Monday, April 25, 2005

Roomba's back, roomba's back

The first Roomba I bought few months ago (OK, six months ago?) stopped working after 6 or 7 runs. Although we were very impressed with the amount of dirt I got, we were disappointed that it broke so easily.

No broken parts, it just wouldn't charge the battery. After waiting a few weeks, I wrote to iRobot, got no response. Then called technical service, and went thru standard 'take battery out, reset, try to recharge' exercises. It didn't work.

Did more reading on the web and fired another e-mail. Got a response this time, and quickly received a new battery. But...

The problem was with the robot, not the battery. Charging (and re-charging) did not work. Called technical service again, explained the problem. And, a quick solution (to my surprise: You send them the plastic piece that holds the brushes -it has a serial number on it-, they send you a new robot.

New robot is up and running. still running... We now have two batteries [can't charge one while the robot is running though...] and another robot for spare parts.

How can you not like this company? With the exception of the first e-mail delay, "no pain customer service."

BTW, did I mention this robot actuall picks stuff up from your carpets. It really does; you can't ask more from such a tiny vacuum cleaner. While the first one was broken, we really missed it.

Wednesday, April 20, 2005

Housing bubble links

Have been reasing the sites below and a few others for sometime. Let's see what'll happen with house prices in a year or so. I believe the prices in SF/SJ Bay Area will stay the same [no increase is good too] or drop a few percent. I hope they do...

http://patrick.net/housing/crash.html
http://www.viewfromsiliconvalley.com/index.html
http://www.housingbubble.com/

Friday, April 15, 2005

CDUniverse

CDUniverse passed our 'the Eloy test.' [You can't call an on-line CD seller a good one, if they don't carry a few Eloy CDs.]

More than 25 Eloy albums... Impressive...

Before Sunrise

What a movie! I kinda expected this one to be good, but didn't expect this much: interesting dialogs, story too :) Certainly one of the best movies of the last century (no kidding, it's like a book).

I wish I had a chance to watch this one without knowing about 'Before Sunset'.

We'll take a few weeks break, let 'Before Sunrise' to sink in, and then watch 'Before Sunset.'