Good/bad news: D1624 arrived, but DOA.

[skippy]

Finally took delivery on my long-backordered D1624 last night. Hustled it downstairs, read the manual, installed the disk drive, slammed it in the rack, powered it up- and found that there was nobody home. Dead front panel/remote. The disk drive spins up, but with no front panel there's no way to control the device, so I have a couple of grand tied up in a 3-slot paperweight. Not a happy camper.

What sort of experiences have people had with Fostex QC in this modern digital age? They used to be sort of so-so, years ago, and this isn't encouraging. If a lot of people have had DOAs recently, I may return this to the vendor, pull my hard earned shekels back out of it, and get in the queue for an MX2424 instead of waiting more weeks for another D1624.

What say you folks?

 

[skippy]

Well, a little followup: Fostex is sending me out a fresh unit via FedEx, so hopefully I'll be able to get it in and running for the weekend. They have a kind of bizarre support policy that has taken some CSR-beatings to work around: they generally require that your defective unit be back in their hands *before* they'll send out a warranty replacement. After I pointed out that that policy would leave me with no unit for another week at a minimum, and that I could have an MX2424 from the local Guitar Satan installed and running this afternoon, they showed a bit more flexibility.

Customer service from Full Compass (where I bought the unit) has been excellent, and they've helped me a lot with administering the beatings on Fostex. Full marks to them... We'll just see if the replacement is dead or alive. If dead, it's Tascam time.

 

[skippy]

Not much interest in the 1624, looks like. Well, just to bring the thread to closure, the replacement unit worked perfectly, and I've been striping tracks with it as fast as I can go.

I have a little work to do to get really facile with the autolocate functions, but for simple tracking, punching in, and editing (the only kind I'll do: digitally emulating an analog machine, a razor blade, and good old Ampex splicing tape!), it works like a champ. Old dog learns some new tricks, and saved a boatload of money over a Tascam. They nickel-and-dime you to _death_ with those damned things (Whaddaya mean there's no I/O at that price?).

If you're thinking of a 16-track, and (since you're a throwback like me) your brain believes that the multitrack should be a box in the corner of the room and not just an icon on the screen of your PC, the 1624 isn't a bad deal a-tall.

Now I just need to spring for a Jaz drive for on-the-fly backup, and some more internal IDE drives and carriers for different clients. Whee! I'd almost forgotten how much fun spending money in the name of making money can be...