is part of business to take a “no profit” or even a loss at times if one (the company itself) is to blame!
Sorry but I completely disagree. Much as I love a bargain and a cheap deal and I’m certainly no fan of Expansys.
A company should lose £100 per unit because a mistake was made in understanding information provided by a Japanese supplier?
So if a 1000 people pre-ordered they should lose £100000 and go bankrupt and not be able to provide goods any more?
Expansys are pretty big, so probably could survive, but the internet with all it’s hot deal sites latches quickly onto ‘bargain’ mistakes really quickly and could easily kill smaller companies.
They have taken no money, there is no binding contract. And in your first line you say ‘accepting the conditions’, well those conditions will definitely say something like sorry mistakes happen and we won’t be liable for them.
Of course, a good company would send out an apology and maybe a discount voucher. But I doubt that will happen…
But I agree. It’s always worth boycotting bad service.
And the little guy is always better, as they have to be to survive. I know, I run a little guy software company and in terms of service, we blow away our multi million pound competitors. It’s not even close.
But people keep spending fortunes on them, for worse software and service.
That’s a whole different rant though! ;)
Marc, do you own a business? :)
First off they most likely wouldn’t loose anything, they are not a NON PROFIT organization, they are a business in the business of making money, so they make money off of EVERY MOVE including the Shipping and Handling fees they charge (trust me that’s how it works!), I am not sure what Japan has to do with the subject here, we are talking about TW supplier here not Japan, but that is beside the point totally as to who & where the supplier is. It is the retailers responsibility to verify and get facts straight PRIOR to listing and going out with something publicly, this isn’t politics :) it’s business :)
So as I already stated, regardless if they would “break even” (which I believe is closer to the fact) or loose some profit it is what a company who wants to be respected should do! Now if indeed this error was from the supplier level, it would be appropriate for the retailer to have the supplier compensate for the error, and that too would be fully possible with the size of Expansys. Unfortunately such compensations more often stay in the hands of the retailer and seldom benefit the end consumer. Bottomline is the price difference between what we “see” as consumers and what Expansys pays, is a lot bigger than you might imagine!
Expansys is no small company and this is just a little drop in the bucket for them even if they GAVE away all these devices that were pre-ordered! Having said that any boycott you or anyone else would feel they wanted to do would also go unnoticed by them, financially speaking, many times such efforts actually bring in new customers in fact :)
Actually legally speaking there *IS* a contract because at some point as a customer you have agreed to the terms, so as to have signed in real life. The exchange of money is secondary! If a company puts a legal document in front of you and you sign it, the exchange of money is not the important part but just part of the written agreement, and it is an obligation of the buyer to provide these funds, and the seller to provide the service/product.
YES it s true that all too often online business just take advantage of the possibility to refund or not having charged the CC, though that is NOT the legal binding part! The exchange of money would ONLY be the “binding part” when/if there is NO OTHER binding documentation, as when you go to your local market to buy groceries :)
Yes I own a business. And I bend over backwards to keep people happy as I’m not the big corporation that can afford to lose customers.
I’m nice too, which makes it much harder to make money!
I agree with pretty much everything you say, but I’m pretty sure in the UK trading law, that in this kind of situation, there is no obligation to supply good unless they took money from you.
And any terms you’ve agreed to when making the order will be hard to find and be in their favour!
To give them some credit, they do reserve for customers on the preorder basis and do give you the opportunity to cancel once they get stock before charging you.
I also would probably never use them, they tend to cost too much, but I want an M528 yesterday, so will pay to get one ASAP.
Yeah unfortunately in this day and age of online purchasing, the…
1. legal obligation of the seller
2. legal rights of the buyer
3. the ability or possibility to demand such without spending more on the legal steps than on the service/products
..tend to have very little to do with reality with international (and even national) online buying. Where all too often the seller (the bigger the worse) has the last say. As most consumers just move on, and the sellers know this.
This is great news!!!! I already have my 3G usb modem I take everywhere with me and or my phone that supports BT PAN and DUN. I hate having it built in and/or having to have another pricy data plan for a single device…
If the lack of 3G is good news for you why don’t you already own an AIGO MID which is already readily available ( on eBay for one at least) and at a LOWER price than this sybling by Gigabyte?
Aigo MID is “in stock” by HK seller(s?) at $659.99 and 358.99 GBP obviously there’s a shipping cost too in “eBay tradition” it’s marked up but since Expansys doesn’t include “S&H” either but they don’t have it in stock either I think it can now be compared.
The Aigo’s on eBay have horrendously high shipping rates and there is always a good chance of around 20% in taxes (if importing to the UK).
Yes as I stated the eBay listed ones have a high shipping cost but even at that its a better deal than the Expansys one! As for the import tax I’d say read the listings ( I just did) since it’s not “by the book” I’m choosing not to post it on here :) but it would clearly indicate that the import duties wouldn’t be an “issue”.
You’re right. I thought the £60 shipping it took it well over the Expansys price.
Import tax dodges are working less and less these days. Even when sellers try to minimise the impact. Certainly in the UK they have realised they are losing out on a nice revenue stream!
Technically the receiver is liable, and legal action could be taken against them, but in reality they basically guess a value and hopefully that isn’t more than it is worth!
Still as long as you are expecting to pay 20% tax then if the dodging works it can be considered a bonus!
If there was a 3G module I’d give it a go.
Yeah it works out to around 420GBP shipped while Expansys’ price of 435GBP is EXCLUDING S&H.
I’m sure the seller wouldn’t mind putting the “actual” (eBay) price as the product cost? 358 +20% should work out to 429 POUNDs so at that point it becomes more than Expansys (when adding the marked up shipping cost from eBay). Many times especially with new products like this there is more or less the same price.
Is there any pictures online at this point of the AIGO (or M528) taken a part? To figure out where/how the HSDPA module would install?
BTW Dynamism has the M528 listed with HSDPA too but no price or anything yet.
If a 3G module is available on release. I’ll still get one, but I won’t be happy about the extra costs.
The tech lust for this is just too high…
Although there only appears to be one Aigo model out right now. There were actually two other model numbers listed in all the launch details. I assume these have better specs/3G options (as they had higher numbers)
disappointing , but this gives more motivation to wait for a proper mid , hopefully one with a decent keyboard as well.
I’m not feeling the keyboard it the best one out there ( I feel Sharp made devices with 5 rows are!) but I’m curious as to why you’re indicating that the M528 one isn’t even “decent”?
Chippy had a recent pre-release unit and he said it was rather Nokia N810 like.
Which is a shame, but not enough to put me off (and a small part of me hopes (but doubts) it will be better in the real thing)
I wish he’d said it was OQO like, as that is pretty good.
Since I have not had an AIGO or M528 in my hands yet I can only go by the pictures and yes the M528 and N810 look like what I call “HTC-like” keyboards that every other sliding Windows Mobile smartphone has had for the past few years, though I think JKK mentioned in one of the videos of the M528 that it had a better feel to it.
OQO 02 keyboard is ok, just a tad wide though, the OQO 01 keyboards, were next into unacceptable.
When I first saw the OQO 02 keyboard it reminded me of the Atari Portfolio, anyone else remember it on here? I have feeling that could very well be the very first UMPC ever? :)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atari_Portfolio
Imagine that’s like 20 years old in a few months!
The aigo has only one camera and the resolution is 300K, the battery is 2700 where as the M528 is 3400 I would prefer the M525. I am not sure if anyone has asked this question what type of connection for the 3G??
Good points, I wasn’t aware of these differences between the AIGO and Giga!
Good pictures of the AIGO unboxing..(yes old news!)
http://www.umpcfever.com/news/?postid=1109
Expansys indicates 3060mAh where did you see 3400?
http://www.expansys.com/d.aspx?i=165783
sorry, my eyes were filled with tears when I saw the update
Not trying to correct you I was just making sure if there was a 3400mAh battery also?
Anyone know if the LG will make it out to the retail market? I wouldn’t mind this one with the mousepad (that’s what it is right?)
http://www.umpcportal.com/products/product.php?id=161
Look, I don’t really care for this thing, but taking 3G out is like (almost) the difference between buying an iPod Touch vs. an iPhone 3G.
No 3G = no fun.
I did my WiFi hotspot chasing with that N&%$#@ 770 and will NOT go through that EVER again with a pocketable Net device. (Note, it’s a slightly different story for me with a Netbook.)
The lack of real good 3G pocketable devices and lack of 3G with my carrier (TmoUSA) make me look into such alternatives as http://www.autonetmobile.com ironically this brings to mind the mobilephones pre-handset era when some of us mobilephone (or let’s say carphone!) users wanted to have a phone WITH US, not only in the car, and the first ‘real’ solution offered was by Benefon in the form of Benefon CLASS that was an NMT (analog) carphone and with a cordless handset that worked just like your cordless at home, but with its base in your car :)
http://oh3tr.ele.tut.fi/~ftp/modifications/benefon/class/kuvat/Class_luurilla.jpg
Now I am tempted to go a similar route with a 3G router in my car :)
man…we want 3G!
on the other hand: i wouldn’t mind building in the hsdpa card (one WITH voice capability) by myself…
nonetheless: without the 3G the device is pretty much useless for most people…
I got the Aigo P8860 last week and has the Wi-Fi and BT. Even though it doesn’t have the 3G built in. You could always use si-Fi or use BT DUN with your extisting GSM phone and you wouldn’t have to get another service to use the 3G. Just my opion, and also the Aigo is 659.99 and the high shipping is not that bad. I ordered last week on Sunday and had the Aigo at my house Tuesday morning very fast. Seller ships next day so I think that’s why it cost so much to ship. I have been able to run Ubuntu and KDE on the Aigo. I posted some pictures over at http://forum.pocketables.net/showthread.php?t=749
http://forum.pocketables.net/showthread.php?t=756
I’ve heared that Aigo has locked down bios that does not allow to boot from extermal media. Is that not true? Or did you managed to install Ubuntu in some other way?
From me inability to install Debian is the the biggest roadblock on the way to buying Aigo/Gigabyte.
Take a look at this: http://www.umpcportal.com/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=3588&forum=22
Posted this also here:
http://www.midmods.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=5
Dedicated to hacking modding MIDs
Despite of what Expansys is offering, on the Gigabyte website the hsdpa-module is still listed in the specifications.
Regards.
http://www.engadget.com/2008/08/19/compal-announces-mid-slider-with-global-hspa-edge-data/
now there’s a third manufacturer who sells this hardware…
Since Steve (Chippy, you know the guy who runs this site :)) is there at IDF I’m sure we will here more about this shortly.
Anyway I believe that Compal might be the one building these for a number of other brands as Compal is an old well known OEM supplier.
http://www.compal.com/index_En.htm
Oh not I remember Compal has been on to this type of form factor for some time now!
http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/14/compal-showcases-prototype-umpc-running-windows-ce/
Just cancelled my order, oh well time to look at other devices i think.
Gigabyte MID M528 MobilX already priced at 655 Euros inc. VAT.
http://www.mobilx.hu/gigabyte-m528-mid.html
The Mobilx price is a lot higher than Expansys. However their description still includes the HSDPA module.
I have emailed them to see if they can confirm it does include HSDPA….
Tegatech (Resselers) sell it §999 USD but with 8Gb SSD (not only 4Gb), I think it’s not a mistake.
Expansys have changed the description again. It now says:
HSDPA available through mini card module (TBC)
Fingers crossed. It maybe be included after all!
Have anybody asked Expansys whether M528 included the HSDPA module? Or are they still waiting the confirmation from Gigabyte?
I’ve mailed to gigabyte and here is the answer:
Dear Sir,
Thank you interesting in GIGABYTE products.
I am sorry but we have no plan to launch M528 in European market at a moment and all bundle function like 3G declare internal not yet
GIGABYTE-Team
Not sure that person knows much!
The M528 is confirmed as a Euro launch. They always stated that’s where it’s first market was and Expansys have already had a test version.
Both Expansys and Mobilx are taking pre-orders, so they are clearly expecting a Euro launch too.
So, hopefully they are wrong on the second point too…
Anyone (else) tempted to (or already has) get the Aigo P8860?
I’d just want to get a “hands on” experience with on of these.