Jason Dunn
07-31-2005, 07:00 PM
I had a strange experience last week. I bought an Epson R200 (http://thoughtsmedia.pricegrabber.com/search_getprod.php/masterid=2423685/prsrt=1) inkjet printer about a month ago, and today I decided to call Epson tech support about an issue that has bothered me for almost a decade (I kid you not): in every Epson printer I've ever owned, dating back to the mid-90's, the default paper size after installing the driver is A4. I live in Canada - we use 8.5 x 11" paper just like the rest of North America. A4 is a European paper format, yet for some reason every printer driver Epson has released in the past decade has put A4 as the default when I've installed it. And if you don't go into the printer options and change the default from A4 to 8.5 x 11", you'll end up with a mess because the printer continues to feed the 8.5 x 11" sheet through and prints where there's no paper. Ugly!
To the point of my story though: I called Epson tech support to report this issue, a decade late, and the tech asked for the serial number of my printer. I gave it to him, and he said it wasn't "right". I repeated it again, very slowly, and he said it wasn't right. I repeated it a third time, letter by letter, pausing between each character. "Sorry, that's still not right" he said. I had to stop myself from cursing at the tech, who's obviously just reading from a screen and can't think beyond it (the proof of this was his confusion over whether or not my month old printer was still under warranty). Then a memory surfaced: when I bought the R200 at Best Buy, I thought it was rather strange that the box had English and Spanish on it - no French. Being from Canada, I'm used to seeing bilingual boxes, but Spanish? The only explanation I could think of is that this printer was meant to be sold in the USA, and thus the serial number was not in Epson Canada's database.
Grey market products are fairly common from discount online stores, but a big-box chain like Best Buy? Quite surprising. My concern is that if I do need some real tech support on this printer, I won't be able to get it because I won't have a valid serial number. I guess I might have to call Epson tech support in the US. :roll:
To the point of my story though: I called Epson tech support to report this issue, a decade late, and the tech asked for the serial number of my printer. I gave it to him, and he said it wasn't "right". I repeated it again, very slowly, and he said it wasn't right. I repeated it a third time, letter by letter, pausing between each character. "Sorry, that's still not right" he said. I had to stop myself from cursing at the tech, who's obviously just reading from a screen and can't think beyond it (the proof of this was his confusion over whether or not my month old printer was still under warranty). Then a memory surfaced: when I bought the R200 at Best Buy, I thought it was rather strange that the box had English and Spanish on it - no French. Being from Canada, I'm used to seeing bilingual boxes, but Spanish? The only explanation I could think of is that this printer was meant to be sold in the USA, and thus the serial number was not in Epson Canada's database.
Grey market products are fairly common from discount online stores, but a big-box chain like Best Buy? Quite surprising. My concern is that if I do need some real tech support on this printer, I won't be able to get it because I won't have a valid serial number. I guess I might have to call Epson tech support in the US. :roll: