I got scammed - paid for equipment which never arrived... need replacements

[Peer Tritz]

Hello to anyone reading,

After many years in the used projector market, I failed my due diligence in basic business practices and have paid the price, financially and emotionally. I purchased 3x Barco DP2K-6E and 1x DP2K-8S with alchemy servers, lenses and CP650. 14 weeks ago.... The supplier is in Asia, at first the contact was great, kept me comprised on the supposed servicing of units until the bank clearance time passed, then the supplier broke of the contact completely. With no means of contact and no idea where my projectors are, I am now up S**t creek with out a paddle so to speak.

The worst part is I had to explain this to my customers. So if anyone has any of the above mentioned equipment to a fair price, so I might still be able to fill the orders and break even at 0, please hit me up - tritz@rebeam.de - If anyone can help, I would be eternally grateful.

I will update this post with the name of the company I dealt with (once all the official legal means have been exhausted). Hopefully this will help someone else avoid falling into the same scam. As always never make 100% prepayment for goods when dealing with a new supplier overseas. This fiasco has lead me to pull out of the DCI market entirely. As its just been exhausting trying to solve this problem.

Best regards
Peer Tritz

[Marcel Birgelen]

I can't help you with the hardware you're looking for. I guess the easiest objects to find would be a bunch of CP650s, but I guess that those aren't your primary concern.

Anyway, this sounds like an expensive lesson... I guess part of doing business is trying to stay out of this kind of problems, but taking risk is also part of doing business... I guess we all had our major bad experiences over time, like a customer going bust while you're footing the bill for a big order...

How did you pay for the order? Over the years, we ordered some stuff via the likes of AliExpress and Alibaba and ever so often you either receive nothing or clearly not the objects advertised (as in, what you get is utter crap). Up until now, I always managed to get refunds, because I paid via credit card. I guess if you paid via wire transfer, then all bets are off, unfortunately. Starting up legal proceedings in some "far away" country also isn't easy, will cost a lot of money upfront and even if you win, that doesn't mean you'll get a single cent back. If you have any kind of liability insurance, maybe it's worthwhile to check if they'd be willing to take this up for you, although chances will be slim.

For some larger deals in the past, in which I had some limited confidence, we used an escrow agent as a middle man. Yeah, those guys are a hassle and you end up paying them a fair share of your commission, but if the other part is willing to deal with it, it's usually a good sign.

[Mark Gulbrandsen]

And to not post the names involved is a HUGE disservice to others that read this column. I in fact got emails fomr who ever this was, but I just delete stuff like that because A, It's too expensive an order to trust the Chinese, and B, I have had similar experiences with items that were way less expensive. The world needs to know who these chiselers are before it happens again.

[Leo Enticknap]

The original poster wrote, "I will update this post with the name of the company I dealt with (once all the official legal means have been exhausted)."

I totally understand why he's being cautious. If you accuse someone of this sort of thing on a public website, online, and then there turns out to have been some sort of misunderstanding (e.g. the stuff was in transit, but it just took a long time), then huge reputational damage has been caused and you're potentially on the receiving end of a nasty lawsuit. If all the necessary due diligence has been done - e.g. filing a police report, and waiting for them to confirm officially that you are a crime victim - those risks diminish by an order of magnitude.

What would have made me suspicious about this is that three of the projectors are DP2K-6Es. They were (I'm guessing this model has now been superseded by the SP2K) very expensive for what they are - almost double the price of the equivalent NEC (900 originally, then 1000). My company, AFAIK, has only sold two of them in the four years I've been here, and I only service one of those: it was bought specifically because the end user needed a projector that is very quiet in operation (which it is: almost silent, compared to the NECs). Given their cost and the fact there are not that many of them around, someone trying to offload three 6Es on the used market in this manner would have raised suspicions in my mind. I'd have asked for their serial numbers and then asked Cinionic about their provenance.

[Mark Gulbrandsen]

It's actually legal to post the ad he was sent. PLus, good luck ever finding those people that were behind it.

[Steve Guttag]

Leo, we've sold 2-3 of the DP2K-6E. Quiet was always the driving force behind them (projector in the room with the audience). In many ways, I'd take a 6E over the NC900/1000...far better lens control/repeatability, easier to service...etc. That said, we've sold more of the NECs in this size.

[Mark Gulbrandsen]

I would not sell any more NC-900's either. When it came out it was the only savior for many small theaters that were just scraping by. I would not sell Barco either, because the Dallas Key's inevitably get lost.

[Leo Enticknap]

The more recent Barcos (S series, L series, and Series 4) replace the Dallas key reader with a button, so there are no keys to lose. But even the mk. II keypads for the B and C series still use the Dallas key, annoyingly.

Agreed totally with Steve that the 6E is a nicer projector than the mini NECs in many ways. Issue is that it isn't so much nicer that most customers are willing to pay the price premium.

[Carsten Kurz]

Funny, but, for some obvious reasons, the Barco 6E has a lower price in germany (europe?) than the NEC entry levels models. Including the ICMP(-X), it's a real bargain. Calibrated contrast, though, is poor.

[Mark Gulbrandsen]

The more recent Barcos (S series, L series, and Series 4) replace the Dallas key reader with a button, so there are no keys to lose. But even the mk. II keypads for the B and C series still use the Dallas key, annoyingly.

.

Yes, I had enough of the "I can't find that thingy you told me to put away in a safe spot" that I completely stopped servicing Barco. After you go to several sites and have this happen.... well....

[Steve Guttag]

And yet, I never have that issue. I zip-tied the Dallas key to the Coax cable. If needed, remove the Coax, pull it up to the Dallas key pad...put the Coax back. In later units (IMBs) I zip-tied to one of the AES cables (at the boot so it wouldn't crush the cable). Never had a key go missing. That said, I'm oh so happy that the Dallas key went away. NEC has opened up a new era in absurdity though...with the laser safety key. Some you need a physical key to be inserted and left in for it to turn the lasers on. On others, you need to have a thumb drive inserted for the lasers to turn on. If it is required, why don't either Christie or Barco have this nonsense? For the USB type (e.g. NC1201L1-A), I found the smallest thumb drive I could find so it doesn't stick out at all and then made two keys per projector just to ensure it never gets lost, broken...etc. Of the two, I'd rather have the physical key...at least then there is something to bypass!

[Pete Naples]

I carry a spare Dallas key with my car keys.

They are £2 on Amazon/Ebay

[Mark Gulbrandsen]

Regardless, it is something totally unnecessary in a digital cinema projector in this day and age. The other two manufacturers got it right...

[Steve Guttag]

No...NEC got it wrong even then. One pretty much HAS to give away the technician password to clear a marriage tamper. With Christie, one can remotely login and take care of the marriage credentials...the local person just has to press a button at the right time. Barco also never has one needing to give away a high credential. They even fixed the need to have an elevated credential to one that is just changing a lamp. Furthermore, it is possible to set the credential levels on a system by system basis. Then again, Christie decided the Medico keys were appropriate for the light engine area (secure area). I've found that 99% of the people store them in that area where the tool is stored so they are right next to the lock. We don't need physical keys on any projector. They need keys on the studios when they issue screeners. You can't build your ship with screen doors and then blame others for your leaks.

[Leo Enticknap]

No...NEC got it wrong even then. One pretty much HAS to give away the technician password to clear a marriage tamper.

The "advanced user" password also works to clear a tamper, and it only allows the end user to enter lamp swapout information (over and above the functions that "user" mode allows). There is also "installation" mode, that allows the user to do everything except update the projector's software/firmware, as well as service mode, which obviously allows everything. If I have to give someone the ability to clear a tamper and I'm not confident that they won't accidentally do something destructive in service mode, I give them the advanced user password, not the service password.

The Dallas key thing, dates back, I suspect to the dawn of digital cinema, and the projector manufacturers were trying to figure out how to implement the DCI requirement that a tamper can only be cleared by someone who is physically present at the projector. It's easy with hindsight to observe that requiring the use of a small physical object, separate from the projector, was bound to create a problem with them getting lost, but I guess that Barco had their reasons for going that route when they did. That having been said, I wish that they'd replaced the reader with a key button during the change from the original B and C series keypads (the ones with the nipple-type numeral buttons that go bad after a few years) to the mk. II part. There is clearly no DCI reason why this couldn't have been done, or else the key button would not be allowed on their newer projectors, either.

Like Pete, I carry a Dallas key on my keyring, and have programmed its serial number into every projector that I service regularly. If, during a service visit, I find that the projector's own Dallas key is missing from its usual place, I'll note that in my service report. But if it's one of my regular service contract "patients," I just use my own key. We (MiT) provide a large pin with a keyring on one end of it that slots into the front leveling foot holder on our pedestals, to which the projector's Dallas key can be attached. As long as the tech or end user remembers to replace it in the slot after use, it's a good solution. But I have seen them get lost.

Funny, but, for some obvious reasons, the Barco 6E has a lower price in germany (europe?) than the NEC entry levels models. Including the ICMP(-X), it's a real bargain. Calibrated contrast, though, is poor.

That is funny, because in the USA, the equivalent models in the rest of Barco's and NEC's ranges are competitively priced against each other (e.g. the DP2K-32B sold for around the same as the NC3200). So I don't think the reason has anything to do with tax or import duties. It's only the DP2K-6E versus the NC1000C-A where there seems to be a significant price disparity.