New reader ? Get a GOOD warranty. Seriously.

[GeoffC]

I paid for an extended warranty on a laptop, with on-site visit, seemed like a good idea at the time and is valid until 2013.

Now I'm not too sure.

An original fault had a call centre advisor wreck the laptop after upgrading the bios and video driver, leaving me with having to remedy the situation myself [solved with last known good re-boot.]

An on site visit brought a new M/B, heat sink and optical drive.

This created a new fault which yet another visit and M/B replacement did not fix.

The laptop now has to go back to the manufacturer for their solution and it'll take 10 days.

Yes, okay, I've got a reasonably good deal on the cost and period of the warranty, based on the original price of the device, but given the hassle I'm wondering if it's worth it .... especially when the call centre advisors don't seem to know what they are doing ....

On the manufacturer's side, at this rate it would have been better for them to have replaced the d*** thing !!!

So as to whether an insurance policy is worthy depends on the price of the insurance against the possible future replacement value of the device in "x" years time.

[smallhagrid]

Wow. Even more surprising.
I am not a gambling man - never have been.

Examples:
No extended warranty was bought on my corded drill - but I did get one on the big NiCad powered on that has a $39 battery pack for $10....result: battery replaced, no more $ spent.

Pair of cheap sleeping bags bought knowing they were cheap and likely to fall apart - and they did - bad zippers and stitching....result: Full refund after a year+ of usage for an added charge of around $5.

Air mattresses, numerous...all made of vinyl and destined to leak sooner than later. ALL covered when purchased - ALL collected on sooner or later and ALL replaced at no further cost, EVEN the most expensive Aero one.

Notice none of these things are small, handheld electronic devices, recently made ?
That is because this thread is about those and well-explained already.
It is NOT about gambling, insurance per se', or horses (and BTW I have been keeping horses for 1/2 of my middle-aged life successfully too, so hit me up for info if you need some...!).

Before things got horribly cheapened and quality-lowered I might have also had a very negative POV and yelled a bit against these things..but times have changed and they are a much better thing now than they were 10 or 20 years ago; and for me as I age they are even better because of the lowering finances in my life AND as a wise person said above - the simple peace of mind they provide.

And if they strike you as 'gambling' and distasteful, I think that is just great too.

mark

[murraypaul]

Before things got horribly cheapened and quality-lowered I might have also had a very negative POV and yelled a bit against these things..but times have changed and they are a much better thing now than they were 10 or 20 years ago;

Financially, they are still a very good deal for the companies selling them, and therefore must be a bad deal (purely financially) for those buying them. It is a zero sum game, if the finance companies are making money, it is because on average they are charging more than they are paying out.
The products may have become more likely to break, but that in case the prices charged for the insurance will also have risen.

and for me as I age they are even better because of the lowering finances in my life AND as a wise person said above - the simple peace of mind they provide.

And that is a perfectly good reason to buy them, just note a purely financial one. Peace of mind is something that has to be valued by each person individually, and can't be reduced to a simple dollar figure.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by murraypaul

Financially, they are still a very good deal for the companies selling them, and therefore must be a bad deal (purely financially) for those buying them. It is a zero sum game, if the finance companies are making money, it is because on average they are charging more than they are paying out.

That's true of any insurance policy, of course. Eg, in 30-odd years I've never made a claim on my house contents insurance, or on any travel insurance policy. I'm the sort of person that insurance companies love .

[clintbradford]

I darned near always recommend some sort of an extended warranty on laptops. Even from the "major" brands. My AppleCare policy on my 17" MacBook Pro cost $250 back in 2006. But it "bought" me a repair that totalled about a grand: I sent it in for a noisier-than-it-should-be right-side fan, and Apple replaced both fans, a logic board, and a thermal sensor. I looked up the parts on ifixit.com, and was astonished to see how much it all cost.

No, I am not a "sucker" for extended warranties. But there are just a few product categories where they can be beneficial.

[smallhagrid]

And they have been a VERY good deal for me when I've chosen one:

Originally Posted by murraypaul

Financially, they are still a very good deal for the companies selling them, and therefore must be a bad deal (purely financially) for those buying them.

For sure, they have:

The products may have become more likely to break, but that in case the prices charged for the insurance will also have risen.

And the extended warranty prices are STILL low and attractive OR they would not be bought by me at all.

I showed very clearly above how financially these have benefitted me:

And that is a perfectly good reason to buy them, just note a purely financial one.

BOTH for small electronic goods AND other things.
That you have strong, personal feelings about this subject does not diminish how these things have paid out for me, personally.

100% agreed:

Peace of mind is something that has to be valued by each person individually, and can't be reduced to a simple dollar figure.

And for this $-poor old guy peace of mind INCLUDES knowing that reading for pleasure and enrichment (which has been a BIG part of my daily life for almost 50 years now...) will NOT be dis-enhanced by some cheaply made tech gear which costs enough that if/when it quits for any/no reason I may not have enough $ to 'just buy a new one'.

I don't have to worry about it. At all. Period.

And for $20.99/3 years on an E-ink reader which has a high probability of lasting that long...EVEN if I never get a pay-out I will be happy I got it JUST for the peace of mind.

Add to that the other thread concerned with the lack of proper labeling possibly indicating something wrong right from the get-go; suspenders AND a belt seem in order here.

Best Wishes,

mark

[HarryT]

We perhaps have less need for extended warranties in Europe than you do in the US, in that EU consumer law provides buyers with considerably more protection than I understand to be the case in the US. EU law requires a retailer to repair or replace a product within a time period that a person might "reasonably expect" a product to last. That period isn't legally defined, but would certainly be several years for a product such as a bookreader or any other "consumer electronics" type product. So even though a manufacturer might nominally offer a 1 year "warranty" they can still be legally required to repair or replace a product considerably beyond that if that would be a reasonable expectation of that product's lifetime.

[Ben Thornton]

Some people will clearly value the peace of mind that they get from buying insurance cover, which is something that only they can judge the value of, I guess.

From the view of whether it's a good investment, however, I rarely think that it is for electronics, especially solid state. Most such equipment has a failure rate that peaks early, and then after a long time (depending on the life time of the various parts). If you get a 1 year warranty in any case, this covers most failures that are likely to happen until - for high tech items - the product will be well out of date. So I never buy such cover.

Having said that, I did have a laptop drive fail just out of warranty. On the plus side, now I've got a Mac

[smallhagrid]

Dingdingdingding - we have a winner !:

Originally Posted by HarryT

We perhaps have less need for extended warranties in Europe than you do in the US, in that EU consumer law provides buyers with considerably more protection than I understand to be the case in the US.

Just so HarryT and well said and explained.
Here in Amerika we are the world's beta testers for every kind of krap from junk electronics to cars with no brakes to poisonous artificial sweeteners.

I know folks with 40 year old (yes - 40 !) blenders, washing machines, refrigerators, ranges and even a dryer or 3.
Buy a new one today though and if it is a small appliance you get a 30-day pat on the back; large....ummm...dare I say it - better get that extended thingy.

"Let the buyer beware' is practically a diety here, for any who care.

Makes me wonder how many of the incredibly strongly worded opinions cited above came from folks here vs. there...?

Best Wishes.

mark

[HarryT]

One example of the way it works here. I bought a non-stick baking tray from my local supermarket about two years ago. A couple of weeks ago I noticed that there were tiny little rust spots all over it - obviously the non-stick coating wasn't terribly good. I took it back to the supermarket; even though I didn't have a receipt, they simply replaced it with a new one without question.

[boswd]

Originally Posted by Xanthe

I never get extended warranties on anything. I haven't found them to be cost-effective.

+1 on that. if its over 20% of the cost of the device, pass.

[smallhagrid]

Very nice:

Originally Posted by HarryT

I took it back to the supermarket; even though I didn't have a receipt, they simply replaced it with a new one without question.

Here, these days, in most stores AND onlne they want multiple proofs of any/everything, a sworn statement and maybe a blood sample !!!

There's soooo much that resembles the idea posed in Dlibert about 'krap4idiots.com' - and here in the boonies (and where we sometimes have wicked winters...) you see the garage windows revealing that they are STUFFED to the door with KRAP, with the cars in the yard.
(Sorry....)

Now, given the most recent and vehement reply here (after yours) I must seriously wonder if many, many of the 'reader type' folks here have replied JUST from seeing the title without actually even quickly skimming the thread for any possibly useful info ?

Regardless of that I am delighted to have made your acquaintance HarryT from across the big water !

Best Wishes.

mark

[bjones6416]

I don't buy extended warranties on any of my small electronics, because I'm usually ready to upgrade before they break or become unuseable. I love gadgets, I admit it.

I also admit that almost all of my electronics were bought refurbished: My Sony Reader, my Kindle 2, my Ipod. I've always had really good luck with refurbished items -- I read somewhere once that the reason refurbished electronics are a good value is because the quality control is more consistent on them than on new items. Refurbished items are always tested for functionality whereas new items might only be randomly tested. I have no idea if that is true or not, but it works for me!

[smallhagrid]

If only I had bales and barrels and boxes of moolah:

Originally Posted by bjones6416

I don't buy extended warranties on any of my small electronics, because I'm usually ready to upgrade before they break or become unuseable. I love gadgets, I admit it.

I'd probably do the same and be drowning in gadgets !

Lacking for disposable $$$ however keeps me careful of the very few things I do buy - and of those which I consider expensive (reader...) and indispensable for daily usage (reader !).
As explained previously, these 'extras' have worked wonderfully for me and the ONLY non-emotional reason I can see for NOT getting one on such young technology would be IF the person was very well endowed with $$$ to buy new one(s) anytime at all.

If you have a box or 2 of extra moolah you'd like to share, do feel free to offer it to me as I know I'd enjoy it ALOT !!!

Best Wishes.

mark

[kacir]

Originally Posted by smallhagrid

This forum is about MODERN e-readers, most of which have been around less than several years (as opposed to ancient tech devices....).

It is very nice of you to tell us what this forum is about.
This forum was established before the first e-ink readers appeared.
The forum was established on in 2002, the first e-ink reader - Sony Librié was released on April 2004

Originally Posted by smallhagrid

Got an old, floppy-based IBM PC ? It'll display ebooks as plain text sure enough...

My first dedicated e-book reader was an old notebook with 486 processor, greyscale LCD display, with burned-out harddisk, so I had to read books from a system floppy, with a small DOS-only text viewer and one book in plain text file.
My first handheld I used as a dedicated e-book reader had slot for memory card size of the full-sized PCMCIA card (about 85x55x6mm). And it still works.

Originally Posted by smallhagrid

Using an old palmtop device does NOT compare to an e-reader because they were NOT made as E-readers !

Well, my first handheld for e-books was Cassiopeia A-11, manufactured in 1997. Its display is 5.25 inch non-backlit greyscale LCD display. A little bit improved brother of this old display is still used in JetBooks.