[Big D]

Quote:

Originally Posted by penbat Lindrone may come to a clear opinion that either UE-10 or Sensa's are better. But for for me it is academic as Sensaphonic's customer service is absolutely appalling via email and Ultimate Ear's email customer service is, in complete contrast, exceptionally good. It would be practically impossible for me in the UK to order Sensa's unless I spent a lot of money on phone calls.

I have every faith that if I ever have to send the UE-10 Pros back to UE they would be turned round quickly and everything resolved. Sensa didn't even reply to my initial e-mail.

 

[MD1032]

At least they didn't deliver your $1000 customized Dell 4100 to the wrong address.

I hate FedEx.

 

[utdeep]

All right, not to sound too negative, but am I the only one hear who thinks Lindrone is going to give these a negative review? That he had given them a negative review since the first time he heard about them?
You want to hate these phones. Go ahead.
If any part of this upcoming review is positive, it speaks volumes for the phone. If it's negative, I'd take it with a grain of salt. If Lindrone says things similar to what I said about the UE5cs, then I will spend tonight crying (without tears as men do) about the $1000 I have deposited in the sink.
Lindrone, you remind me a little too much of my best friend.

 

[penbat]

Quote:

Originally Posted by utdeep All right, not to sound too negative, but am I the only one hear who thinks Lindrone is going to give these a negative review? That he had given them a negative review since the first time he heard about them? You want to hate these phones. Go ahead. If any part of this upcoming review is positive, it speaks volumes for the phone. If it's negative, I'd take it with a grain of salt. If Lindrone says things similar to what I said about the UE5cs, then I will spend tonight crying (without tears as men do) about the $1000 I have deposited in the sink. Lindrone, you remind me a little too much of my best friend.

He must have had some hope that they were better than Sensa's as it would be extreme to blow $1000 just so he can write a bad review about them and then make them gather dust.

 

[utdeep]

I don't know about that. If you have enough disposable income, you can spend whatever you want to make a point. When I get to that point, I'll begin my political career...

 

[lindrone]

Hmm... lots of speculation about what I'm going to say already, no?...

Utdeep, they're probably much better than the UE5c, that much is for sure.

Penbat, stop speculating what I'm going to say... you do way too much speculating with just about everything.

Sensaphonic's business model is very different compared to UE's.. thus the dramatic difference in customer service. Sensa basically don't respond to emails... they're not very web-savvy. You basically have to call them. You can't really blame a company for not being web-savvy, that's just never been their audience anyway. Unlike UE, who's clearly trying to sell into some high-end consumer space.

Sensaphonic prefers to do everything through an audiologist, because they want people to know about hearing preservation, and make sure the customers are getting the most information as possible. When I went to my audiologist, the first thing is a lecture about hearing protection and proper usage for my IEM. Not only that, all questions & service I've had gone through my audiologist... I had very little contact with Sensaphonic other than the initial phone call to get a reference.

UE, on the other hand, wants to cut out the audiologist from the process as much as possible. They only need them to make impressions, if they have a way of taking impressions without a well-trained audiologist, they would screw that entire community over completely. Their contact with specific audiologist are very little, and they instruct the audiologist to just take impressions. My audiologist used to work with UE, and they cut her out after they found out she was telling the customer more than they wanted her to. They don't want anyone to get in the way of their potential sale.

UE is a very customer-friendly company, but does a lot of very under-handed things in the industry in general. They remind me of Microsoft, you know... the end product is good, and everybody uses it, but you know what they had to do to get to where they are.

Should you care? In a way, probably not... even in my mindset, I love using Microsoft & Adobe (and think of any other huge corporation with good products and poor ethics) products; simply because they work, and I believe them to be superior. If UE was truly superior by a substiantiable margin, I wouldn't hesitate to tell everyone to just get them, even though the company ethic leaves a lot of questions.

 

[doctorjuggles]

Quote:

Originally Posted by utdeep All right, not to sound too negative, but am I the only one hear who thinks Lindrone is going to give these a negative review? That he had given them a negative review since the first time he heard about them? You want to hate these phones. Go ahead. If any part of this upcoming review is positive, it speaks volumes for the phone. If it's negative, I'd take it with a grain of salt. If Lindrone says things similar to what I said about the UE5cs, then I will spend tonight crying (without tears as men do) about the $1000 I have deposited in the sink. Lindrone, you remind me a little too much of my best friend.

I don't think lindrone is dumb enough to spend $1000 and not give the product a fair chance. He has nothing to prove to anyone on this board, and to automatically give the UEs a negative review isn't something I'd anticipate lindrone doing. The only thing he has to prove to anyone is himself. If you'd dropped a grand each for two products to compare to each other, wouldn't you be honest with the end result with yourself, no matter which way it took you?
Sure, his opinion in the end may mean he prefers the Sensas, but I think you're being a little insulting to the chap's integrity to say he'd be that narrow minded and blinkered.

 

[Welly Wu]

I don't know if we should speculate what Lindrone is up to but I am highly doubtful he will ever give a balanced and objective viewpoint about Ultimate Ears (the company) or their products. He seems hell bent against them. That is where he will do much damage to his own credibility. Just my brutally honest and truthful opinion.

 

[doctorjuggles]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Welly Wu Just my brutally honest and truthful opinion.

Funny that when lindrone says that's what he will provide, you're not willing to accept it.

Everyone's slagging him off and saying he's going to write a biased review when he hasn't even written it yet. Smooth.

At this point I could point out that he's the only one of us to have heard both products, so anyone in here accusing him of bias is only revealing THEIR bias more than he is his. But it's futile to point out something like that in here.

 

[acs236]

I am definitely looking forward to the review, especially considering that Lindrone has heard many different canal phones. So far these have gotten very good reviews. I don't recall even one thing critical being said about them. Notwithstanding any bias, the review will probably be very informative.

 

[Welly Wu]

I don't think so. One thing I've learned as a reviewer is to keep mum about any personal biases or prejudices about a product before I publish the review. Still, the best thing to do is to remain neutral and dis-attached to the product while in the review / writing process. I knew the Ue-10 PRO would trounce the ER-4P/S but I didn't tout that opinion too widely until I published my second review.

It's all about the attitude toward the specific product that is in serious question here. That attitude -- for good or for worse -- colors the entire mindset of the reviewer. That's my observation. Reviewers should be faithful first and foremost to their readership about being balanced and objective and I think the best way to do that is to not mention whatever your thoughts or biases are before you publish the review. It winds up avoiding a lot of pitfalls such as credibility and integrity attacks down the road by your audience. It's also much more professional and courteous to all parties involved.

 

[doctorjuggles]

Hmmm. I'm confused. It's okay to be biased, so long as you don't mention it up front. Once your bias has established what you believed in the first place, then it's okay to voice the bias?

I'm not having a personal go at you here, Welly, I respect you and your comments have been very useful to me, in fact I'm also looking at the UEs now from what's been said in here. But really, if you have a bias, whether you voice it or not, you're going to produce a biased review.

I know what everyone is saying, I understand the points being made. But I think people are being a little harsh on lindrone and underestimating him a bit. As I said, he ain't no fool. It's his money and he's not going to waste it just to prove you wrong. UE has had nothing but glowing reviews and suddenly, over the last two days, there have been two negative comments and everyone has their backs up, like it's some kinda personal attack on them just because someone else doesn't like what they like.
You have to admit, Welly, you've done it yourself. You sprung to the defense of UE saying that the shipping mistake wasn't their fault, when it really was.
I think everyone is taking it all too personally. The pro reviews still outnumber the anti reviews by a wide margin. That's because, when you get right down to it, the Sensas and the UEs are both likely to be fantastic products in their own right.

 

[Welly Wu]

Yes, I am defensive of UE for obvious reasons. Still, this is more about being equally if not more defensive of something far more important that the company itself: your own integrity and reputation. I have friends who work in the publishing industry including Stereophile and The Absolute Sound. One thing they tell me is that if I decide to get into reviewing business be it books, films, music, audio equipment, etc. is to always protect your own reputation and integrity. Don't wind up trashing someone's work or a product before you sit down, think, and go through the writing process. You'll wind up saving yourself a lot of grief and turmoil when people can take your word without having to call into question your biases and prejudices coloring your published work. That is my issue here. I don't doubt Lindrone will write a great review. I don't doubt his sincerity or ability to write well. I do offer advice: shut up before you publish your findings. Sure, let us know you got a, b, or c product but keep quiet about your opinions and prejudices / biases especially when people ask you for your early opinions. It will save you a lot of grief from having to defend yourself from people who are supposedly against you. Again, I may very well be defensive of UE but I am focusing herein on giving some decent advice to Lindrone: keep quiet until you publish your review and make yourself available thereafter to your readers. Otherwise, you'll wind up in a quagmire and your thread will be littered with frustrating and off-base accusations. Worse: you'll engender more vocal opponents engaging in character attacks and your published work will always be clouded with seeds of doubt forever. It's a stigma that is hard to erase.

This is my personal policy when it comes to the before the article is published phase (i.e., pre-writing phase). I adhere to it firmly.

 

[Big D]

I have been very reticent to mention anything about the sound quality of the UE-10 Pro until I have had a chance to really use them, but I have only had them for 4 days now.

I am more than happy to comment on fit, materials, etc while I am making my own mind up on the sound.

 

[lindrone]

I'm staying away from everything that Welly has been saying so far... sorta pointless to even try. You can see for yourself to see if the review is biased or not.

The end result of all these accusation though, is that I can't recommend against UE even if I did feel like they're inferior products because I'm already biased, but I can't recommend for them because then it'll look like I'm just satisfying his demands. I'm just going to stay away from listening to anything that Welly has to say

Your personal policy aren't mine... people are eager to know, so I give them a few things I notice here and there. It also provides a trackable history of what is consistent and what isn't, if anything changed from my first impression to the final review... which are important to note as well.

(I just said I'd stay away from everything that Welly has said.. but then I didn't.. lol...)

Anyway, onto what this thread started with. All this talk about UE's quick and fast customer response.. I emailed UE early yesterday, and I got this back today:

Quote:

I certainly apologize if there was anything done on our part that could have been done differently. I have copied the appropriate parties in on this email. Kind regards, Mindy Harvey

No offers for refund in shipping, not a real apology anyway. Of course, I think I've already offended Mindy once, when I contacted her and told her about my horrific audiologist experience. When she asked me who I went to instead, I told her the name of my audiologist. She wasn't very pleased, you can tell by the tone of her voice... she knows my audiologist, and they do have some sort of a history (remember what I said about my audiologist gettinng cut off from UE?)...

So maybe Mindy just doesn't really like me now