OBiHai Support???

[Swain]

Does Obihai even monitor the forum?  I posted to the New User news feed about problems with OBiBT 4 days ago, and no one has responded.  24 hours ago, I put in a ticket regarding the problem.  Have not received even an acknowledgement.  Does Obihai support exist?

[Mango]

Does Obihai even monitor the forum?

No they do not.

With regards to your ticket from yesterday, keep in mind that many businesses gave their employees that day off due to Christmas being on a Sunday.  So not receiving a response yet is not that unusual.

Sadly there have been similar problems reported by other OBiBT users.  The OBiBT (and also OBiLINE) seem underdeveloped.  When you hear from Obihai Support, please let us know what their response is in case it is helpful for other users.

[Swain]

Thanks for the info.  I'll wait another 48 hours before pulling the plug.  I realize that the holidays can throw a kink in customer support; however, (in my experience) an automated acknowledgement (of ticket receipt and information about a potential delay, or at least a "time frame" for response) is standard for most "good" customer support operations.   As for the OBiBT, I'm already a bit miffed to shell out $25 for a "proprietary" bluetooth dongle (when a $5.00 generic one should work), but when it doesn't work (won't keep a connection) it's all the more irritating.
I do appreciate your help, however, and will post the resolution (if any).  For me, bluetooth is a requirement.

[Swain]

For the benefit of those who followed this post, here's an update.

I went several rounds (of email) with OBi support regarding the OBiBT issues I was having.  Most of dialog was of the usual (and irritating) variety: Is it plugged in?  Is the phone within range of OBiBT dongle?  And my favorite... Your Device Managment shows NO Dongle on your BT1 service (Translation: Your OBiBT is not working). 

Really? Imagine my surprise! 

Finally they acknowledged that the dongle was likely defective and asked me to return it.  They indicated they would send me a replacement AFTER mine had been returned.  I told them No Thank You and requested a replacement for both the OBiBT dongle and the OBi200 from Amazon.  Amazon graciously responded that they would rush replacements out to me and asked me to return my "defective" units as soon as practical.  Now THAT'S customer service!

I requested replacements for both because neither I nor OBi support(?) could determine which was defective, the OBiBT itself or the BT port on the OBi200.  At any rate, Amazon, true to its word, rushed me replacements (along with a sincere "sorry you're having a problem") and I received them pronto.

I'm happy to report that after my initial testing, the Bluetooth features now appear to be working.  Still a few more tests to go (like trying to pair a second phone even though the OBiBT can only support a single connection at a time).  I will report final results later.  In fact, I plan to post more detail about using OBiBT because it's so critical to my setup and there appears to be very little, if any, content on this forum about it.

The real hero of this story (to this point) is Amazon.  OBihai could learn a thing or two about customer service from them.

[Davoice]

FYI... this is a fairly common experience among hardware vendors. Try getting Netgear to replace your broken access point quickly. It's futile!

If you're w/in the return period on Amazon, a replacement via Amazon will ALWAYS be faster than an RMA replacement. Same thing applies to things bought in local stores.