Stay away from Sandisk

[kevs]

I'm a professional photographers for 20 years. I 've had lots of customer service issues. I find Sandisk to be the worst of the batch. I recommend everyone not buy more from them.

[Ken]

Could you be a little more specific with your experiences?  I have been using their cards for over six years without any problems.

--Ken

[billseymour]

I am also interested in more info- My own historical experience with Sandisk cards and flash drives has been fine. Is the problem mainly with the products, or with the customer service?
Thanks--Bill

[kevs]

The cards are fine, except the last one. On whole though they are fine cards.

But I called them, you get a horrid wait, some goofballs with heavy Indian accents who say they will call and e mail back with your RMA ( because of computer problems) -- and then never call back or e mail back.

You e mail support 2x and they don't e mail back. Ever. They also wont do data recovery. And their techs are generally morons.

In contrast to Lexar support it's night and day. I will never buy Sandisk again. Such a garbage company.

[billseymour]

Thanks, Kevs. The next obvious question is: have you been satisfied with product quality of Lexar products? I've not used any, but Lexar is clearly a major player in the product space.
--Bill

[Ken]

The cards are fine, except the last one. On whole though they are fine cards.

But I called them, you get a horrid wait, some goofballs with heavy Indian accents who say they will call and e mail back with your RMA ( because of computer problems) -- and then never call back or e mail back.

You e mail support 2x and they don't e mail back. Ever. They also wont do data recovery. And their techs are generally morons.

In contrast to Lexar support it's night and day. I will never buy Sandisk again. Such a garbage company.

Thank you for the follow up.  I was not aware that any memory manufacturer was offering data recovery.  Is this a service that Lexar is providing?

--Ken

[johnbeardy]

If you think Sandisk's Indians are lousy, you should try my internet providers' Filipinos.... In short, outsourcing is the devil's work and any management consultants who advocate it should be condemned to eat MBA certificates for the rest of eternity.

Lexar's Image Rescue has helped on the one occasion I needed help.

John

[BoglePhoto]

Sandisk has a problem with the new 30 mb/s cards. It seems that most Nikons of the D2 series, D2x, D200, etc., have issues with these cards. The cards give a CHR, and this file does not contain any image data, when it has taken the picture. Sometimes turning the camera off and then back on will get it to reset, but in my last shoot, about 4 of 70 files were shown as corrupted. Image recovery is sometimes possible, but I had an earlier card and it told me that none of may files were images. I used Lexar's recovery program and got them, but dealing with Sandisk Customer Frustration, I mean support, is horrible. You have to log in, create a case file, just to get them to contact you, and then they tell you try shutting off the camera, reformat the card, etc. After about 4 e-mails they then start to talk about taking the card back, but it is a couple of more e-mails before you get the coveted RMA. I bailed, when they told me that if it was under 30 days, you could take it back to the dealer. I exchanged it at Circuit City, and the new card is a bit less buggy, but still a problem. I cannot tell if it can be fixed by Nikon firmware or Sandisk, but until then, I will not buy a 30 mb/s card, or a Sandisk Card. I have not had problems with Lexar, and have had issues with prior Sandisk cards. I guess that is why they always seem to have deep rebates on the cards, and are in all of the office and big box retail outlets on sale.

Bill Bogle, Jr.