Spawn

I've done ebay and Cardomain to great satisfaction. Smartass has an order forthcoming soon. Avoid etronics like the PLAGUE!! Millionbuy looks to be the same setup, they don't actually have any of the products, they drop ship them. I waited a month for speakers before etronics finally said they don't ship to Canada, then it took a week of daily phone calls to get my refund.

smpl_gy

I've done the Etronics and Onlinecarstereo several times.....I DO NOT recommend Etronics unless you are willing to drive to NewYork to purchase in-store. Onlinecarstereo worked great for me everytime I dealt with them....

PS If you are a newbie, I strongly suggest you visit a local shop to get proper advice on what to purchase. They will be able to offer proper post sales support if you are having issues and are unsure how to fix it. Another thing is Internet specs tend to be inaccurate. Visit the manufacturer's website to verify them...If you are someone who knows what to look for, for your particular application and does the install, tuning etc yourself and are not reliant on a shop for anything major, then online is the way to go...It worked for me...

smpl_gy

It's so funny that you mentioned that "they dont ship to canada" thing. I ordered from them several times and had quite the headache getting my products. But i got them eventually. The last time I placed an order with them, my order was paid for, in-full, and they hit me with the "we dont ship to canada anymore" 4 weeks later. To this day, I still have not received the product that I plaid for (luckily it was only $50)...

Lethal

I really hope your not suggesting that someone got to a local car audio shop and USE them for their knowledge and experience so that person can then go and buy the gear off the internet. Thats deplorable.

If you want to buy off the internet, then fine. I don't agree. But using a shops knowledge and experience knowing full well that your not going to buy from them is despicable. So their good enough to answer your questions but not to earn your money?
Why not ask the e-dealer? I am sure that whatever <sarcasm> product you ask about is going to be perfect <sarcasm> for you regaardless of application.

And no. Not all online dealers are that way but they are few and far between.

I'm not even going to start about the comeback I am sure to hear about "But I can get the same thing online for $200 that the local shop is gouging me $450 for." Do a search if your comeback involves this and wade through the many pages of repetitive .

Using the local shop with no intention of buying is my beef.

MR2NR

iTrader: (66)

Not even considering the good vendors here on the site is mine, seconded by prying information from us and taking the business elsewhere.

AAAAAAA

iTrader: (7)

I feel like I need to add something to these posts

I defenetly understand how frustrating this could be for a dealer, but keep in mind that a lot of shops really have bad advice to give. Looking back when I was younger talking to people form store to store, the stories were different and when I revisit them a lot were false or very narrow minded. How can you expect new comming consumers to trust them when you get conflicting info? I am sure that is an ongoing thing... So what is a consumer to do?

Well the consumer, in his quest to be informed, will go on the net (Where anything you want to know is there for free) , either to a message board or some articles and get the answer and then purchase his equipment for much cheeper from the same place he got his free information from; the net.

Of course then he will go back to one of the shops he didnt trust for information and ask them to install it. And I can tell you a real good reason for that. People dont trust the salesman. But in general might trust the installer. I remember always wanting to talk to the installers since they seemed to know what they were talking about.

mike bisson

iTrader: (1)

Right on Joe -- I get this in home audio all the time... " I have some drawings, where would you put the speakers..." "how do I run the cables?" I just advise the person that when our installer comes to do the work, they will go over location with them at the house... if the conversation ends, I now know they were phishing for free information.

When you ask a salesperson at a shop for information for 15-30 minutes with no intention of buying, you are hurting that person. They may be losing another sales opportunity (if they are on commission) or be taken away from an administraitive duty or installation.

I have yet to meet someone who works for free -- doctors charge for time, mechanics charge for time, yet no one values the salesperson's time.

AAAAAAAAAAAA may I come to your work and take up your time for 30 mins to an hour and not purchase your services? Would your employer mind? Please let me know how I can turn that into a money making model... if you can I will appreciate it very much, next on my list after that will be finding out how to perfect the perpetual motion machine....

AAAAAAA

iTrader: (7)

You can, I work for the government ha.
But really, dont tell me you dont have other tricks like the one mentioned above to tell if someone is trying to get free info or if they want to purchase right?

I am not saying either side is right or wrong, but both sides have their faults. Its just the way it is.

Here is an example: I walk up and make an offer on a used PG ms1000 at a shop they have on display without a price. I make a reasonable offer (Essentially I offered a bit more then what I could get elsewhere on a used anniversary edition MS1000) and the OWNER laughed at me.

He said I was full of , he then back tracked after he called PG and they confirmed they were making MS1000's still. What a douche. Before the call to PG he was trying to tell me the ms1000 was a classic and that it had been modified to be a pure class A amp.

Ranting ranting...
Basically I am sure even all the vendors or guys who own shopds that come here have stretched the truth to sell something one time or another, or maybe more often then they want to remember... or perhaps they just beleived the crap they are\were saying.

Like that one time a guy said he was only buying amps for the shop that had high dampening factor because that was the only thing to look for. I still cant believe he actually told me that.

mike bisson

iTrader: (1)

Great, so I'm paying you... how about getting some work done today?

AAAAAAA

iTrader: (7)

But I also pay myself following that train of logic.
I didnt mean to **** you off by the way.