Z9 - yamaha, Worst support i've ever had!

[Krazykaj]

Hi,

I am having serious problems with Yamaha and the Z9 (the three actually) i have gotton from them.
See the following for info:
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...hreadid=420285
or

http://www.audioholics.com/forums/showthread.php?p=16335#post16335 post 118 page 12
I'm Krazykaj

I have experiance absolute hopless support from Yamaha and after THREE months three Z9's and constant apealling to Yamaha to do something i still do not have a working unit!

is there anything you guys could suggest i do?
Or is this what i should expect for a Flagship, award winning unit from a large company?

No customer should fork out near $10 000 and get this in return, in any country.
please let me know of any similar experience or if i'm just an unlucky one, if so, what do i do now?

thankyou greatly

[skeptic]

What is a Z9?

[piece-it pete]

It's a top of the line monster HT receiver, I'd love one for HT!

http://www.yamaha.ca/av/Receivers/RXZ9.asp

Krazykaj,

That's terrible! They've got such a great rep too. Have you tried "asking for the manager" at customer support? I'd act (and be) furious!

Pete

BTW, I've heard this kind of story about their motorcycle division before.

[eqm]

I know i'm over here in the states, but the one i've seen did the exact same thing you describe as far as making the picture worse. the video processor in your denon 2200 shouldn't be re-processed anyway, and is probably stronger than the dcdi in the first place. the 5803 denon has a new firmware update and doesn't try to process the video, so that might be worth a shot. you should probably be able to find one in the same price range as your z9

[Woochifer]

I guess my question to you is have you tried recalibrating your monitor or double checking to make sure that all the settings are correct for your region?

In my dealings with Yamaha, their customer support (in the U.S.) has been very good and definitely a lot more responsive than anything I've gotten from Denon or Sony. Then again, I've never had a defective unit from Yamaha either.

FYI, the customer support is handled by the regional distributor for each country and I would guess that Australian models are somewhat different than the U.S. models with different power supply parts, tuners, and probably video components as well since Australia uses the British PAL broadcast standard.

[Krazykaj]

thankyou for the quick replies,

we've manage to deal with people pretty high up in Yamaha (thanks to the great help of the store i bought it at, they're as fusrtated a i am) and that i why we are now using the internet and other sources to get soemthing done, because what we were doing before didn't seem to work very well.

and as to the Denon 2200's proecessing, i may be wrong here, but i was told that the DCDi was slightly better (that's why we got it partially), so what we do is turn the 2200 processing off and use the Z9, if it worked. But in either case the Z9 can actually completely pass the 2200 video signal through without processing it at all which is what we do at the moment, if fact the Z9 can only process interlaced signal, it automatically turns its processing off and switches to "pass through" if anything else is put in (eg. the 2200s already deinterlaced signal). but the z9 can't even match the 2200 at the moment and that's what were trying to fix, we're desperatly trying to a FULLY working unit.


and as to recalibrating my moniter and double checking my equipment, believe me, over three months i've tried so many things, i know the Z9's options nearly backwards now. I also took it to the store and with the help of the great Staff and equipment there saw that the problem was in the Z9, not our equipment (the third unit didn't even make it to our home! as we saw it was already bad).
And yes, the units are slightly different down here down under, so's the corperate part of it. but that doesn't seem to matter as they still arn't doing anything to fix it, that is why i'm now appealing to others such as yourself and Yamaha in general for any suggestions on what i might do. maybe if i show my fustration on a wider scale Yamaha might take the hint and do something. But as they are now, they should NOT be doing what they are doing. I agree with you as well that Yamaha has (or should i say had) very good support, i have owned numerous equipment from them, that i why i find all this completely unacceptable.

but again, thankyou for the response, i'll let you know of Any updates, and the more help i could get the better, and would be most appreciated.

KJ

[agtpunx40]

is it the same reoccuring problem, or has each unit had something else wrong with it. If it's the same problem in each unit, it might be some sort of problem with the production run in Australia, or some sort of calibration or compatibility issue. Really, even though I like Yamaha, own a Yamaha reciever, and plan on getting a new Yamaha reciever fairly soon, if I had had your experience, I would just return it and go with something else. You shouldn't have to deal with this kind of stuff from any company, so I would move on ASAP. But this is kindof strange as Yamaha is known to have at least better customer service than it's competitors.

[Krazykaj]

But this is kindof strange as Yamaha is known to have at least better customer service than it's competitors.

that's what i thought as well, which is possibly why i'm still hanging in there. I have owned numerouse Yamaha products over the years (nothing like this unit though) and have not had a problem. And really, i would like to keep the Z9 (it is a good unit, in everything but the video) i am just very annoyed at Yamaha, and how long it's taking and how dificult it is do do something that should be so simple.

but soon i shall maybe have to get other equipment if this isn't cleared up, but that is a path i would prefer not to take, and if i must, i won't go quietly and let Yamaha get rid of me that easily, especally after all this time. As you said, they are a large company, and have a farily good reputation in product quality and service, so this is not on.

but i'm definetly taking down your alternative sugestions.

thankyou for the responses

[Krazykaj]

if you are interested ( i took some suggestions), here is the email we sent to a number of people, including Yamaha. (it's been edited slightly for privacy reasons)

please let me know if it's any good.



(EIDT)

For a start, we are really frustrated with the seeming Yamaha’s lack of timely response and not even keeping us informed.



Therefore, a day or so ago, my son (ME, krazykaj) has begun to make enquiries within those in the industry, on the internet, about our problems and experience with Yamaha. While we deeply regret having to do this, but we feel we have been more than generous far too long. Without Yamaha keeping us informed, we feel forced to gather our own information and, more importantly, to create for us a sense of some action.

The responses so far may be of interest to you. The responses should be of a very serious interest to Yamaha’s most senior management in Australia and overseas, especially with the kind of attention my son’s enquiries have generated in barely a day and a half, including on influential web sites.

Even *if* the cause of our Z9 problem is *wholly* from the user end (which we do not agree), Yamaha should be helping *you* to resolve it for us. We all know that a faulty item will turn up now and then. This is not our major complaint – though receiving three faulty units in a row is one of our major concerns as well.

Our major concern now is the after-sale service, which for the Z9 is promoted that it will be top class, with which we are astonished. Almost three months later, three Z9 units later, with a lot of wasted time and extra expense to us, we are still no closer to a satisfactory resolution on our problem. The situation is now well beyond “just return the Z9” and giving us our money back.

The forums where we have asked about Z9 were:

http://www.hometheaterforum.com
http://www.avsforum.com/
http://www.audioholics.com/forums/
http://forums.audioreview.com/
http://www.soundandvisionmag.com


In America, (edit) bob president of bob (Edit) wrote to my son the following:


I spoke in person to a top exec at Yamaha today on your behalf and also pointed him to your thread on my forums. Let’s see what happens. . . .



Best Regards;

bob
HAA Level 1 Certified
President of bob.com



Another respondent from Australia mentioned that we should approach Dept. of Fair Trading regarding numerous issues. We do *not* yet want to go this way, at least not until after we alerted both you and Yamaha, and gave you all one more decent opportunity to get this really right.

Here is a further sample of the dozens of replies Karl received just in a day and a half:

“Thanks for the alert about this model. With your info, many members will stay away from this model until Yamaha gets its act together.”

“Hey, when you put that kind of cash down for a product( actually for any product they sell), Yamaha should find a way to make you happy! . . . “

“Well that sounds awful. I would flip out, and most likely would take it back and not buy another Yamaha product. I take offence to that type of service. . . .”

“spending the kind of monies that ppl spend on a car, and getting $hit like this is simply unacceptable . . .”

“I would not only email the head Yammy guy in Australia your message I'd include all link to all of your threads in all of the forums you've posted this in and tell him these forums are filled with people that are interested in hi-end audio equipment and if your issue isn't resolved swiftly and properly this will reflect very bad for Yamaha in these forum and will result in lost sales and customers. . . .”

“That's terrible! They've got such a great rep too. Have you tried "asking for the manager" at customer support? I'd act (and be) furious! . . .”

“But this is kind of strange as Yamaha is known to have at least better customer service than it's competitors. . . ."

“I wouldn't give a dime to them . . .”



Please, (edit), could you urge and escalate this issue as appropriate, and for Yamaha to really come to the party. Yamaha should use this as an opportunity to show how they can meet and *now* well exceed customer’s expectations. We are just as happy to report on quality support.





Yours Sincerely,



please tell me it's ok

[Woochifer]

But this is kindof strange as Yamaha is known to have at least better customer service than it's competitors.

Keep in mind that Yamaha's American distributor handles the customer support separately from Australia. How it's perceived here might not be the same as how it actually is overseas.

[Krazykaj]

yamaha has got a fairly good reputation down here as well, that's why i'm hoping for other's sake that this is a rare case.

[nick4433]

Krazykaj, while I understand that you got a good package deal price on the Yammy I am sure you can still isolate the price on the Yammy and get that much money back or get a store credit and buy something else or for that price, get into seperates. I am only saying this because no receiver is worth that much trouble. I would have given up on the receiver after two tries, let alone three and still counting.

[piece-it pete]

Krazykaj,

The letter is very good. The key to these kinds of things is tenacity, don't give up, keep asking for the next boss. And losing your temper vs getting mad is usually not a great idea.

Although I must admit getting your money back and moving on isn't a bad idea.

Good Luck!

Pete

[Krazykaj]

Although I must admit getting your money back and moving on isn't a bad idea.


Pete

sadly, it sure looks like i'll have to do that if this doesn't fix up soon

[Krazykaj]

if you are still interested in the way my 'issue' with yamaha is going i posted at AVS forums and hometheaterforums.com with the reply i got.

AVS
Home theater forums

please let me know of any comments, suggestions or rebukes
they're most welcome

thanks

[Krazykaj]

two new 'developments' have come about,

first

(quoted from Yamaha's previouse response . . . )
We received Mr >>>>'s returned RX-Z9 unit back to our service centre. They performed basic testing (which they do to all returned stock) to verify it is working, and it was. Then we arranged to have it shipped to our head office for further testing. We believe the RX-Z9 was in the same condition as it was in Mr >>>>'shome.

Mr >>>>>'s returned RX-Z9 performed perfectly normally, both on the LPX-500 and the PDM-1. There was no distortion visible across the top of the test pattern at all. No unusual shimmering was evident.

Please advise Mr >>>>> that we have been constantly trying to solve his problem since we have been aware of it. He seems to think we have indifference to his problem, which is of course not true. There has been up to five Yamaha Australia staff working on this situation. The complexity of the product and the problem - combined with our inability to replicate the problem - has meant there has been nothing further we could tell Mr >>>>>> about this until now.


we just found out that the thrid unit which died, never left the store and Yamaha have not tested it or received it, and has still not left the store, and the second unit is still in our home!. could someone please explain to me which Z9 they say they tested (especially which one of OUR units they tested!!!). i cannot be the first one as they, Yamaha, said it was a dud, and that's how this whole thing got started.
this new bit of info was quite some shock to us as it means this letter is . . . . well i'll let you be the judge of that.


and secondly, we today, took DVD's and went to test another Z9 in a completely different (highly regarded) store. They there had the Z9 set up COMPLETELY with Yamaha equipment, DVD and projector.
The problem was there, and in some cases worse than we were experiancing it ourselves at home!!!!

the manager even saw the problem himself, and it took us a whole of 15min to show him our run of tests, let's hope he goes to Yamaha about this as well.


anyway, said i'd keep you posted, this post may then interest you, please give me you feedback, as i think you'll have to admit, it ain't looking good.

cheers

[piece-it pete]

Krazykaj,

Sounds like the big runaround to me, keep hammering them, don't let up!

Have you contacted the US headquarters direct, clue them in to these threads? They might not like it much (they SHOULDN'T like it at all), it might help. Heck contact ALL the regional headquarters, these rooms are international, and are making Yamaha look like a bunch of jackasses.

You know, the other posters recommending seperates are on to something good, IMO. For that kind of money you could snag a decent preamp, and have a stack of amps, maybe from a place that actually cares.

Good luck, stay the course!!

Pete

[Krazykaj]

Again, if you are still intersted in what is happening down in Aussie land and the problems with the Z9:

I'm still waiting on the 5th Z9 that was meant to come this week, all new and fixed and upgraded. Though as we were expecting, it did not come, so hopefully next week.

I might also add, i am now not the only person in Australia that seems to have serious issues with the Z9's Video features. See the AVS forum ("Yamaha this is NOT RIGHT!!!! Z9 issues" thread) for a lengthy post from someone else who is not very happy with Yamaha and in the way this is being delt.

I suspect that possibly there is a major flaw in the Aussie models and that more and more problems will arise down here. (who knows?)
I now know of SIX Z9's that do not work as they should, yet Yamaha Australia say they do.

I don't know what is going on!

i'll post my results with the Z9 number 5 as soon as possible.
And i'll still be contacting Yamaha and see if i can find out what is going on.

KJ

[kpzbee]

I was wondering what became of this. Good luck with the new one!

[Krazykaj]

still no new Z9 so before we get rid of the Z9 or figure out what we will do, i thought i'd take a few photos of the problems, they are posted over at the AVS forums.

the problems you will see are not just evident with my setup, but with 4 others we have seen, including one that was completely made up of Yamaha gear. and don't forget, the photos don't do the problems justice, it is much worse when actually watching it.

link: AVS "Yamaha this is not right!! Z9 issues" thread