Thanks to everyone for getting in touch with me. I've got a fairly clear picture now of where things stand with Rhys and the phonoclone 3 group buy:
1. Rhys is still around, still posting to the forum, and trying to deal with at least three different group buys.
2. The other group buys he started are in far worse shape that the phonoclone 3 one. More people, longer delays.
3. There seems to be a few orders trickling out, but the majority of people still have nothing.
4. Rhys has closed his web storefront.
What all this tells me is that Rhys proceeded with these multiple group buys in an irresponsible way. What went wrong I can only guess at, but I imagine it was something along the lines of using the money he received for other things, thinking he could pay it back later. He did not, however, set out to deliberately defraud and he is currently trying to sort out the situation.
How each of you choose to deal with this is up to you. I personally don't feel he is deserving of any sympathy:
- He has not sent people boards that were paid for over three months ago.
- He has never given us an honest explanation for the delays.
- He does not reply to most of the email he receives.
- He has said kits were shipped when they were almost certainly not.
- He has never apologized.
That said, I don't know what, if anything, we as a community can do about it.
Richard
Confirm received:
||earsandeyes||2||The Netherlands|| (boards only)
||JBdV||?||The Netherlands|| (kit, received May 8th, not on wiki)
Confirm did not receive:
||rjm||2||Japan|| (paid for boards, never told how much to pay for additional parts)
||lancer||4||Singapore|| (kit, paid, shipped May 8th)
||kffern||2||Australia|| (kit, paid, shipped May 23rd)
||northernsky||2||Italy|| (kit, paid, no shipping info given)
||prooptiki||2||Greece|| (boards only, no shipping info given)
||FinnC||2||Denmark||(kit, paid, shipped May 2, not on wiki)
||Yan6||2||Canada||(boards only, paid, not shipped - waiting on other boards?)
Unconfirmed
||enzedone||2||New Zealand|| (kit, posted May 7th saying he had not received)
||noelectrix||2||Germany|| (kit, posted May 15th saying had not received)
1. Rhys is still around, still posting to the forum, and trying to deal with at least three different group buys.
2. The other group buys he started are in far worse shape that the phonoclone 3 one. More people, longer delays.
3. There seems to be a few orders trickling out, but the majority of people still have nothing.
4. Rhys has closed his web storefront.
What all this tells me is that Rhys proceeded with these multiple group buys in an irresponsible way. What went wrong I can only guess at, but I imagine it was something along the lines of using the money he received for other things, thinking he could pay it back later. He did not, however, set out to deliberately defraud and he is currently trying to sort out the situation.
How each of you choose to deal with this is up to you. I personally don't feel he is deserving of any sympathy:
- He has not sent people boards that were paid for over three months ago.
- He has never given us an honest explanation for the delays.
- He does not reply to most of the email he receives.
- He has said kits were shipped when they were almost certainly not.
- He has never apologized.
That said, I don't know what, if anything, we as a community can do about it.
Richard
Confirm received:
||earsandeyes||2||The Netherlands|| (boards only)
||JBdV||?||The Netherlands|| (kit, received May 8th, not on wiki)
Confirm did not receive:
||rjm||2||Japan|| (paid for boards, never told how much to pay for additional parts)
||lancer||4||Singapore|| (kit, paid, shipped May 8th)
||kffern||2||Australia|| (kit, paid, shipped May 23rd)
||northernsky||2||Italy|| (kit, paid, no shipping info given)
||prooptiki||2||Greece|| (boards only, no shipping info given)
||FinnC||2||Denmark||(kit, paid, shipped May 2, not on wiki)
||Yan6||2||Canada||(boards only, paid, not shipped - waiting on other boards?)
Unconfirmed
||enzedone||2||New Zealand|| (kit, posted May 7th saying he had not received)
||noelectrix||2||Germany|| (kit, posted May 15th saying had not received)
Boards
As of yet, no boards. Including an order from his web page(2 driver boards).
I have lost money twice in about the six years.
What I get frustrated with is, that the Kiwi/oz $ is not that great against the euro/us, what starts out as a reasonable amount for you guys, turns out to be quite a lot for us down here. So it turns out to be a big burn.
But I find that most people on this forum are honest.
So I just have to wear this.
As of yet, no boards. Including an order from his web page(2 driver boards).
I have lost money twice in about the six years.
What I get frustrated with is, that the Kiwi/oz $ is not that great against the euro/us, what starts out as a reasonable amount for you guys, turns out to be quite a lot for us down here. So it turns out to be a big burn.
But I find that most people on this forum are honest.
So I just have to wear this.
Ok, the games up: score is 2-9. In this post Rhys insisted is was 7-3.
"I belive there are 3 out of 10 kits still to be received richard. I think people dont realise that its only the people without their stuff that are posting / getting in touch. Everyone else keeps quiet, so it actually looks like nothing has ever arrived."
Confirm received:
||earsandeyes||2||The Netherlands|| (boards only)
||JBdV||?||The Netherlands|| (kit, received May 8th, not on wiki)
Confirm did not receive:
||rjm||2||Japan|| (paid for boards, never told how much to pay for additional parts)
||lancer||4||Singapore|| (kit, paid, shipped May 8th)
||kffern||2||Australia|| (kit, paid, shipped May 23rd)
||northernsky||2||Italy|| (kit, paid, no shipping info given)
||prooptiki||2||Greece|| (boards only, no shipping info given)
||enzedone||2||New Zealand|| (kit, paid, no shipping info given)
||FinnC||2||Denmark||(kit, paid, shipped May 2, not on wiki)
||Yan6||2||Canada||(boards only, paid, not shipped - waiting on other boards?)
||noelectrix||2||Germany|| (kit, paid, arranged for delivery after June 1st)
Unconfirmed
(all wiki orders accounted for)
"I belive there are 3 out of 10 kits still to be received richard. I think people dont realise that its only the people without their stuff that are posting / getting in touch. Everyone else keeps quiet, so it actually looks like nothing has ever arrived."
Confirm received:
||earsandeyes||2||The Netherlands|| (boards only)
||JBdV||?||The Netherlands|| (kit, received May 8th, not on wiki)
Confirm did not receive:
||rjm||2||Japan|| (paid for boards, never told how much to pay for additional parts)
||lancer||4||Singapore|| (kit, paid, shipped May 8th)
||kffern||2||Australia|| (kit, paid, shipped May 23rd)
||northernsky||2||Italy|| (kit, paid, no shipping info given)
||prooptiki||2||Greece|| (boards only, no shipping info given)
||enzedone||2||New Zealand|| (kit, paid, no shipping info given)
||FinnC||2||Denmark||(kit, paid, shipped May 2, not on wiki)
||Yan6||2||Canada||(boards only, paid, not shipped - waiting on other boards?)
||noelectrix||2||Germany|| (kit, paid, arranged for delivery after June 1st)
Unconfirmed
(all wiki orders accounted for)
Maybe he's honest, but just bites off more than he can chew and then can't manage to rectify the problems.
I am involved in another G/B with 1500 boards so far, this is very worrying as well.
Richard,
Thanks for putting all this work in. I actually didn't realise so many people have been burnt by this.
I have just registered this issue with Paypal. I think everyone involved should do the same so that some sort of history can be built about all this.
I am involved in another G/B with 1500 boards so far, this is very worrying as well.
Richard,
Thanks for putting all this work in. I actually didn't realise so many people have been burnt by this.
I have just registered this issue with Paypal. I think everyone involved should do the same so that some sort of history can be built about all this.
Ok, still seems to be a crapshoot but things are looking up.
-- Original wiki, boards only. --
Received:
||earsandeyes||2||The Netherlands||
Not received:
||rjm||2||Japan|| (paid for boards, never told how much to pay for additional parts)
||prooptiki||2||Greece|| (paid, no ship date)
||Yan6||2||Canada||(boards only, paid, not shipped - waiting on other boards?)
-- Original wiki, kit option. --
Received:
||kffern||2||Australia|| (shipped May 23rd)
Not received:
||lancer||4||Singapore|| (shipped May 8th)
||noelectrix||2||Germany|| (arranged for delivery after June 1st)
||northernsky||2||Italy|| (no ship date)
||enzedone||2||New Zealand|| (no ship date)
-- Orders placed after the first group buy finished. --
Received:
||JBdV||2||The Netherlands|| (received May 8th)
Not received:
||FinnC||2||Denmark||(shipped May 2)
||pchw||2||?|| (shipped May 26th)
||Tham||2||Malaysia|| (shipping "later this week")
-- Original wiki, boards only. --
Received:
||earsandeyes||2||The Netherlands||
Not received:
||rjm||2||Japan|| (paid for boards, never told how much to pay for additional parts)
||prooptiki||2||Greece|| (paid, no ship date)
||Yan6||2||Canada||(boards only, paid, not shipped - waiting on other boards?)
-- Original wiki, kit option. --
Received:
||kffern||2||Australia|| (shipped May 23rd)
Not received:
||lancer||4||Singapore|| (shipped May 8th)
||noelectrix||2||Germany|| (arranged for delivery after June 1st)
||northernsky||2||Italy|| (no ship date)
||enzedone||2||New Zealand|| (no ship date)
-- Orders placed after the first group buy finished. --
Received:
||JBdV||2||The Netherlands|| (received May 8th)
Not received:
||FinnC||2||Denmark||(shipped May 2)
||pchw||2||?|| (shipped May 26th)
||Tham||2||Malaysia|| (shipping "later this week")
I felt the need to run through the thread for Rhys' posts, to get a sense of the timeline.
If fairness, the long delay was mostly between the delivery of the boards and the announcement that the kits were ready to be ordered. He waited for payments to be complete before ordering the parts, ran into a big computer crash in early April, and got the parts middle of April. It's after that point that communications seem to have run into trouble, and some of the outstanding problems can probably be traced back to the computer crash.
In short --- one might have hoped that the kits would have been sent in early may rather than late may, but the delay is not unreasonable. I suggest people get in touch with him to sort out shipping date if they haven't already, and be sure to give him your shipping address as he might have lost it.
And we'll see how things go from there.
Please note that some of the capacitor markings on the boards he his sending are reversed. I've posted it before but I'll attach the corrected orientation again.
April 16th
April 14th
April 7th
April 6th
March29th
March 26th
March 16th
Reversed capacitor issue exposed Feb 12th.
here
Boards delivered Feb 10th.
here
Kit proposed: Feb 4th
If fairness, the long delay was mostly between the delivery of the boards and the announcement that the kits were ready to be ordered. He waited for payments to be complete before ordering the parts, ran into a big computer crash in early April, and got the parts middle of April. It's after that point that communications seem to have run into trouble, and some of the outstanding problems can probably be traced back to the computer crash.
In short --- one might have hoped that the kits would have been sent in early may rather than late may, but the delay is not unreasonable. I suggest people get in touch with him to sort out shipping date if they haven't already, and be sure to give him your shipping address as he might have lost it.
And we'll see how things go from there.
Please note that some of the capacitor markings on the boards he his sending are reversed. I've posted it before but I'll attach the corrected orientation again.
April 16th
April 14th
April 7th
April 6th
March29th
March 26th
March 16th
Reversed capacitor issue exposed Feb 12th.
here
Boards delivered Feb 10th.
here
Kit proposed: Feb 4th
Attachments
My response is here.
In a positive development, JBdV sent me photos of his kit he got from Rhys. They look really nice:
What with kffern's kit arriving, if we can see a few more arrive in the next week or so then we can say we've turned a corner on this episode.
Of course if you filed a Paypal dispute, be sure to mark it resolved as soon as you get your kit.
Thanks,
Richard
In a positive development, JBdV sent me photos of his kit he got from Rhys. They look really nice:
What with kffern's kit arriving, if we can see a few more arrive in the next week or so then we can say we've turned a corner on this episode.
Of course if you filed a Paypal dispute, be sure to mark it resolved as soon as you get your kit.
Thanks,
Richard
Sorry!Suggestion from my side since the Dale 768 K is in backorder with Mouser and Carbon resistors are easily to get everywhere:
Everyone can get their boards running easily by buying a few Carbon resistors including a tempory Carbon replacement for R6.
I hope Rhys will ship the Dale RN60D 768K 1 % to everybody once they come in. (These resistors are really difficult to get)
Lead time with Mouser right now is 11 weeks.
Everyone can get their boards running easily by buying a few Carbon resistors including a tempory Carbon replacement for R6.
I hope Rhys will ship the Dale RN60D 768K 1 % to everybody once they come in. (These resistors are really difficult to get)
Lead time with Mouser right now is 11 weeks.
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