Can-can, can you do the cam-cam?

So I received my replacement camera.

Wouldn't you know, they sent me a completely new one. Thank you, HP!
I was happy until I realized the little caveat that Quail has already pointed out.

Thank goodness Hawk is now experienced in the ways of opening obnoxious packaging.

The new camera is actually a better model than mine was. But shh.
However, the heating problem is still there and the mic has gone dead. Plus the lens turns pink every so often.

So is it just me, or did I get even more problems? But hey..better model. With a free headset! Yes, feeling like a member of N'Sync easily eclipses the new troubles that cam has brought me.

Guh I give up. I guess I'll just send mine back to that helpful service rep, pretend there are no troubles with the new one (and feel incredibly foolish when he examines it and finds out there's no problem for him), and resign this issue forevermore.

Burnin' Hot

After the whole hacking through plastic escapade, I was enjoying having a little camera perched on my monitor. Until I noticed that it practically burns whenever I adjust it. Additionally, there was a one-time dealy with a faulty microphone. So I fired off an email to HP. May I add that it was an extremely unprofessional complaint in which I was too lazy to capitalize? I was expecting a response with a simple "apply ice pack and quit whining" (only in technological gobbledegook).

Not so.

I got not one, but two phone calls from HP. The people I talked to were not only friendly, completely fluent in English (apparently outsourcing has not touched our friend at Hewlett...YET), and seemingly high-ranking (I winced once I remembered how much effort I had put into that complaint), but they seemed to be extremely concerned about my little cammy.

Then I began worrying about my impulsive complaint. Is the heating that big of a deal? Was the mic a one-time glitch? Am I about to make a fool out of myself? (They know my NAME. I was thinking about typing in my usual Internet alias. Right now, I'm trying to decide how seriously they would haven taken a person called 'Pipster.')

So the end result is that they're going to send me a replacement and I have to FedEx my little buddy back.

Maybe there really is an issue, but maybe there isn't.

Moral of the story is, don't complain to an effective customer service unless you REALLY want your problem taken care of.

I also notice that Quail and I seem to take turns being the active one. Perhaps if our faithful reader pool (that's you) expanded, there would be more posts. Hint hint.

Plastic Shards in my Carpet

So everyone knows that obnoxious hard plastic packaging that comes with pretty much every type of electronics sold these days. Yes, my eager beaver readers, we finally have a blog-worthy story.

Hawk finally caught up with the rest of the civilized world and bought a webcam.
However, the prized piece of technology came in..you guessed it...plastic that would probably withstand a couple dozen depth charges and aerial assaults.
Why on earth would a packager want to market a produce encased in packaging almost impossible to open? Are they TRYING to piss off their customers?

But Hawk believed that the webcam was worth the pain of working her scissors between two layers of the polymer. Besides, there was the added benefit of feeling very Indiana Jonesy*. You know, hacking through the underbrush with a machete. Only modernized.

So at first hack with the trusty office scissors, a little gap opened. However, a stronger push caused the weaker of the two contenders to yield. The following pictures are not for the weak-hearted. Horrible layouts and graphic images of abused office supplies follow.

Undaunted, our valiant Hawk attacked with a letter opener.

The ruler is of course there only for comparison. Hawk is not foolish enough to fight plastic with plastic.

Bad puns aside, it was time for serious business. Out came the Fiskar children's craft scissors.



They worked shockingly well, and Hawk
was incredibly amused by the little
camera-shaped indent inside the plastic.

Yet the journey was far from over, as there appeared a SECOND LAYER of plastic between Hawk and her prize. By now incredibly annoyed and cursing the inventor of packaging plastics, Hawk attacked with a vengeance.

The result? Well, as you can see here, it wasn't pretty.

Hawk now turns her attention to recycling and finding herself a spiffy fedora before her next adventure.





* Hawk has never watched any Indiana Jones movies, but she swears to sometime before Wal-Mart begins packaging their cheap underwear in hard, molded plastic containers.

Note: The deluge of images in this post are not indicative of future posts by the Hawk. She was merely carried away by the awesomeness of her little webcam. Or, to put it more bluntly, she was camera-whoring and loving it.