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Author Topic: Deluxe wants their USB sticks back Mike Blakesley Film God Posts: 12767 From: Forsyth, Montana Registered: Jun 99 posted 07-16-2010 02:59 PM                        We just got an email from Deluxe asking us to look around our booth and return any Deluxe USB sticks we might have laying around. (Since we've never gotten one from them yet, this was an easy chore for me to do!) See, this is why Technicolor has the late-return charge for hard drives. People can't be bothered to send stuff back unless there's a "consequence" for not doing it.  |  IP: Logged Chris Slycord Film God Posts: 2986 From: 퍼항시, 경상푹도, South Korea Registered: Mar 2007 posted 07-16-2010 03:26 PM                     It also shows why sending out small files this way way is a bit stupid. Anyone who can get an email to be told to do this likely has internet access, meaning that they could save money by just putting the files on a server. Now there's no need to send out hundreds of thumb drives and no need to worry that they'll never come back. Heck, they could even send those stupid files in the email (somehow I doubt people are going to pirate random adverts).  |  IP: Logged Dustin Mitchell Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1865 From: Mondovi, WI, USA Registered: Mar 2000 posted 07-16-2010 03:34 PM                     From my past experience Deluxe has had a not so good record on their end for tracking this kind of stuff. When sending things back to Deluxe (or any of the digital distributors) ALWAYS write down the tracking numbers when you send stuff back, that way when they call complaining about you not sending stuff back you can give them the tracking numbers to prove you sent it to them. With USB sticks though typically they just want you to send them back with whatever hard drive is going back that week so its a bit harder to track.  |  IP: Logged Monte L Fullmer Film God Posts: 8367 From: Nampa, Idaho, USA Registered: Nov 2004 posted 07-16-2010 04:41 PM                     I just throw them back in the Grey HD box when I ship the drive back. Keeps them quiet. -Monte  |  IP: Logged Brad Miller Administrator Posts: 17775 From: Plano, TX (36.2 miles NW of Rockwall) Registered: May 99 posted 07-16-2010 06:15 PM                     I hope everyone throws away their Corsair/Voyager mini USB sticks in protest for their awful design so they won't be re-used. I am really tired of managers putting the thing in backwards and not being able to read them. Seriously, what kind of crappy USB stick will fit EITHER WAY???  |  IP: Logged Mark Strube Master Film Handler Posts: 322 From: Milwaukee, WI, United States Registered: Feb 2007 posted 07-16-2010 06:31 PM                        One of our Doremi servers won't even read the mini sticks. (Of course it's in our largest house.) Reads everything else. I'm guessing it just doesn't make the connection due to some inconsistency in the construction of the USB port. I hate those crappy little drives. Every time we get one of those and it's something that's important to load, I just have to contact them to send us a real USB drive.  |  IP: Logged Mark Gulbrandsen Resident Trollmaster Posts: 16657 From: Music City Registered: Jun 99 posted 07-23-2010 07:07 PM                     It would probably cost more for the return postage to mail it back than it cost to buy.... Mke Deluxe pay for the return postage! Of course you could send it back cheaply by Media Mail which sometmies take weeks... Mark  |  IP: Logged Jeremy Weigel Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1062 From: Edmond, OK, USA Registered: Mar 2007 posted 07-23-2010 07:38 PM                     Since there has never been any instructions included with the sticks on what to do with them, I've given quite a few of them to employees and friends. Now that I know that they want them sent back with hard drives, we'll start doing that, but at this point they'll still have to wait a while until we open another Deluxe digital movie since we send our drives back after we upload them.  |  IP: Logged Frank Angel Film God Posts: 5305 From: Brooklyn NY USA Registered: Dec 1999 posted 07-26-2010 05:42 PM                        They wanted the DTS discs back too -- a lot of good that did.  |  IP: Logged Mike Blakesley Film God Posts: 12767 From: Forsyth, Montana Registered: Jun 99 posted 09-27-2010 10:52 AM                        When I started this thread I wondered, "why would they send a USB stick out with a hard drive anyway?" So then when we got our digital machine, I found the answer: The stick contains the "attached" trailer. Well why the hell can't Deluxe put the trailer on the hard drive like Technicolor does? We've probably played 4 or 5 films so far where the "attached" trailer wasn't included in the box. Luckily none of them were trailers we really needed but it seems they could solve this "problem" pretty easily.  |  IP: Logged Mark J. Marshall Film God Posts: 3188 From: New Castle, DE, USA Registered: Aug 2002 posted 09-27-2010 01:07 PM                    Aren't these projectors connected to the theaters' internal LAN to read the box office times? If so, why is an external drive needed to move the data at all?  |  IP: Logged Mike Blakesley Film God Posts: 12767 From: Forsyth, Montana Registered: Jun 99 posted 09-27-2010 01:28 PM                        What does any of that have to do with USB sticks or attached trailers??  |  IP: Logged Mark J. Marshall Film God Posts: 3188 From: New Castle, DE, USA Registered: Aug 2002 posted 09-27-2010 02:27 PM                    I'm just curious why "sticks" are required to move data to a machine that's connected to the network. Is the content too big for that?  |  IP: Logged Todd McCracken Master Film Handler Posts: 263 From: Northridge, CA, USA Registered: Mar 2008 posted 09-27-2010 02:36 PM                    Not all digital sites are networked, and even those that are aren't all created equal. That and the only distributor that has any real access to a network is Cinedigm as we are the only integrator/distributor left standing. (TDC got rid of all their integrated sites a while back) Generally USB sticks are used for keys and supplemental packages by those without full access to a network.  |  IP: Logged Mark J. Marshall Film God Posts: 3188 From: New Castle, DE, USA Registered: Aug 2002 posted 09-27-2010 04:23 PM                    Ah I see. Bummer.  |  IP: Logged

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