TouchDRO Adapter Upgrade or Trade-In

[ycroosh]

Well, that's awesome.
I've been told I stand out in a crowd but I never knew how much.

You tend to have opinions on things, had some good feedback on the app, and your location is set to Portland, Oregon. That's easy to remember

 

[ParkerS]

We live in a capitalistic society. If you don't know how to run a business you will go bankrupt. I can get a China DRO for $200 with two scales and you want $300 for a box and I need to spend another $100 for a tablet and another $250 for "recommended" scales. Your DRO is not competitive. I used your DRO for 3 months and still can't figure out what it does that a China DRO doesn't. As a customer I don't care about your class III and flying probe. It's your problem how you make your stuff. I only care that what I paid for works and doesn't need a paid upgrade 3 months later. Never had a problem with anything from aliexpress except slow shipping. I am telling you about china DROs so you can better understand how overpriced touch dro is. Take this as feedback. May be instead of writing long complaining posts and accusing your customers you can learn something and figure out how to be competitive.

 

[bulgie]

Well Yuriy, you led him to water, but you can't make him think.

For me, my Touch DRO is one of the most amazing bargains I have ever purchased. I am blown away by the value proposition, even without Yuriy's fantastic support and communication. I only have it on the mill for now but I will probably buy another for the lathe. I wasn't so sure I wanted to do that (don't really miss it on the lathe) until this latest announcement of a practically-free upgrade offer, which I think is pushing me off the fence. Wanting to buy another one now! I'm gobsmacked to find that someone is annoyed about this. Unless he's a sock puppet for a Chinese DRO maker. Not accusing, just wondering what could make a person say such stuff.

 

[Revilo]

I'm not sure why ParkerS is being so rude and abrasive on a public forum, I've been very happy with touchdro and the support from Yuriy!

It's not like the old adapters will suddenly stop working, if any other company released a new model i doubt they'd be as generous in their totally optional upgrade offer.

@ycroosh I've got an igaging type adapter i'd like to trade in. But i'm not sure which scales i'll get as replacement yet, are the dsub connecters soldered in on the new ready built model or are they plugged in like the previous glass scale, solderless, almost-ready-to-run, option and could be swapped around to suit?

Thanks

 

[PNW_Guy]

I ordered a touch dro less than three months ago. It set me back more that $200 just for the box and a tablet and it's already obsolete. Now I need to pay extra $25 and shipping to get my brand new dro updated. I emailed touch dro sevetal times and they are not even bothering to respond to my emails. Very frustrated. I should have gone for a dro off aliexpress instead I guess. I could have gotten a full package for that money and aliexpress gives you some protection when you buy from them.

This is hilarious, and you clearly don't understand the product in any way.

"It's obsolete" is simply not true. Nothing has changed on your DRO. It works exactly how it did when you bought it. Are you the kind of person who buys a new car, then complains the next year when the newer model gets a new feature? I'd love to be there when you go to the dealership and complain that your '23 car is obsolete because the '24 has 5 more horsepower.

Your existing DRO is exactly what you bought and paid for 3 months ago. It'll work forever, and if you like it'll get more features from free app updates.. Is your tablet obsolete too? A bunch of new models were just released.

You do not need to update the firmware. It' simply an option if you want to add features. Please, call your buddies on AliExpress and ask them about adding features to one of their DROs. That'll be a funny call.

I'm not affiliated with Touch DRO in any way, other than being an owner of an older model. I bought one for my mill 7(?) Years ago. It still works exactly the way it worked when I bought it, even though newer more advanced models were released. However, in that time I never connected it to the internet, so I didn't get any of the free software upgrades that were released.

But if you think this is a crap product, sell it to me and buy something on Ali Express; I'm sure all their upgrades are free and have free shipping both ways.

 

[ycroosh]

Good morning, folks,
First of all, thank you everybody for the kind words. Sorry, I got a bit grumpy yesterday in that long post. I generally have pretty thick skin, but I've been tired...
As far as ParkerS comments go - I get that you are frustrated, but I suggest that if step back, calm down a bit, and re-read my offer you might realize that it's actually a good thing for you. If not - I'm sorry about your back luck but I don't know what else to tell you. I've made some choices about the way I run this business. If I'm wrong, I'll find out very quickly. After all, we do live in a capitals society and people have choices.
Regards
Yuriy

 

[ycroosh]

I'm not sure why ParkerS is being so rude and abrasive on a public forum, I've been very happy with touchdro and the support from Yuriy!

It's not like the old adapters will suddenly stop working, if any other company released a new model i doubt they'd be as generous in their totally optional upgrade offer.

@ycroosh I've got an igaging type adapter i'd like to trade in. But i'm not sure which scales i'll get as replacement yet, are the dsub connecters soldered in on the new ready built model or are they plugged in like the previous glass scale, solderless, almost-ready-to-run, option and could be swapped around to suit?

Thanks

The connectors are soldered into the board. The pinout is set using a small plug-in board. In the photo below, the left row of the pins is connected to the differential input drivers, and the right row is connected to the DB9 connector. The plugin board connects then according to a specific pinout (in this case, Option E is for the Acu-Rite "SENC" pinout). I will sell these little boards separately, so people can swap the pinout as needed.
Regards
Yuriy

 

[SouthernChap]

Good morning, folks,
First of all, thank you everybody for the kind words. Sorry, I got a bit grumpy yesterday in that long post. I generally have pretty thick skin, but I've been tired...
As far as ParkerS comments go - I get that you are frustrated, but I suggest that if step back, calm down a bit, and re-read my offer you might realize that it's actually a good thing for you. If not - I'm sorry about your back luck but I don't know what else to tell you. I've made some choices about the way I run this business. If I'm wrong, I'll find out very quickly. After all, we do live in a capitals society and people have choices.
Regards
Yuriy

Seriously, your reply was rational, fact based, patient above and beyond the call of duty, as polite as can be expected, and perfectly professional.

The strict policy of 'no flaming' and the standards of restrained courtesy on this forum are some of its standout virtues. Given the 'bad old internet me' and my previous impatience of folly (to be fair to me, both others' and mine!) on other forums, I was very grateful for the constraints on my posting behaviour these latter two aspects enforced yesterday.

Anyway, if ever I'd been tempted to buy a cheap AliExpress DRO, I certainly am not now. I will be getting some scales, a decent tablet and a TouchDro adapter.

 

[Inferno]

Let me add in that I do something similar to what Yuriy does, on a MUCH smaller scale, so I might understand more than the average person about how to explain this upgrade.

Let me preface to say I buy stuff from Aliexpress so I'm not prejudiced against them.

I start with an idea. I build a prototype. If the prototype works well, I might offer it to the general public.
In my case, I don't have any software I upgrade so that's where things disconnect.

I may upgrade my design (I just sent an upgrade off to fab last night) and will offer those after they come back. Someone would have to buy a new unit if they want the upgraded features. I might offer them a discount if they return the old one as I don't want to give a discount and then have them sell the old one. So it's a discount and return (I buy back what they have) or they pay full price.

Neither Yuriy or I have to do this.

Having said that all, I would still, gladly, help people who are using ver.1 of my original design as long as I can. And anyone who buys Ver.2 will get support if/when I design Ver.3, as will those who have Ver.1

NOTHING becomes obsolete. It gets upgraded to the point where it needs a new board to upgrade more (AKA add more features) based on knowledge not available when Ver.1 was released.

The alternative is to not release ANYTHING until perfection is achieved and we all know that's not possible.

 

[bulgie]

"Nothing is so good that someone somewhere won't hate it."
Or the related "haters gonna hate". Pithy!