DW>
MSGID: 1:348/300.0 3297da5a
DW>What is the story with the optima upgrade.  I'm one of the many system
DW>operators that took advantage of the hayes optima 28800 VFC offer.  I got 
the
DW>modem specifically because it was hayes and at the time there was a lot of
DW>controversy over which modems were good and which were not.  I received 
he
DW>free upgrade kit to the V34, and now I find myself with an upgraded 
external
DW>VFC/V34 28800 Optima and a dead end as far as upgrade.  I called customer
DW>support, and they informed me that it will cost $249.00 (Canadian) to 
upgrade
DW>to the 33.6 Business Modem with flash rom.  (That is the sysop price for 
n
DW>_UPGRADE_) ..  Then I found out that you can purchase a brand new Optima 
33.6k
DW>Businessmodem through the Sysop/ISP for $249.00 Canadian... I'm a little
DW>confused here..  This means that I can trade in my current modem and get a 
new
DW>33.6 modem for the same price it will cost me to buy an additional modem, 
which
DW>is the exact same thing ..
 
DW>Any ideas / opinions / explanations on this?
Daniel,
We're offering all of our 33.6K upgrades basically at cost.  Those that
can be flashed are free.  The ones that require just a single chip are
like $10, etc.  In the case of the older metal case OPTIMA 288's, there's
no way to upgrade the old units.  So instead we're offering a trade-in to
the OPTIMA Business Modem once it has 33.6K at $199.  In addition to
33.6K you pick up a slew of features including flash roms, caller-id,
distinctive ring detect, remote config, voice, etc.
Sysops already get these units at $199 brand new as an outright
purchase...$199 is as low as we can go on that unit and cover costs.
So basically the special for a sysop is that you can get the same unit
and keep your old one instead of trading it in....in which case you can
resell it to one of your users or whatever.
(The $199.00 listed above is in US dollars).
Michael -- Hayes Online Services
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