A Discussion of Quality and the Marketing Frenzy

Quite a little industry has grown up on Ebay since 1999 when I started selling scanned service manuals. I've seen some of my customers turn into competitors, and that's fine. Some of these newcomers have really gone off the deep end in their marketing frenzy. Some make the silly claim that a larger file always means a better scan. Some claim that 11x17 sheets are better for printing than already sectioned 8-1/2x11 sheets, which may or may not be true depending on your equipment. All of them claim to have the very best scans available, which also may or may not be true, but some of them also brag about being "better than the rest", which is rather amusing considering that almost all of them bought or otherwise obtained at least some of their product from us and are reselling our product while jumping through hoops to convince you that "theirs" is "better".. most of them are resorting to bigger and bigger fonts, more and more jargon, and more and more extravagant claims and sometimes downright lies about resolution and etceteras to induce you to choose them over anyone else, while others merely list a manual and a "guarantee of the lowest price on eBay" followed by what's usually a higher price than ours (because of their high "s&H").

We won't play those games. While the great majority of our offerings are of the highest quality (see samples), we try to make every model possible available, and some of the manuals are very old. Therefore not all the scans are as pretty white as we'd like. Where a better copy is available it replaces the older as soon as possible, and of course that's available to previous purchasers free (FTP) or at cost (CD).. but we're not going to refuse to provide you information you might need just so we can compete with a group of marketing experts on the quality issue, no matter how extreme or ridiculous their marketing ploys become, especially when half the "FEATURES" they list are likely to be exaggerations at best. I'll say this about our products, though: you will be able to read and use the information in all cases, and there are no identification letters added into the document body. The files are always of sufficient size to ensure readability but are never limited to being ponderous or excessive in resource requirements. A version will be provided that will perform well in everything from an old Pentium I to the newest whiz-bang on the computer emporium's shelf. If you're a technician, engineer or student who needs to work on or with a piece of equipment, my scans will give you what you need. If you're a scanning enthusiast concerned about exactly how the product is arrived at as opposed to the result, you'll want to seek the "BUY ME!!!" crowd. One thing you can depend on is that whoever you choose, you're most probably going to basically get what you need... only in many cases you're going to get far less than you would have if you'd purchased our products from us instead of from a plagiarist. We constantly upgrade items, and buying from us ensures access to the upgraded material.

May all your dogs be the kind that have tails to wag!


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