FS laser just lost a sale.....


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    Default FS laser just lost a sale.....

    I just got off the phone with them and I have to say I WILL NEVER BUY FROM THEM!!! I had considered them when I first started looking at getting a laser and before I had found this forum and now that I have actually talked to them I wouldnt trust them any farther than I could toss the G.Weiki 1290 I have coming in this week...

    The reason I called was because I was curios about there new RetinaEngrave 3D gizmo.. It sounds interesting!!! From the conversation I had it seems it doesnt really do anything more than what Lasercut 5.3 already does, it just makes it a little easier to do.. But thats not what bothered me. In all honestly I probably would have ended up buying a laser from them but the next few sentences are what stopped me from even considering them..

    I think it was Walter I talked to. Anyways I explained to Walter that I had a G.Weiki and all and that I was considering picking up a couple of there 20x18 or 24x18 lasers. He proceded to tell me how much of a POS G.Weiki lasers are and how they couldnt handle large files and if I tried to print a file larger than a couple of megs it would crash and that even a 1 or 2mb file takes over an hour to load on the machine and then crapped all over the quality of the cuts and explained how there lasers and software are far supperior..

    Now I havent even recieved my machine yet but I have done a bit of reading here and on a few other forums and have never heard of that happening before. Being a business owner I cant stand it when someone craps all over there competition especially when its a bunch of BS!!! Even if the laser I bought is a POS (Im pretty sure its not) there are more constructive ways to talk to a potential customer than completely trashing your competition.

    Sorry for the rant, but this type of stuff really chaps my hide...

    Phil

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    I do find it rather comical Phil...

    Guess who makes the FSE machines before they have the retina cards fitted

    as an aside, G Weike are fast becoming (if not already) the most reliable and trustworthy company in the industry.

    cheers

    Dave



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    Default gweike laser

    Phil,
    yes,if i were you,i also will become wrath.trashing competor sometime is not a good way,even we should be co-worker
    although our POS is different from FS laser,but customers also think this kind of controller is ok
    anyway,just calm down,and hope you will buy your ideal laser machine

    tina from Gweike laser
    email: tina@wklaser.com



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    FSL respects all potential customer opinions but it is unfortunate that the original poster is basing his post on opinions instead of facts (and FSL doesn't employ anyone named Walter). FSL has purchased many various types of machines in our Las Vegas showroom. Visit us and you can see with your own eyes the FSL RetinaEngrave difference side by side.

    Full Spectrum's 100% USA Developed RetinaEngrave 3D Ethernet+USB controller and software is far superior to Chinese developed software and laser electronics in our opinion. Of course our opinions are just opinions but we do back them up with facts and tests.

    When you receive your laser with Chinese electronics and software you will see that our statements are simply facts. If you load a large raster file such as a 20"x20" image at 1000dpi (20,000x20,000 pixels) it will take 30mins to an hour to process and download to the machine - if it succeeds at all. Just try it with a stopwatch - this is an empirical test. The power control is extremely poor on most Chinese machines and you will find that you cannot turn the power low enough to conduct vector marking on thin materials like paper without burning it up - again easily tested by yourself. The menu items are all in broken English/poorly translated Chinese.

    RetinaEngrave 3D is true direct printing. You can use all the latest applications such as AutoCAD 2012, CorelDraw X6, Adobe Illustrator CS5, and even MS Word etc.

    RetinaEngrave 3D produces TRUE 3D effects, raising the Z table to keep the item in focus and adjusting various power levels per image intensity.

    To keep the highest quality standards, RetinaEngrave is available only on FSL sold machines.

    Our evidence is in our track record: we offer all customers 100% money back guarantee on the RetinaEngrave portion of their order when purchasing our machines. No one returns it.

    Come visit us and see the FSL difference with your own eyes.



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    Quote Originally Posted by fullspeceng View Post
    FSL respects all potential customer opinions but it is unfortunate that the original poster is basing his post on opinions instead of facts (and FSL doesn't employ anyone named Walter). FSL has purchased many various types of machines in our Las Vegas showroom. Visit us and you can see with your own eyes the FSL RetinaEngrave difference side by side.

    Full Spectrum's 100% USA Developed RetinaEngrave 3D Ethernet+USB controller and software is far superior to Chinese developed software and laser electronics in our opinion. Of course our opinions are just opinions but we do back them up with facts and tests.

    When you receive your laser with Chinese electronics and software you will see that our statements are simply facts. If you load a large raster file such as a 20"x20" image at 1000dpi (20,000x20,000 pixels) it will take 30mins to an hour to process and download to the machine - if it succeeds at all. Just try it with a stopwatch - this is an empirical test. The power control is extremely poor on most Chinese machines and you will find that you cannot turn the power low enough to conduct vector marking on thin materials like paper without burning it up - again easily tested by yourself. The menu items are all in broken English/poorly translated Chinese.

    RetinaEngrave 3D is true direct printing. You can use all the latest applications such as AutoCAD 2012, CorelDraw X6, Adobe Illustrator CS5, and even MS Word etc.

    RetinaEngrave 3D produces TRUE 3D effects, raising the Z table to keep the item in focus and adjusting various power levels per image intensity.

    To keep the highest quality standards, RetinaEngrave is available only on FSL sold machines.

    Our evidence is in our track record: we offer all customers 100% money back guarantee on the RetinaEngrave portion of their order when purchasing our machines. No one returns it.

    Come visit us and see the FSL difference with your own eyes.
    Yes they are just my opinions and as I stated I was not sure of the name.. The fact of the matter is that there are already a ton of people using "Chinese" lasers and I have never heard anyone make statements like your employee made yesterday.. I have also seen several examples of the types of work you claim can not be done by "Chinese" lasers. I called your company because I was actually interested in buying at least one laser from you but was instead so turned off by the conversation I had that there is no way I will ever do business with your company.

    It does sound like your retinaengrave 3d system is potentially a very handy piece of work, but you should really talk to your people about how to deal with potential customers.. Now instead of buying a laser from you I guess I will have to suffer through using my "Chinese" Lasers.

    Phil



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    In the business world sales people are trained to make sales so you can always expect a sales person to push their own products. However it is also FSL company policy not to give out false facts to make a sale. If you have specific complaints please send us an email and management will investigate.

    However it appears your complaints are just in regard to specific statements that we can verify through testing. Load a 1-2meg jpg file on LaserCut and see how long it takes. Load a 20MB jpg file on LaserCut and see how long it takes then report back. You will see that we are telling the truth. Turn down the power to the minimum on LaserCut and you will see it cuts out in the range of 8-15% which will always cut through paper/card stock/thin wood on a 80W laser. There's no way we could find to turn the power low enough only mark on card stock with an 80W laser but not cut through it using the power control through the Chinese electronics. How many poorly translated Chinese menu boxes do you find in the Chinese software? Again easily verified with screenshots.

    The cold hard facts don't lie.

    At the end of the day you want your laser to do the job. If you are happy with a low cost Chinese machine running Chinese software and electronics, why pay more?

    However, it is our opinion that the limitations of the Chinese software/elecronics are completely unacceptable when compared side by side with RetinaEngrave which is the reason FSL has spent over $1m and developed RetinaEngrave.



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    Quote Originally Posted by fullspeceng View Post
    In the business world sales people are trained to make sales so you can always expect a sales person to push their own products. However it is also FSL company policy not to give out false facts to make a sale. If you have specific complaints please send us an email and management will investigate.

    However it appears your complaints are just in regard to specific statements that we can verify through testing. Load a 1-2meg jpg file on LaserCut and see how long it takes. Load a 20MB jpg file on LaserCut and see how long it takes then report back. You will see that we are telling the truth. Turn down the power to the minimum on LaserCut and you will see it cuts out in the range of 8-15% which will always cut through paper/card stock/thin wood on a 80W laser. There's no way we could find to turn the power low enough only mark on card stock with an 80W laser but not cut through it using the power control through the Chinese electronics. How many poorly translated Chinese menu boxes do you find in the Chinese software? Again easily verified with screenshots.

    The cold hard facts don't lie.

    At the end of the day you want your laser to do the job. If you are happy with a low cost Chinese machine running Chinese software and electronics, why pay more?

    However, it is our opinion that the limitations of the Chinese software/elecronics are completely unacceptable when compared side by side with RetinaEngrave which is the reason FSL has spent over $1m and developed RetinaEngrave.
    So, assuming (and I have no reason to assume otherwise), you are completely correct in all aspects of what you say, you *still* lost the sale, and you're *still* here defending what you say. In business, the "win" is to get the sale, not to be proved right on the internet... FWIW, some people (myself included, and I'm thinking of buying one of your lasers. We'll see once I've phoned you) react badly to an aggressive sales pitch. Personally, the harder someone tries to push me in their own direction, the less I trust what they say. Good products stand on their own merits.

    Here's my thinking on whether I'll be buying from you:

    The good:
    • The laser itself seems accurate
    • The controlling software looks to be truly excellent for the price class
    • Price. Despite the above, it's still cheaper than the competition. I've looked at RabbitLaser, HurricaneLaser, LightObject, several others whose name escapes me. I even priced out building it myself (buildlog.net) and FSLaser is still cheaper, although the buildlog.net one would be more capable.


    The bad:
    • Quality control is lacking on the laser - brackets are easily bent, screws being the wrong size, etc. etc.
    • There are several reports around the 'net that the laser arrives in a less-than-usable state.
    • Again, several reports of general dickishness: bribery to gain good reviews, denial of access to forums, badmouthing competitors, the above hard-sell, denying support to non-first-sale-owners, etc.


    "The good and the bad" culled from this forum, your own forum, and the net (e.g.: here)

    I own several CNC machines, although I'm just a hobbyist. One of them is a PCB engraving machine by EverPrecision. Since I'm not the first owner of that device, the US dealer won't talk to me or give me the upgrades that are available. That little detail cost EverPrecision dearly when the company I work for bought new PCB engraving machines from LPKF instead... Being a dick can be a very costly attitude to take, and whereas I'm sure you are convinced that the actions you're taking are in the best interests of your business, I'm just saying that it ain't necessarily so.

    Generally it seems to me you have good products, worth what you're charging for them, but the customer-service aspect lets the side down. For me, it's down to building myself, or buying your laser now... We'll see which way I go after I've spoken to your sales reps.

    Just my $0.02.



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    Personally I'd buy the G.Weike too (and did) it's not perfect, but the price is reflective of that.

    The software is a bit slow, but if you're doing production work on it that requires that level of speed, you should buy accordingly. i just don't see the value in the cost difference.



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    Well, G.Weike seems to care even less about quality control than FSLaser - if I had ordered the laser in this thread, it'd be going back at their expense. You ought not need to re-weld your laser cabinet, not to mention the long list of other defects...

    For me, the software is just as important as the hardware. I don't know that it's important that the laser has a generic 'print' driver - I think anything I cut/engrave will be from a CAD/Design program like Corel Draw, but FSLaser do seem to be pushing the envelope with their software. Much more so than anyone else, anyway, and that's a definite plus.

    It does seem to me (at the moment) that the best option might be to build the buildlog.net one which gives me a 20" x 12" work area compared to the 9.5" x 12" of the FSLaser hobby one, for a slightly higher price. Rather than paying $2810 for the smaller ready-built laser (including the beam combiner and shipping/insurance), I think the cost would be ~$3300 for the build-it-yourself laser, including the retina-engrave stand-alone hardware, so I'd still have the best software and twice the work area. Even more if I just bump up the MakerSlide a little bit...

    Unfortunately, there's something of a shortage of parts for the build-it-yourself option at the moment (store.makerslide.com is on vacation for June, and Bart (@buildlog.net) is not providing the same sort of kits that he used to). So I have to decide on getting the instant-gratification of the smaller laser now, compared to the annoying-delay of waiting for all the parts and then building, and then finally having the device. The heart says "buy the FSLaser one. The head says "wait and build"...



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    Well then you won't be paying under 4K for a 90W laser, i'm reasonably sure fslaser are still using the same overall design, the same tack/spot welded unaligned case, if they're taking it apart, rebracing it and rewelding it on an aligned jig then thats awesome but you're paying a lot more for it. the same lifting mechanisms etc.

    Someone's gotta pay for that $1,000,000 dollars of development they keep mentioning.

    The things i listed are very basic, the crack is more cosmetic than anything its a super easy fix. cleaning the mirrors is easy, and you should realign it after shipping anyway.

    It's a double edge sword when you write up the good and the bad, people will view it in different ways and possibly read too much into it without taking into account the price.

    I've gone over the machine with a fine toothcomb and seen the problems and the solutions, I sent our feedback back to them, some they might agree with, some they might not, but I'd still buy another one from GK.



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    The Full Spectrum Hobby laser can accommodate work pieces of 16"x12" with a true cutting area of 9.5"x14.5".

    We of course sell all sorts of models with various bed sizes. Call us and we can give you some options.

    FSL has made the business decision to no longer sells control card by themselves so the only way to get RetinaEngrave is to purchase an entire machine from FSL.



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    Quote Originally Posted by charliex View Post
    Well then you won't be paying under 4K for a 90W laser.
    Indeed. We all have our lines in the sand...



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    Quote Originally Posted by fullspeceng View Post
    The Full Spectrum Hobby laser can accommodate work pieces of 16"x12" with a true cutting area of 9.5"x14.5".

    We of course sell all sorts of models with various bed sizes. Call us and we can give you some options.
    Right, but your prices are out of my range (as a hobbyist) to get the larger size bed. I don't necessarily need a larger laser (40W is fine), but I would like a larger *area* without having to take the bottom off the laser. The cheapest option I could see on your website (the 20x12) is $6k including shipping and insurance. That's a far cry from the ~$3k for building it. If there's something I'm missing then feel free to PM me / reply ...

    Quote Originally Posted by fullspeceng View Post
    FSL has made the business decision to no longer sells control card by themselves so the only way to get RetinaEngrave is to purchase an entire machine from FSL.
    That makes me sad. You should probably change the web-page at Full Spectrum Engineering then, because it states that you sell the card separately. I will also make a point of posting on buildlog.net that you have changed your position on selling the retina-engrave separately, and advise Bart to take down the advert for it.

    Still, it's your product and your choice; I'll just have to live without it. I know there are alternatives (lightobject have one, as do Thunderlaser. I'm a (fairly accomplished, even if I say so myself) software engineer. I'm relatively sure I can put something together to do what I want, given a halfway-decent API. When I do, of course, I'll make it open source. I've got code in gcc & gcj, in the linux kernel, and I've written my own operating system before. I'm used to giving code away.



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    I've been fiddling around with the leetro dlls, so i can write my own software interface. Initially we were just going to drop in our own controller but for a first stab i'm just going to knock out a printer driver on top of the dlls (at least for windows) its the low hanging fruit.

    since we are rebuilding our own case/enclosure with a 36"x48" working area it may end up with its own controller anyway.



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    Default Re: FS laser just lost a sale.....

    They just did it publicly trashed others lasers, were are so good and the other guys suck. Let me tell you from personal experience FSL machines suck and so do the people. Their crappy people to work with their support sucks. All they want is your money, then to bad for you if your machine breaks and it will. Don't expect much help.

    Quote Originally Posted by fullspeceng View Post
    FSL respects all potential customer opinions but it is unfortunate that the original poster is basing his post on opinions instead of facts (and FSL doesn't employ anyone named Walter). FSL has purchased many various types of machines in our Las Vegas showroom. Visit us and you can see with your own eyes the FSL RetinaEngrave difference side by side.

    Full Spectrum's 100% USA Developed RetinaEngrave 3D Ethernet+USB controller and software is far superior to Chinese developed software and laser electronics in our opinion. Of course our opinions are just opinions but we do back them up with facts and tests.

    When you receive your laser with Chinese electronics and software you will see that our statements are simply facts. If you load a large raster file such as a 20"x20" image at 1000dpi (20,000x20,000 pixels) it will take 30mins to an hour to process and download to the machine - if it succeeds at all. Just try it with a stopwatch - this is an empirical test. The power control is extremely poor on most Chinese machines and you will find that you cannot turn the power low enough to conduct vector marking on thin materials like paper without burning it up - again easily tested by yourself. The menu items are all in broken English/poorly translated Chinese.

    RetinaEngrave 3D is true direct printing. You can use all the latest applications such as AutoCAD 2012, CorelDraw X6, Adobe Illustrator CS5, and even MS Word etc.

    RetinaEngrave 3D produces TRUE 3D effects, raising the Z table to keep the item in focus and adjusting various power levels per image intensity.

    To keep the highest quality standards, RetinaEngrave is available only on FSL sold machines.

    Our evidence is in our track record: we offer all customers 100% money back guarantee on the RetinaEngrave portion of their order when purchasing our machines. No one returns it.

    Come visit us and see the FSL difference with your own eyes.




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    Default Re: FS laser just lost a sale.....

    there are better options for controllers out there now that leave most in the dust for $500 you can get a controller that will work every day for years and years what can do pic engrave, cutting or what ever you wont.

    so you can get a cheap laser chuck the controller in the bin and replace it with the $500 one

    <img src="https://ivxo1q-dm2305.files.1drv.com/y4mENMmTr_Cabc7pR0FUdB6gtbADq2JbuG4_rGy0eBQvLJx19pTi6TqMUIJN0xgOyDIc0gWoxYhS38HpbSTFGdfaK-o42IOU6jczrhDpfpCOTNGL1X6hvZCbgj0y35gqmq1YGTrWwShYGV-C7lXA2esy0Pi_WfnBSyroDLSGXwce4uSr1U7op7srdi78rispHCa_K4aFlTlJPVkkNWMfgh_Tg?width=60&height=60&cropmode=none" width="60" height="60" />

    Being Disabled is OK CNC is For fuN


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FS laser just lost a sale.....

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