Xcal 1 Going Offline Discussion

[genebaby]

Am I the only person who has an Xcal 1, was only a week or so off the cutoff date to touch up my tunes and am fairly OK with the deal of having to update to Xcal 3?

I am amazed at the way so many people have their noses out of joint; I'm not saying I'd want to if I had a choice, but in the same merit I wish I didn't have to pay money to update half the stuff in my house as time goes by.

I suggest you all put your cars back to stock and get chummy with your local ford dealerships and just update to the new model every 2yrs lol

I'm amazed you don't care that your right as a consumer has been taken away. You are just the kind of person SCT are looking for in a customer. Please forward your credit card details to Rick Trudo, he will be happy to sell you lots of stuff you don't need.

Microsoft do it every few years. XP is next on the list. Unfortunate, but nothing you can really do.

As Goldie said too, this is NOTHING like that. People who give these kind of analogies do not understand the situation. This is like Microsoft making Windows XP unusable for EVERYONE in Australia who is using it because they found a few people were pirating it and couldn't stop them any other way. The solution of course is to be the more secure Windows 7.

OR

You purchase and internet enabled Fridge which tells you the weather and can order your food online. The manufacturer decides they don't want to support that fridge anymore, they haven't sold many lately so they send it an update online and it no longer cools its contents. Big deal they say, you can still put stuff in it, but if you want to cool them, buy our new model.

This is how it is with us, Big Deal, the box can still flash your car with the tunes in it. BUT if you want to put a new tune in you need to buy our new model.

[icer]

in the USA you can sue anyone for anything these days. Fark...id look into it if I was in usa and make big class action.

USA is the best for suieng people for nothing.

[hardcore]

I have an Xcal 1 which has generic tunes on it. I have not been able to afford to go and get a custom tune. Does this mean its useless for me and I am stuck with the generics?

[RHR]

sounds like it

[Daniel]

genebaby, I am far from a daft consumer who would pass around my financial details to be reaped unnecessarily; but I think I have a better understanding of what happens in the world in terms of electronic hardware either being upgraded, replaced or simply no longer being supported.

Now, how the whole situation came about isn't ideal for a group of us, this is obvious, but in no way was it unforeseen as it's been in discussions for quite some time.

May I ask how long you dreamt of using your Xcal 1, uploading new tunes and having tuner, software, customer and manufacturer support for this device?

You seem to have taken this personally genebaby, is there more to this story or your own situation for you personally that has dragged you in emotionally so deep?

On a side note.

If people who buy, then modify cars refuse to accept the fact that odd things can change and update over time. Supportive software and or hardware may be needed in the future if you find yourself in need to modify your vehicle yet again, it's pretty understandable amongst everyone I know who mods cars.

If somebody thinks this doesn't sound right or cannot comprehend this, then I'd think that modified vehicle ownership is not for them.

I have an Xcal 1 which has generic tunes on it. I have not been able to afford to go and get a custom tune. Does this mean its useless for me and I am stuck with the generics?

Your case is unfortunate, but this is right.

I'd suggest having a chat to the tuner who you purchased from, they may possibly be a little more sympathetic with your situation if they sold it to you recently and help out where they can with custom tuning costs.

It depends highly on how long you've had the Xcal 1, the plans you have to go forward and where/who you got it from.

Either way, you will have to upgrade the hardware to Xcal 3, then get the cash back for the Xcal 1 and start with your custom tuning plans. Good luck, you will love the car all over again once its tuned up nicely

[genebaby]

genebaby,.....

Daniel, what happened to me is I paid $1300 and my consumer rights are being violated, that's all. I don't take things like this lying down. No further support is a very different thing to shutting these boxes out from being tuned for the sake of a few by a security flaw SCT have in their own product.

Like any IT product they will be superseded but the fundamental principal will remain that they will still be able to do the job they were first purchased for until they cease functioning. If you have an Atari 2600 in working order, it will perform as well as it did in 1981. Won't play Doom but you wouldn't ask it to, and I don't ask my box to support newer cars, just the car it was purchased for.

It is simply not legal to do what they have done. I've stated that if I require further functionality such as purchasing a newer, non supported car I would have no issue upgrading, THAT is part of life with cars, NOT having a working device disabled remotely to create revenue.

[mjadeb1984]

amen genebaby

[genebaby]

I did speak to an officer of the ACCC this afternoon, they gave me a call. They find this situation very interesting and likened it to an issue with the PS3 where Sony remotely disabled some part of it's functionality and there was no choice in the matter. I'm not up on the PS3 so not sure what happened, but I would wager the PS3 can still play games, the Xcal1 can't be tuned so it's even worse with this.

Basically, they don't like companies doing this to consumers, selling a product and then disabling/removing features after the sale. I'm not sure why Sony did it but SCT's reasons for doing this will not look good.

[RHR]

Did he give any indication as to whether they were going to follow it up

[genebaby]

They are going to look into it now. I'm not sure what will happen next but if they want any more information they will contact me again.

Anybody else feel like lodging one please do at this link: Create New Complaint

It's pretty simple and easy. I did explain this is a nation wide issue so the more the merrier.