I was looking for a drive controller and called Computer Renaissance.  I
described to them what I wanted and how it would be used.  They said they had
just what I wanted, so I bought it.  It did not work, and the directions said
it was unlikely to work as I wanted.  When I took it back they refused to give
my money back and denied having told me that it would work.

Since then I have heard of several other instances where they did the same
thing.

Has anyone else had a similar experience with Computer Renaissance?

21 responses total.

All I've ever bought from them was a used case, which worked as it was
supposed to.  Some people I know who worked there a few years ago had horror
stories about their return policy, including that what they were supposed to
tell customers the policy was before the customers bought stuff was not the
same as the policy they were supposed to use against customers who wanted to
return stuff.

Please elaborate

Something in writing would have helped.  Such as what they claimed that the
part will do, and a statement that if it does not do this it can be returned
for cash (not credit, Bill is still dealing with what he traded for, that also
does not work as claimed).

I usually consider CR as I would a garage sale, or a UoM Prop Dispo sale...
buyer beware.  If I'm not _certain_, I either don't buy there, or figure my
$ spent is a well-learned lesson.

        I've heard horror stories about CompRen too, but never from what I
consider to be veteran, cautious shoppers -  most of whom, to be fair, would
know more about the computers they sell than their staff.

A friend of mine where I used to work (UM) went to CompRen and asked for
a new video card for the computer system he had purchased from CompRen
shortly before.  They sold him a 4meg SVGA card and told him it would
work.  He got home with it and tried the card, but he could not get any
resolution higher than 640x480 (using the drivers supplied with the
card, or the latest drivers downloaded from the card manufacturer's web
site) to work so he could see anything reasonable on the screen.  

He took the card back, CompRen plugged it into another machine in their
store, it worked, and they told him 'see it works fine'.  He argued that
they had sold him the card to work in the machine he had purchased from
them, and that they should have known if it would work, and if not,
should give him his money back.  They disagreed, refused to give him his
money back, and he ended up writing a complaint to the president of the
CompRen chain.  He did get an apology for the poor service, but no money
back.  He chalked it up to experience and vowed never to buy something
at CompRen again.

I realize this is all second hand, and I've tried to relate it as I
recall him telling me the story, but of course, second hand information
can be unreliable.  If anything, I do remember his extreme frustration
with the people in the local store, who stone-walled him, and his anger
at being sold something that flat out did not do as promised.  He was
somewhat mollified by the apology from CompRen corporate, but I doubt
he'll ever go back there.  If I run into the guy, I'll point him here,
but I don't think he'd be interested much in Grex.

there is always the better business bureau to which a written complaint may
help others, and the State of Michigan consumer Protection Agency (which might
contact CR and let them know people are unhappy with their practices).

Computer Ren doesn't really seem to be overly interested in selling anything
either.  STeve and I went in one day as I want to get a palm top of some sort
and they had a huge sign in the window for a Palm Pilot IIIx.  A friend from
work as a Palm Pilot III and loves it so I decided to check it out.

Told the sales guy that I was interested in it expecting him to get one out and
give me the standard sales pitch (they didn't have one out on display even
though advertising a big sale).  He not only didn't show me one but when I
asked about it all he said was "It's has the same features as the Plam III
with more memory".  When I asked how much memory he replied "twice as much".

At that time the only thing I knew about the machines was that they were
small and were basically electronic organizers.  His information was no
information at all and for all he knew he had a sale but didn't do the least
amount of work to reel it in.

I will never step in the store again and will probably buy my machine by mail
from a source found on the net.  I don't like the hard sell, but this was way
too far the other direction.

At least Circuit City let me play with all the machines they had and told me
the differences and even told me that I probably wouldn't need to go to the
expense of buying the IIIx as almost no one uses the extra 2 meg of memory.
(Boy are they ever going to be wrong, especially since I have found a C
compiler for the thing.)

We've recently had a good experience buying a computer, mail order,

from Dell.

  I've heard nothing but good things about Dell.

Our computer volunteers have never complained about any difficulty in working
on the hardware (like they have with P-Bell and Gateway).
I was not called back one time when I phoned C. Ren about a modem.

One problem with Dell is that if you order a foo this week, and order
the same foo next week, you may well get completely different computers.
This is annoying if you expect to be able to install an operating system
on them, because the drivers you need will be different.

(This wouldn't be a problem with Unix, but it's painful with various
forms of windows.)

I've seen that the Ann Arbor CompRen is the worst in the area in just about
everything. The best one was the one in Farmington Hills, but they closed up
a while back, and went into on-line deals only. I never had a problem with
them, the guys there knew their stuff. They even spent 2 hours searching for
info on a motherboard that I brought in there. I bought a good deal of parts
there and only had a problem with one of them, an Aztech sound/modem combo.
I took it home, installed the drivers, and it just didn't want to work right.
took it right back to the store, and even though it was a used item to start
with, they took it back, and I bought another sound card (AW32Pro) which I'm
still using today. 
I was sorry to see them close up the shop, but I did get some killer deals
from the closeout, like a Realtek 10/100 PCI NIC for $5, and various other
bits of hardware (fans, brackets, cables) for under $20 total. 
From what I understand, the same guys who ran the Farmington Hills store also
run the Troy one, so if you're up for a drive, that's the place to go. 
For me, the A2 CompRen is a last resort store. Most of the stuff that they
sell there used (i.e., motherboards, HDDs, RAM) you can get _new_ somewhere
else for a few bucks more. 

I think Computer Renaissance is a co-op of independent
businesses and the store in one town is probably not co-owned
by the same person who owns a store in another town.

While I suppose the national organization should apply
some standards, ones good or bad experience in one store
may not be all thatrelevant
to ones expectations in another.

Computer Renaissance is a franchise operation.  The franchiser is Gro-Biz of
Minneapolis, MN

What other Bizes do they Gro?

Play it Again Sports and Once Upon a Kid.  The y do others, but I don't
remember them all.  They have a web page, but I don't recall the address.

Used sports, used clothing and used computers.

Also "Music Go Round" and "Disc Go Round" (might be out of business).  There's
a Music Go Round in the Oak Valley Center.  They sell used musical instruments
along with cheap new stuff.  I got a good deal on a bass guitar speaker there
a year ago, but their keyboard pricing tends to be surrealistic.  Apparently
all prices for used stuff comes out of a corporate "blue book" which is a tad
out of date.

We will refer Kiwanis people there for guitar amps and saxophones.

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