Re: sad initial impressions of LairdShare

I recently brought up this very same point in a post about other shared storage companies.

While researching the exact same thing you are...reasonably priced shared storage solutions, just about every company we contacted either didn't respond to inquiries, took days to do so, or when they did respond, didn't or couldn't answer the handful of questions I asked. Sorry...but this is gonna be a long post!

Emails sent requesting information went unanswered...phone calls went unreturned...and promised follow-ups never came.

We contacted all the major players in the under $25,000 arena...and a couple in the $35-$50,000 range.

The only companies that provided good service were Apace systems, Tiger Technologies and Aberdeen Systems. We contacted roughly 20 companies. Most sold complete systems, but a few were software or hardware only, like Tiger, which sells SAN software, and Aberdeen, which sells hardware.

Of the other companies, the ones that did finally respond usually did so with convoluted and confusing product descriptions or pricing lists...or in some cases, with recommendations or technical information that was flat-out wrong. Others made the technology out to be so complicated that it would require a team of IT experts to install and administer the system.

The company we chose (Apace), won not so much for their product's capabilties or price (which were certainly important), but mostly because they gave us unbelievable service. Their reseller, IEEE, inc. answered emails within hours, and returned phone calls the same day, usually within the hour. They spent hours on the phone with us in conference calls prior to the sale explaining and demoing the product. Their engineers spent literally 3-5 hours setting up our system remotely...taking control of each PC on the network and tweaking settings. They did this two afternoons in a row...acting as if we were the only client they had.

After a power outage...when I couldn't find the power switch to turn the unit back on (it's the size of a pin head), I called, got a live-person immediately, and was up and running in seconds. Now granted...I'm pretty much an idiot for not being able to find a power switch...but it's the only thing I've had to call for since the unit was installed 3 months ago. It defragments itself automatically and best of all works as advertised.

Bernard at Tiger Technologies was also very helpful and very responsive...and we seriously considered his product coupled with other hardware.

I just couldn't imagine buying from some of the other companies. Many didn't seem to have a clue about how their systems worked...how shared storage systems work in general...or didn't seem to care about our requirements.

Most ignored my brief, consice list of requirements, which was copied into every email sent and read into each phone message I left. The sales person would ask me questions I had already answered in detail. One company made me fill out a long, poorly laid out PDF form before they'd give me more information. I had literally answered all the questions in my initial email...but that wasn't good enough...they couldn't provide a quote or answer my questions until I put that same information into their crappy, confusing form.

Companies would repeatedly tout how well their system worked with Avid or Final Cut...until I pointed out that we used Harris VelocityQ editing systems...a fact that was explained in detail in all initial emails and phone calls.

Some of these companies are among the biggest names in the shared storage business! How they got there I have no clue. Maybe they're going through growing pains. All I know is if I don't respond to our client's emails within 24 hours, and follow through on what we say we're going to do for them...they don't stay our client very long.

I'll take the small company with a solid product and great customer service over the big Kahuna with the fancy product and indifferent service every day of the week.

It doesn't do much good to turn out a great product if your sales people can't sell it and your customer service people can't fix it.





Chris Blair
Magnetic Image, Inc.
Evansville, IN
www.videomi.com