Creative Labs owes you $62

[LED]

Thanks goes to Gray Lensman for posting this info

 

[bendixG15]

Here's a piece of the article posted above....thanks

Creative did not admit liability, but graciously agreed to settle the embarrasing case. Anyone, anywhere* who purchased one of these products before the end of 2004, and is unhappy with the audio processing, will be able to get 25 per cent off the cost of their next purchase from Creative's website, up to a limit of $62.50

 

[Vegito]

nice.. i got 3 retail box cards.. im sure i can get a mp3 cheap now..

 

[fstime]

No Audigy 2

 

[saltedeggman]

OEM not applicable right?

 

[LED]

Originally posted by: saltedeggman
OEM not applicable right?

Select and use or try Audigy ES

 

[Regs]

Meanwhile, the lawyers who helped inflict this savage punishment on Creative will get up to $470,000 for their work, it seems.

Interestingly, the three individuals who originally filed the complaint receive a mere $1000 to $3000 for all their trouble.

lol. Well the lawyers did do all the work.

 

[Auric]

Consider before wasting your time that their website pricing is uncompetitive and thus 25% off amounts to bupkis. Examples including shipping (reseller vs. creative):

Audigy 2 ZS OEM
$70 vs. n/a

Audigy 2 ZS Gamer
$120 - $30 rebate = $90 vs. $138 is 53% higher

Audigy 2 ZS Platinum Pro
$207 vs. $259 is $25% higher

Audigy 4 Pro
$261 - $50 rebate = $211 vs. $309 is 46% higher

 

[pm]

These coupon settlements where the lawyers walk away with real money and the supposedly injured customers get a useless coupon just make me want to grind my teeth and phone my congressional representatives.

The Feb. tort reform law should get rid of these useless coupons by tying the lawyers fees to the coupon redemption rate. Anyone know when it becomes law?

I'll never forget the US Robotics 56k modem one. The premise is that modem manufacturers were advertising 56k modems that were limited to 53k. Fair enough, I guess, although I personally knew exactly what I was getting when I bought my USR 56k modem. Settlement: us "injured" customers get a $15 coupon to be redeemed against future USR modem purchases. Lawyers get $1.5 million.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Originally posted by: pm
These coupon settlements where the lawyers walk away with real money and the supposedly injured customers get a useless coupon just make me want to grind my teeth and phone my congressional representatives.

Yes. I agree. Equal rights for both people and lawyers!

Originally posted by: pm
The Feb. tort reform law should get rid of these useless coupons by tying the lawyers fees to the coupon redemption rate. Anyone know when it becomes law?

Hey, I hadn't heard of that, but that's a great idea. Seriously. It essentially makes the lawyer's gain from brokering the "deal", sort of commission-based, and dependent therefore on how good of a deal that they broker for members of the class. I like that.

Originally posted by: pm
I'll never forget the US Robotics 56k modem one. The premise is that modem manufacturers were advertising 56k modems that were limited to 53k. Fair enough, I guess, although I personally knew exactly what I was getting when I bought my USR 56k modem. Settlement: us "injured" customers get a $15 coupon to be redeemed against future USR modem purchases. Lawyers get $1.5 million.

I'm sure you know, but there never was a "53Kbit/s limit".. just a factor of real-world line conditions. I used to get 54.6 connects, on a really, really clean line, with my USR external, and those were solid, true connections speeds too, not inflated. I used to get 6.1-6.2KB/sec downloads on pre-compressed files.

 

[Jotho]

Originally posted by: VirtualLarry
I used to get 54.6 connects, on a really, really clean line, with my USR external

That's a very high modem connection speed. Windows reports that my USR PCI modem connects at 52kbps, which is probably pretty accurate since I usually download at around 6kb/s.

 

[pm]

Originally posted by: VirtualLarry

Originally posted by: pm
The Feb. tort reform law should get rid of these useless coupons by tying the lawyers fees to the coupon redemption rate. Anyone know when it becomes law?

Hey, I hadn't heard of that, but that's a great idea. Seriously. It essentially makes the lawyer's gain from brokering the "deal", sort of commission-based, and dependent therefore on how good of a deal that they broker for members of the class. I like that.

Text of Class Action Fairness Act of 2005: http://www.theorator.com/bills109/s5.html
Search for section 1712.

CONTINGENT FEES IN COUPON SETTLEMENTS- If a proposed settlement in a class action provides for a recovery of coupons to a class member, the portion of any attorney's fee award to class counsel that is attributable to the award of the coupons shall be based on the value to class members of the coupons that are redeemed.

It continues on to discuss the other types of legal fees that can be levied and ties these to the coupon redemption rate.

I am pretty sure President Bush has signed this into law. I wonder if this stupid settlement is covered under this law or if it predates it, or whether the law hasn't taken effect yet.

 

[Lonyo]

I use my nForce 2 onboard sound (non-Soundstorm) over my Audigy, because TBH, the Audigy comes with a load of bloatware, the 5.1 is harder to set up than on the onboard sound, Audigy didn't offer me anything really extra (apart from EAX which I haven't ever used), and it saves space in my case not using the Audigy.
It's currently collecting dust for being a POS.

 

[LED]

Originally posted by: pm
I'll never forget the US Robotics 56k modem one. The premise is that modem manufacturers were advertising 56k modems that were limited to 53k. Fair enough, I guess, although I personally knew exactly what I was getting when I bought my USR 56k modem. Settlement: us "injured" customers get a $15 coupon to be redeemed against future USR modem purchases. Lawyers get $1.5 million.

I'm sure you know, but there never was a "53Kbit/s limit".. just a factor of real-world line conditions. I used to get 54.6 connects, on a really, really clean line, with my USR external, and those were solid, true connections speeds too, not inflated. I used to get 6.1-6.2KB/sec downloads on pre-compressed files.
[/quote]

.The FCC limits legal speed on the Telephone network to 53Kbps

You?ve probably noticed this if you have a 56Kbps modem. Sometimes you might connect at 49333bps, while other times it might be 50000bps. But you?ve never seen a true 56Kbps connection. You are not alone. No one has ever seen a 56Kbps connection (outside of a lab) because the Federal Commun-ications Commission (FCC) restrains the maximum connection speed of modems to 53Kbps.

 

[Sniper82]

if you have the audigy how do you get the coupon or whatever?

 

[ViRGE]

Originally posted by: pm
These coupon settlements where the lawyers walk away with real money and the supposedly injured customers get a useless coupon just make me want to grind my teeth and phone my congressional representatives.

The plantif's lawyers are getting paid 470K in legal fees as a result of this settlement.

 

[Pariah]

Originally posted by: ^Sniper^
if you have the audigy how do you get the coupon or whatever?

Just fill out this form and they email you the coupon.

Form

 

[LED]

Originally posted by: Pariah

Originally posted by: ^Sniper^
if you have the audigy how do you get the coupon or whatever?

Just fill out this form and they email you the coupon.

Form

After the claim is filled, the person will be notified that the claim form has been received. Your claim is subject to validation by Creative. Your claim will not be processed until after the Effective Date of the settlement which will not occur until July 24, 2005 at the earliest.
Then the certificate will be issued which I'm assuming will be a number that can be used on CLabs site towards a purchasing.

 

[andy nowotny]

nice, thanks

 

[MidasKnight]

Link to claim form:

Text

 

[ManBearPig]

er, i dont get it. You dont get actual money or coupons? Just money to another audigy card?

 

[VirtualLarry]

Originally posted by: LED
The FCC limits legal speed on the Telephone network to 53Kbps

You?ve probably noticed this if you have a 56Kbps modem. Sometimes you might connect at 49333bps, while other times it might be 50000bps. But you?ve never seen a true 56Kbps connection. You are not alone. No one has ever seen a 56Kbps connection (outside of a lab) because the Federal Commun-ications Commission (FCC) restrains the maximum connection speed of modems to 53Kbps.

Except that isn't actually true.

What the FCC limits, is total maximum output power, to limit the potential of noise from one POTS line coupling into another. A line that is short enough (low enough attenuation, because of the lesser distance, to not require a power level that violates the specs), and clean enough (so that bits don't get robbed because of noise/frequency imparements in the line), can, legally, reach speeds above "53K". It's BS that the modem companies started using, to disclaim why their advertised "56K" modems, weren't reaching 56K, to ward off potential lawsuits.
There was a very in-depth discussion about this, on comp.dcom.modems, I could probably find it again if GoogleNews were cooperative enough. (I miss DejaNews.. badly!)

 

[LED]

VirtualLarry...I think @ one time there was a exceeding point when X2 Robotics and 3 Com were separate as the X2 technology could exceed that but when they united with KFlex to form V90 the FCC limits could not be exceeded. The X2 tech. could 57+K so please don't think I'm doubting you just pointing out that it not going to happen in 99% of the Cases because past the fact that a very clean line is needed, anyone who flashed the X2 Modem to V90 can not go back and hardly any ISP support it.

Plus nowadays most with dial-up are using Web Accelerators which of course doesn't help on download speeds.

 

[n0cmonkey]

So, if you're unhappy with Creative's products you can get a discount on future products?

What's the point?

 

[LED]

Originally posted by: n0cmonkey
So, if you're unhappy with Creative's products you can get a discount on future products?

What's the point?

Ummm so you'll try and buy their newer and better claim to Fame products (ie. Audgy4, Speakers) ?