This week, I bought a ZAGGmate Keyboard.
Unpacked, charged, tried to pair it with the iPad, only to find that it was DOA.
OK, shit happens, brought it back, got it exchanged.
Charged it, pulled out the plug, out came the socket with it.
Just like that, without putting exccessive force on it.
Extremely pissed, I went back and got another one.
Never even got as far as charging it, because when I tried to put my iPad in, that plastic angle you need to pull up for resting the iPad against it came out and I found that one of these little hinges was missing.
Thsi time, they refused to exchange it, because according to them, this was a mechanical fault caused by some kind of wrong handling on my side.
All discussions were fruitless, so I took it back home and thought I might glue some metal hinge on to get it to work.
So, I pluuged it in, the blue light came on, it charged and I even managed to pair it.
Finally.
Only... it stopped working a few minutes later and went dead when I moved it to work with it on my lap.
That really pissed me off.
For me, 99 Dollars is money, and shelling it out for some useless piece of crap isn't my favourite thing to do.
As I was stuck with this dead junk now, I decided I might take as well take it apart and check it out.
Well... the inside is even worse than the outside. No wonder this thing didn't work.
First of all, the micro USB-socket is soldered on only with two tiny bits of solder. This HAS to come off sooner or later.
Furthermore, checking the soldering with a magnifying glass, I saw that there was a piece of solder stuck between two leads. I guess this caused it to short out. Overall, the soldering is very bad, as though they soldered it with a wrong temperatore.
Then, the keyboard-connector was half loose, it hadn't been properly stuck into the socket.
The whole construction is just stuck together with loads of adhesive tape.
I remember this kind of 'workmanship' from stuff we bought in the seventies of the last century, but in the 21st century we live in now, I would have expected production-methods to have developed a bit.
Taking a close look at the aluminum, I guess the fact that the keyboard itself didn't work might actually have saved my life. The edges hadn't been treated properly, the danger of cutting your wrists on that isn't all that small.
All that I can say about the ZAGGmate Keyboard is: Keep your hands off!
Getting one faulty item can always happen. But three of them, all with different faults... where is their quality-control? Paying 99$ for a piece of bent aluminum and a little keyboard, I at least expect some decent quality.
Unpacked, charged, tried to pair it with the iPad, only to find that it was DOA.
OK, shit happens, brought it back, got it exchanged.
Charged it, pulled out the plug, out came the socket with it.
Just like that, without putting exccessive force on it.
Extremely pissed, I went back and got another one.
Never even got as far as charging it, because when I tried to put my iPad in, that plastic angle you need to pull up for resting the iPad against it came out and I found that one of these little hinges was missing.
Thsi time, they refused to exchange it, because according to them, this was a mechanical fault caused by some kind of wrong handling on my side.
All discussions were fruitless, so I took it back home and thought I might glue some metal hinge on to get it to work.
So, I pluuged it in, the blue light came on, it charged and I even managed to pair it.
Finally.
Only... it stopped working a few minutes later and went dead when I moved it to work with it on my lap.
That really pissed me off.
For me, 99 Dollars is money, and shelling it out for some useless piece of crap isn't my favourite thing to do.
As I was stuck with this dead junk now, I decided I might take as well take it apart and check it out.
Well... the inside is even worse than the outside. No wonder this thing didn't work.
First of all, the micro USB-socket is soldered on only with two tiny bits of solder. This HAS to come off sooner or later.
Furthermore, checking the soldering with a magnifying glass, I saw that there was a piece of solder stuck between two leads. I guess this caused it to short out. Overall, the soldering is very bad, as though they soldered it with a wrong temperatore.
Then, the keyboard-connector was half loose, it hadn't been properly stuck into the socket.
The whole construction is just stuck together with loads of adhesive tape.
I remember this kind of 'workmanship' from stuff we bought in the seventies of the last century, but in the 21st century we live in now, I would have expected production-methods to have developed a bit.
Taking a close look at the aluminum, I guess the fact that the keyboard itself didn't work might actually have saved my life. The edges hadn't been treated properly, the danger of cutting your wrists on that isn't all that small.
All that I can say about the ZAGGmate Keyboard is: Keep your hands off!
Getting one faulty item can always happen. But three of them, all with different faults... where is their quality-control? Paying 99$ for a piece of bent aluminum and a little keyboard, I at least expect some decent quality.
