Beware Suunto computers D9 and Vytec.

[RonFrank]

I am actively boycotting Suunto for a different reason which is that I refuse to purchase products from a company who sells watches and other electronics all day online through thousands of retailers, but refuses to sell a dive computer online because of the good ol' boy diving retail network.

There are some things however where the warranty, and how the company handles the warranty is VERY important. Expensive DSLR's and dive computer are both on my list of things that I refuse to buy without a manufacture warranty because there are so many duds out there.

Case in point, one buddy purchased an Oceanic VT pro computer. It died several times, and the end result was the Oceanic replace the entire unit once, and the transmitter two times on top of that. This over a period of about a year, with the computer going to Oceanic each time with the exception of the first failure where the LDS replaced the transmitter as it was less than 30 days old.

Another friend purchased the Atom 2 in January 2007, and his entire unit has been replaced once after it failed in Coz during a dive.

In both these cases the manufacture (Oceanic) replaced the units without question, and the new units came with full term warranties. Kudo's to Oceanic for stepping up and making good on their warranty even if it's a PITA to have to loose a computer for weeks.

Suunto has a poor warranty policy, poor service, and this is not the first time it's been discussed on the board. Now I have TWO reasons to avoid Suunto products even if they are Sexy! I do however love my SK7 compass, so I guess I own ONE suunto product!

 

[RonFrank]

Off topic but...for all you LP patrons (myself included)

Have you guys seen the recent supreme court decision allowing the manufacturer to dictate the MSRP? Here to for, a manufacturer could not dictate the msrp for a retailer but since ole G dubya has stacked the Supr Court the Sherman Anti trust act (1911) has been overturned. Companies like LP may soon find themseleves in court or out of business.

Off topic, but LP is NOT an authorized dealer of Suunto products, so they have NO agreement with the manufacture, and are not bound by the rules.

What this will do is allow LP to beat up on authorized dealers even more, not less.

 

[Hoosier]

LP always wins unless the manufactures change their sale policy. Their network dealers aren't ready to beat LP with the manufacture's way of business.

The higher the equipment price goes up, the more LP can have business because there will be more room to play with the price.


Look at the old archive on the board. Many LDS owners were arguing, How can you buy your life supporting equipment over the internet?" at that time.

What has been changed over time last 2 years? They were out of business or are selling the product over the internet like LP.

Funny world......

 

[Azza]

MySuunto Vyper's sensor shat itself after 2 years and 1 weeks flawless service...kept saying I was at 15 metres when I was on the boat...
Aqualung NZ wanted $500 to fix it...bloody thing only cost me $800:shakehead
So I went and bought an Atom instead and now thats playing up as well...I think I'm going back to analog until these guys sort their out.

 

[somewhereinla]

Just an idea, but is it possible that some of the dive computers that show the wrong depth are actually set to a wrong altitude settings?

 

[Azza]

Just an idea, but is it possible that some of the dive computers that show the wrong depth are actually set to a wrong altitude settings?

Not mine. I never ever played with the altitude and when it shat itself, it failed to turn on so I went back up, turned it on, and straight away it read 15 metres. To befair it was ultra conservative during the dive

 

[red_barbarian]

I'm wondering if SUUNTO is dumping known bad inventory in the SE Asia market. Maybe I missed something but it looks like most of the complaints are located in Asia. With the worst reports coming out of SE Asia. I bought a mosquito in SE Asia 2 years ago, and it also died. I hoped it was just a result of a low voltage battery so there went another few dollars.

 

[Hoosier]

I'm wondering if SUUNTO is dumping known bad inventory in the SE Asia market. Maybe I missed something but it looks like most of the complaints are located in Asia. With the worst reports coming out of SE Asia. I bought a mosquito in SE Asia 2 years ago, and it also died. I hoped it was just a result of a low voltage battery so there went another few dollars.

It ccould be.


Many major manufactures used to sell out their inventory at the Asia market. The price in Asia market is much higher than U.S. and EU markets. It is much easier to sell it out with some discount price to the dealers. The warranty is also anorhter black hole. Each countries have a different warrnaty policy, for example, one year instead of two years. So, that is another reason why I have argued, major brands' international warranty is another gimmick...

Another thing in Asia market is also considered as a good place to test their new equipment.

Believe it or not, the buying power for the new equipment in Asia market is much higher than U.S. and EU because Scuba is recognized as a rich sport. The average income on the scuba community in Asia is relatively higher than U.S. and EU.

 

[Scared Silly]

It is matter of quality control of Sunnto, not OEM company in China. Sunnto has a right and chance to change their source or OEM provider.

Please read some business articles or journals. The pressure to cost down on the OEM product is driven from the main companies (U.S. and EU), not China OEM companies by themselves.

Do you want a good example?

Wal-Mart.......

Hoosier, I am not sure I follow you on this. The pressure transducers used on the computers are third party. They should be made/bought based on specs from Suunto. The third party should be doing the majority of the QA on them. Whereas Suunto should be doing QA on the finial product.

Are you says Suunto should be doing the QA on the transducers before they go in the product???

As for cost cutting - that is a bit of a different matter that is not fully germain other than for QA.

I happen to have a contact with the president of Suunto NA (i.e. everything but diving) which are headquartered up the road from me and in the past have talked with the president of Suunto Finland - who probably be here in a couple of weeks - about some issues related to my dive gear. Through them, I got my issues resolved and have had pretty good luck in dealing with AquaLung since then.

Some history - Suunto uses AquaLung as their distributor because of the their large world wide network that has been in place for many years. To certain degree this makes sense as it helps them get themselves established in to the market. However, as some have noted the sales model that AquaLung uses for better or worse contradicts how other Suunto products are sold. I am sure that Suunto is continously watching this relationship.

 

[ShakaZulu]

So, Sunnto warranty is nothing better than LP..... LOL~~~~

.....

It isn't about whether or not yours is working ok?

Love it...too funny

I had this same problem on my Mosquito, LP replaced it though....