Mega SD

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fernan1234
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Re: Mega SD

Post by fernan1234 »

broken wrote:Uh. No. I mean you can hear the cd accessing the disc/laser movement come out over the audio. I’m not talking about mechanical noises.
This happens on normal volume levels? I never noticed laser movement noise coming out of my speakers when using a Mega CD, and I use tower speakers and like them a bit on the loud side. Nor did I ever hear such noise over the speakers when using a PCE CD unit. I most definitely heard the SD card with the SSDS3 though.

The assemblies themselves certainly make noise, but again those are on the console, not the sound output, and can be drowned out by the clean music tracks.
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Xyga
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Re: Mega SD

Post by Xyga »

Dunno about Genny2 but MD2's with modded stock RGB lead have video as clean as MD1 with the exception of jailbars for those with a shitty encoder.
And sound is clean too although inferior in quality to most MD1's, but it's said that some late VA3 and especially VA4 have much better audio.
So in principle a good VA3 or a VA4 with fixed RGB lead is great (the latter can have a good encoder as well)
Too bad those revisions seem rare though, I've seen only one VA4 and missed the grab. *sigh*


PS slightly OT: about krikzz, I can confirm their new 'everdrive store' works flawless and is fast. had to pay like 4€ for outside-EU card purchase but that's all.
Strikers1945guy wrote:"Do we....eat chicken balls?!"
fernan1234
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Re: Mega SD

Post by fernan1234 »

Yeah, I was also under the impression that some model 2's can be pretty good too, albeit not the best.

Either way, the message from those with a stake on this product seems to be:
-The design team is convinced these issues are more tolerable than adding a PSU (or a PSU option).
-Everyone should be rather grateful than critical now that an ODE is finally available.
-Model 2 users should not be surprised about additional noise with a MegaSD since they already made the mistake of choosing a model 2 in the first place.

Being generous, it can be said those points make sense, but I still would say model 2 users (and maybe others too, time will tell) could at least receive an official warning when buying the product, just to avoid a repeat of the same kind of disappointment as before. I'll try to stop the bitching with this.
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Mobiusstriptech
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Re: Mega SD

Post by Mobiusstriptech »

Fernan. You don't own a MegaSD. Have you actually even listened to the audio on the videos I shared? Have you heard anything with your own ears at all? Otherwise if you have been carrying on about all of this without actually having heard the supposed noise this entire argument has been a colossal waste of time for everyone. Providing warnings about something that isn't any different is just plain ridiculous. The problem here is that something was reported by one person, which from their own admission is not even what they were complaining about and now a new ridiculous conspiracy has been created by people who don't even own one.

Also, I don't have any stake in the product. I don't work for TO and never have been an employee of theirs.
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fernan1234
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Re: Mega SD

Post by fernan1234 »

Mobiusstriptech wrote:Fernan. You don't own a MegaSD. Have you actually even listened to the audio on the videos I shared? Have you heard anything with your own ears at all? Otherwise if you have been carrying on about all of this without actually having heard the supposed noise this entire argument has been a colossal waste of time for everyone. Providing warnings about something that isn't any different is just plain ridiculous. The problem here is that something was reported by one person, which from their own admission is not even what they were complaining about and now a new ridiculous conspiracy has been created by people who don't even own one.
I'm sorry if I misunderstood something, but I thought the audio clips you posted were using a Triple Bypass modded system, and not the console model that another user reported having problems with, and so they did not seem relevant to that particular point, but just to the general point of noise being present when using SD cards. And that's why I also sketched an argument as to why SD cards are not the most sensible choice for these ODEs, not just complaining without substance.

I reacted to the report of the flashcart having more noise from SD access on one model versus another, which simply sounded too similar to my disappointing experiences with SSDS3. I don't own a MegaSD but I've followed this thread hoping that things were indeed different this time around and eventually own one, but after seeing red flags that suggest the possibility of the same kind of frustrations due to the same kind of design choices all over again I posted my thoughts on this forum. I made comments about how alternative approaches could be used to get around this kind of issue altogether, to the extent that it may be present, as well as on the track record of inadequate debugging, at least on SSDS3 emulation accuracy. I found the excuses provided inadequate too, and expressed that as well. If there's something wrong with that then I won't keep doing it.
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Mobiusstriptech
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Re: Mega SD

Post by Mobiusstriptech »

The point of the videos was to show that the noise you are so worked up over isn't real. Your argument of just use USB instead of SD shows that you don't actually understand what the access noise is caused by, when it's actually a thing. If you need a video from a model 2 with no mods to understand this, fine. The media being used to read the data has nothing to do with the cause of any noise. The comments from broken about the Sega CD unit having noise from the laser pickup is completely accurate. I have recordings of it from a MD1VA3.

The problem here is a new conspiracy based on nothing has been created and is being perpetuated as fact by people that don't own the device or even know what it actually sounds like. If you won't take the time to listen to the audio in the clips because you didn't find it relevant then it proves the point that you aren't looking to find a positive experience, you are looking for the negative comments and feeding off them.

This isn't an issue of design choices by TerraOnion, it's an issue of design choices by Sega from 30 years ago. Why is that concept so hard to comprehend?
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Drunk_Caterpillar
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Re: Mega SD

Post by Drunk_Caterpillar »

I guess I was one of the lucky few who ordered early on day one, so I've been enjoying my MegaSD for a few weeks now. Other than some weirdness with the initial configuration and some extra work that needed to be done to make saving work with Sonic 3 Complete, I'm loving it! Being able to try out some game patches without needing to burn discs is a huge relief! Now if only I could find a simple way to apply the Sonic CD++ patch to the ReDump version of the game I'd be happy as a clam.

Quick question though! Does anyone know how to convert between the .SAV format used by the MegaSg jailbreak and the and .SRM format used by the MegaSD? Would love to carry over all my saves to the MegaSD so that I can take advantage of its extra features from here on out.
fernan1234
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Re: Mega SD

Post by fernan1234 »

Mobiusstriptech wrote:The point of the videos was to show that the noise you are so worked up over isn't real. Your argument of just use USB instead of SD shows that you don't actually understand what the access noise is caused by, when it's actually a thing. If you need a video from a model 2 with no mods to understand this, fine. The media being used to read the data has nothing to do with the cause of any noise. The comments from broken about the Sega CD unit having noise from the laser pickup is completely accurate. I have recordings of it from a MD1VA3.

The problem here is a new conspiracy based on nothing has been created and is being perpetuated as fact by people that don't own the device or even know what it actually sounds like. If you won't take the time to listen to the audio in the clips because you didn't find it relevant then it proves the point that you aren't looking to find a positive experience, you are looking for the negative comments and feeding off them.

This isn't an issue of design choices by TerraOnion, it's an issue of design choices by Sega from 30 years ago. Why is that concept so hard to comprehend?
Perhaps USB instead of SD would have the same problem, but it has been granted that the use of an external PSU, regardless of the media type, would avoid all such noise problems. That has nothing to do with Sega's choices. It has been admitted that we could be in a world where this is not a concern at all with the use of a PSU (just like the original CD unit had its own PSU). The same admission was made in regard to the SSDS3. Same lessons, same results. Why is that hard to comprehend?

I've made a point of how this is particularly important in the case of ODEs where game images are accessed not just on load but throughout gameplay. I don't share the perspective that the burden of a PSU outweighs the benefit just mentioned and I expressed that point. I also posted why to me broken's comment about original CD units having equivalent or worse noise is not adequate, just as it was the case with the PCE CD. I don't see anything conspiratorial in that. Again, I simply reacted to a user's report of variable noise on one model versus another as that resonated all too strongly with my own frustrating experience with the previous TO ODE. Where's the conspiracy there?
Drunk_Caterpillar
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Re: Mega SD

Post by Drunk_Caterpillar »

fernan1234 wrote: I don't share the perspective that the burden of a PSU outweighs the benefit just mentioned and I expressed that point.
How nice of you to share your perspective on a product you don't own, have never used, and will likely avoid. The community is so much richer as a result. ;)

Look, Terraonion--and for that matter, users like me--disagree with you. At some point you'll just have to judge for yourself when you actually get one in your hands, instead of clogging up threads like this before you've even used it.
fernan1234
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Re: Mega SD

Post by fernan1234 »

Drunk_Caterpillar wrote:
fernan1234 wrote: I don't share the perspective that the burden of a PSU outweighs the benefit just mentioned and I expressed that point.
How nice of you to share your perspective on a product you don't own, have never used, and will likely avoid. The community is so much richer as a result. ;)

Look, Terraonion--and for that matter, users like me--disagree with you. At some point you'll just have to judge for yourself when you actually get one in your hands, instead of clogging up threads like this before you've even used it.
I owned two of their other ODEs for which the same argument can be made so that's the ground I would stand on for this. My opinions stay there for you and others to judge. Plus this is a forum, not an owner's club. At least I think that this kind of discussion can, hopefully, have two useful outcomes: one, it may perhaps nudge future discussions and developments of ODEs into better choices. And, two, it was good to show that the response to potential problems with certain models is essentially: "well, if there are problems it's on you for using the bad model console, not on the product." I'd re-quote the posts for posterity but I think I reached the limit of my stubbornness. So yeah, let's just say the product is flawless and beyond critique, it's a gift from Heaven. I'd be happy if my misgivings turn out to be wrong, and as time goes by it's not just people coming in and saying they're happy after finally receiving their product and firing up their favorite game successfully, but deeper usage that shows there's no repeat of the previous ODE's issues. In that case I'll most likely buy one myself and will be fortunate to have your blessing to voice opinions (unless Krikzz has released his own Mega CD solution by that point).
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donluca
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Re: Mega SD

Post by donluca »

broken wrote:We recommend the redump ISO’s.
Just a word of warning: I've used redump sets in the past and they always had some quirks.

Since then I've only used Truerip sets without issues. Anyway, if TO has tested the redumps sets then, by all means, use them.

Just my 2 cents.
broken
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Re: Mega SD

Post by broken »

The majority of our testing and dev happened with redump ISO’s.
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Lawfer
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Re: Mega SD

Post by Lawfer »

donluca wrote:Just a word of warning: I've used redump sets in the past and they always had some quirks.
Such as?

donluca wrote:Since then I've only used Truerip sets without issues. Anyway, if TO has tested the redumps sets then, by all means, use them.
I originally started using Truerip ISOs back a year ago because people said that they were the most accurate 1:1 rips around since they were ripped with CloneCD, and I kept using them until I started to notice many issues here and there, things such as the audio shifts were bigger than in the ones from Redump, some tracks being silent where there should be music and even in some cases the data part would not be accurate compared to my original copies.
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donluca
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Re: Mega SD

Post by donluca »

Lawfer wrote:
donluca wrote:Just a word of warning: I've used redump sets in the past and they always had some quirks.
Such as?
MegaCD would be one of those. Mickey Mania CD would always lock up at the later stage at some point or another.
I think I found a bad rip on the Saturn one as well IIRC.

But if TO have done their tests using Redump sets then I'd strongly suggest using them instead of Trurip to avoid potential issues.
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Overkill
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Re: Mega SD

Post by Overkill »

This is big:
Spoiler
This is my first post about the Mega SD, and it's only about the order/shipping itself. As soon I got my hands on my unit I can talk about the quality, and I truly hope it's good as it seems, so at least this story ends in a good manner…

I hardly have time to keep the pace on the retro mods scene, and sincerely I didn't knew nothing about TO and theirs devices and accessories, and I was impressed after visiting their web shop with all the advanced stuff they have.

This happened in June, when suddenly, looking at one of FB groups I'm member of, I looked at the Mega SD news. Checking the specs, I thought this is just what I need to give my Mega CD laser and my games in CD some deserved vacations, and maybe store it on original box and have some more space on my gaming desk. I still believe this device worth 230€ if it does what's advertised.

Going directly to the link I was pleasantly surprised to see the price was in Euros, but I still wanted to know their location, and from were the items are going to be shipped. Strangely from the web shop I didn't understand the exact location. But I can confirm that during that period (day 01 of pre-ordering) it didn't have any import/taxes fees, or Andorra location written.

For piece of mind I goggled a bit searching for the company, and saw some posts saying it's from Spain (My neighbour country).

So looking back at that day in June, this is what I know for sure: I will order/pay now, in Euros, and they will only ship it in August, but it's DHL and I will have my hands on this very soon after it's available. And seems this guys are from Spain, so this will be super fast!

I bought/paid this the minute after, using credit card. (I now see people talking about PayPal, but I don't remember seing it available). I didn't visited the site again after the purchase. On August 01, I searched for Mega SD in YouTube, looking for a day 1 review. I was able to find one unboxing/testing, and seems what I was expecting, so far so good.

On the ordering side, I received on 03/08 one mail from TO saying "Your order with the reference xxxxx is currently in transit." But using the link to track my package I got an DHL "not found" message. I thought it was probably a matter of some hours to be available. The days after, the status was the same, that's when I returned to TO site, and found their forum, and a post from Todd, written in 05/08 explaining the delays, and the DHL tracking unavailable. That's when I understood also the shipping it's coming from Andorra because they moved:

"DON'T PANIC! Yes, DHL is usually really quick, but we have a special set of circumstances that are causing this slowdown. Terraonion has moved to Andorra and since DHL doesn't have an office in Andorra, all packages get transported to them for processing. Also, local customs in Andorra are not use to processing a lot of outbound packages for export. They are clearing about 45 per day. So when we drop off several hundred at one time, it takes them multiple days to clear.

After that it goes into the DHL system for processing on it's way.


The bottom line is this: From the time a package "ships" till the time it arrives to you is going to possibly be 2 to 3 weeks. Once we get all of the MegaSD orders shipped, shipping shouldn't be an issue. But for now packages are going to take a while to process.

Don't be alarmed if the package sets in Andorra for a while. That's customs. Don't be alarmed if it sets in DHL for a while. That's normal since the packages have to be transferred to DHL in Spain.

Also if you see shipping exceptions or clearance events: Ignore them. It's processing through DHL.

If your tracking isn't active at first, again, give it some time.

We appreciate your patience."

At this time, and reading this I didn't think about any customs fees. Also I remembered the sale had an "no shipping taxes" or something like that. It was later that I started to read on the same TO support forum that some people from EU are getting taxes, then searching the site again I found an "news" dated 06/08 saying:

"Terraonion relocated from Spain to Andorra approximately 2 months ago. Lately we have been receiving lots of questions about this and I thought this deserved a blog post of it’s own.

All of our products are still produced inside of Europe, however we are no longer located in Spain.

We made this move to Andorra to help put the company in a better place for future developments. Spanish tax law is extremely hard on small businesses, so leaving Spain was our only choice. One thing to keep in mind: If you are located in the EU, you will most likely have to pay import/VAT charges upon delivery. We have no control over this as there is no VAT on exports in Andorra so no way for us to collect it. However your country might very well charge you. Please check with your local government on your import laws regarding non EU countries."

Ok, they needed to move to Andorra because of taxes and stuff, but have they forgotten many people like me bought this Mega SD almost two months ago, without having a clue on this?!?

I'm 41 years old, and buying stuff from the internet over 20 years now, and I understand the hard way, in my early Ebay.com shopping that I can't buy stuff from USA, or Japan, or any where outside EU without a good reason, because as soon it arrives it gets taxed - My country vat (23%), plus handling fees from their "services". Now EBay also evolved and we can see prices with already this included, and we have a "final price" to look.

The 18€ DHL express service I paid was not express anymore because it got delayed by all this Andorra story, and their difficulty to handle so many shipping’s, and I got extra charged, because now I have to pay VAT, plus customs handling, plus DHL extra service of taking care of the clearing with the customs. So I received an not so nice message on my mobile phone and mail from DHL asking for the invoice so they can show it to the customs. Checking my TO order mail, I didn't found nothing, but had this written: "You can review your order and download your invoice from the "Order history" section of your customer account by clicking "My account" on our shop." So I entered TO site once again, just to find there is nothing there also. So I written an message to them asking for it. Until today I didn't receive any invoice, or any answers from them... So Last Friday I decided to just make an print screen of that email, and send it to DHL, they replied fast saying it's ok and Customs are about to give their sentence. One hour later I received another email with this:

"Your DHL Express shipment with waybill number XXXX from TERRAONION S.L. has arrived in the country and cleared customs. There is import duty/tax due on your shipment. The amount is € 126.77.

To avoid any impact on delivery, please pay us this amount securely online now. Click here to pay, view the duty/tax calculation and download the relevant documents."

Looking at all the posts in their forum, this seems the largest amount received. It's not surprise on a country with 23% vat, and pos IMF. But for me this would never happened if TO have been fair since the beginning...

Sadly this will be my first and last purchase from them. Even if they continue to develop great products like this one seems to be, I can afford to buy directly from them.

I wish them best of luck, but I'm afraid the costumers are all around the world, in European Union, US, etc. not in the little Andorra which is best know for tourism.

Happy gaming everyone
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Shelcoof
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Re: Mega SD

Post by Shelcoof »

Overkill wrote:This is big:
Spoiler
This is my first post about the Mega SD, and it's only about the order/shipping itself. As soon I got my hands on my unit I can talk about the quality, and I truly hope it's good as it seems, so at least this story ends in a good manner…

I hardly have time to keep the pace on the retro mods scene, and sincerely I didn't knew nothing about TO and theirs devices and accessories, and I was impressed after visiting their web shop with all the advanced stuff they have.

This happened in June, when suddenly, looking at one of FB groups I'm member of, I looked at the Mega SD news. Checking the specs, I thought this is just what I need to give my Mega CD laser and my games in CD some deserved vacations, and maybe store it on original box and have some more space on my gaming desk. I still believe this device worth 230€ if it does what's advertised.

Going directly to the link I was pleasantly surprised to see the price was in Euros, but I still wanted to know their location, and from were the items are going to be shipped. Strangely from the web shop I didn't understand the exact location. But I can confirm that during that period (day 01 of pre-ordering) it didn't have any import/taxes fees, or Andorra location written.

For piece of mind I goggled a bit searching for the company, and saw some posts saying it's from Spain (My neighbour country).

So looking back at that day in June, this is what I know for sure: I will order/pay now, in Euros, and they will only ship it in August, but it's DHL and I will have my hands on this very soon after it's available. And seems this guys are from Spain, so this will be super fast!

I bought/paid this the minute after, using credit card. (I now see people talking about PayPal, but I don't remember seing it available). I didn't visited the site again after the purchase. On August 01, I searched for Mega SD in YouTube, looking for a day 1 review. I was able to find one unboxing/testing, and seems what I was expecting, so far so good.

On the ordering side, I received on 03/08 one mail from TO saying "Your order with the reference xxxxx is currently in transit." But using the link to track my package I got an DHL "not found" message. I thought it was probably a matter of some hours to be available. The days after, the status was the same, that's when I returned to TO site, and found their forum, and a post from Todd, written in 05/08 explaining the delays, and the DHL tracking unavailable. That's when I understood also the shipping it's coming from Andorra because they moved:

"DON'T PANIC! Yes, DHL is usually really quick, but we have a special set of circumstances that are causing this slowdown. Terraonion has moved to Andorra and since DHL doesn't have an office in Andorra, all packages get transported to them for processing. Also, local customs in Andorra are not use to processing a lot of outbound packages for export. They are clearing about 45 per day. So when we drop off several hundred at one time, it takes them multiple days to clear.

After that it goes into the DHL system for processing on it's way.


The bottom line is this: From the time a package "ships" till the time it arrives to you is going to possibly be 2 to 3 weeks. Once we get all of the MegaSD orders shipped, shipping shouldn't be an issue. But for now packages are going to take a while to process.

Don't be alarmed if the package sets in Andorra for a while. That's customs. Don't be alarmed if it sets in DHL for a while. That's normal since the packages have to be transferred to DHL in Spain.

Also if you see shipping exceptions or clearance events: Ignore them. It's processing through DHL.

If your tracking isn't active at first, again, give it some time.

We appreciate your patience."

At this time, and reading this I didn't think about any customs fees. Also I remembered the sale had an "no shipping taxes" or something like that. It was later that I started to read on the same TO support forum that some people from EU are getting taxes, then searching the site again I found an "news" dated 06/08 saying:

"Terraonion relocated from Spain to Andorra approximately 2 months ago. Lately we have been receiving lots of questions about this and I thought this deserved a blog post of it’s own.

All of our products are still produced inside of Europe, however we are no longer located in Spain.

We made this move to Andorra to help put the company in a better place for future developments. Spanish tax law is extremely hard on small businesses, so leaving Spain was our only choice. One thing to keep in mind: If you are located in the EU, you will most likely have to pay import/VAT charges upon delivery. We have no control over this as there is no VAT on exports in Andorra so no way for us to collect it. However your country might very well charge you. Please check with your local government on your import laws regarding non EU countries."

Ok, they needed to move to Andorra because of taxes and stuff, but have they forgotten many people like me bought this Mega SD almost two months ago, without having a clue on this?!?

I'm 41 years old, and buying stuff from the internet over 20 years now, and I understand the hard way, in my early Ebay.com shopping that I can't buy stuff from USA, or Japan, or any where outside EU without a good reason, because as soon it arrives it gets taxed - My country vat (23%), plus handling fees from their "services". Now EBay also evolved and we can see prices with already this included, and we have a "final price" to look.

The 18€ DHL express service I paid was not express anymore because it got delayed by all this Andorra story, and their difficulty to handle so many shipping’s, and I got extra charged, because now I have to pay VAT, plus customs handling, plus DHL extra service of taking care of the clearing with the customs. So I received an not so nice message on my mobile phone and mail from DHL asking for the invoice so they can show it to the customs. Checking my TO order mail, I didn't found nothing, but had this written: "You can review your order and download your invoice from the "Order history" section of your customer account by clicking "My account" on our shop." So I entered TO site once again, just to find there is nothing there also. So I written an message to them asking for it. Until today I didn't receive any invoice, or any answers from them... So Last Friday I decided to just make an print screen of that email, and send it to DHL, they replied fast saying it's ok and Customs are about to give their sentence. One hour later I received another email with this:

"Your DHL Express shipment with waybill number XXXX from TERRAONION S.L. has arrived in the country and cleared customs. There is import duty/tax due on your shipment. The amount is € 126.77.

To avoid any impact on delivery, please pay us this amount securely online now. Click here to pay, view the duty/tax calculation and download the relevant documents."

Looking at all the posts in their forum, this seems the largest amount received. It's not surprise on a country with 23% vat, and pos IMF. But for me this would never happened if TO have been fair since the beginning...

Sadly this will be my first and last purchase from them. Even if they continue to develop great products like this one seems to be, I can afford to buy directly from them.

I wish them best of luck, but I'm afraid the costumers are all around the world, in European Union, US, etc. not in the little Andorra which is best know for tourism.

Happy gaming everyone

That's insane :shock:
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Lawfer
Posts: 2283
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Re: Mega SD

Post by Lawfer »

Overkill wrote:This is big:
Spoiler
This is my first post about the Mega SD, and it's only about the order/shipping itself. As soon I got my hands on my unit I can talk about the quality, and I truly hope it's good as it seems, so at least this story ends in a good manner…

I hardly have time to keep the pace on the retro mods scene, and sincerely I didn't knew nothing about TO and theirs devices and accessories, and I was impressed after visiting their web shop with all the advanced stuff they have.

This happened in June, when suddenly, looking at one of FB groups I'm member of, I looked at the Mega SD news. Checking the specs, I thought this is just what I need to give my Mega CD laser and my games in CD some deserved vacations, and maybe store it on original box and have some more space on my gaming desk. I still believe this device worth 230€ if it does what's advertised.

Going directly to the link I was pleasantly surprised to see the price was in Euros, but I still wanted to know their location, and from were the items are going to be shipped. Strangely from the web shop I didn't understand the exact location. But I can confirm that during that period (day 01 of pre-ordering) it didn't have any import/taxes fees, or Andorra location written.

For piece of mind I goggled a bit searching for the company, and saw some posts saying it's from Spain (My neighbour country).

So looking back at that day in June, this is what I know for sure: I will order/pay now, in Euros, and they will only ship it in August, but it's DHL and I will have my hands on this very soon after it's available. And seems this guys are from Spain, so this will be super fast!

I bought/paid this the minute after, using credit card. (I now see people talking about PayPal, but I don't remember seing it available). I didn't visited the site again after the purchase. On August 01, I searched for Mega SD in YouTube, looking for a day 1 review. I was able to find one unboxing/testing, and seems what I was expecting, so far so good.

On the ordering side, I received on 03/08 one mail from TO saying "Your order with the reference xxxxx is currently in transit." But using the link to track my package I got an DHL "not found" message. I thought it was probably a matter of some hours to be available. The days after, the status was the same, that's when I returned to TO site, and found their forum, and a post from Todd, written in 05/08 explaining the delays, and the DHL tracking unavailable. That's when I understood also the shipping it's coming from Andorra because they moved:

"DON'T PANIC! Yes, DHL is usually really quick, but we have a special set of circumstances that are causing this slowdown. Terraonion has moved to Andorra and since DHL doesn't have an office in Andorra, all packages get transported to them for processing. Also, local customs in Andorra are not use to processing a lot of outbound packages for export. They are clearing about 45 per day. So when we drop off several hundred at one time, it takes them multiple days to clear.

After that it goes into the DHL system for processing on it's way.


The bottom line is this: From the time a package "ships" till the time it arrives to you is going to possibly be 2 to 3 weeks. Once we get all of the MegaSD orders shipped, shipping shouldn't be an issue. But for now packages are going to take a while to process.

Don't be alarmed if the package sets in Andorra for a while. That's customs. Don't be alarmed if it sets in DHL for a while. That's normal since the packages have to be transferred to DHL in Spain.

Also if you see shipping exceptions or clearance events: Ignore them. It's processing through DHL.

If your tracking isn't active at first, again, give it some time.

We appreciate your patience."

At this time, and reading this I didn't think about any customs fees. Also I remembered the sale had an "no shipping taxes" or something like that. It was later that I started to read on the same TO support forum that some people from EU are getting taxes, then searching the site again I found an "news" dated 06/08 saying:

"Terraonion relocated from Spain to Andorra approximately 2 months ago. Lately we have been receiving lots of questions about this and I thought this deserved a blog post of it’s own.

All of our products are still produced inside of Europe, however we are no longer located in Spain.

We made this move to Andorra to help put the company in a better place for future developments. Spanish tax law is extremely hard on small businesses, so leaving Spain was our only choice. One thing to keep in mind: If you are located in the EU, you will most likely have to pay import/VAT charges upon delivery. We have no control over this as there is no VAT on exports in Andorra so no way for us to collect it. However your country might very well charge you. Please check with your local government on your import laws regarding non EU countries."

Ok, they needed to move to Andorra because of taxes and stuff, but have they forgotten many people like me bought this Mega SD almost two months ago, without having a clue on this?!?

I'm 41 years old, and buying stuff from the internet over 20 years now, and I understand the hard way, in my early Ebay.com shopping that I can't buy stuff from USA, or Japan, or any where outside EU without a good reason, because as soon it arrives it gets taxed - My country vat (23%), plus handling fees from their "services". Now EBay also evolved and we can see prices with already this included, and we have a "final price" to look.

The 18€ DHL express service I paid was not express anymore because it got delayed by all this Andorra story, and their difficulty to handle so many shipping’s, and I got extra charged, because now I have to pay VAT, plus customs handling, plus DHL extra service of taking care of the clearing with the customs. So I received an not so nice message on my mobile phone and mail from DHL asking for the invoice so they can show it to the customs. Checking my TO order mail, I didn't found nothing, but had this written: "You can review your order and download your invoice from the "Order history" section of your customer account by clicking "My account" on our shop." So I entered TO site once again, just to find there is nothing there also. So I written an message to them asking for it. Until today I didn't receive any invoice, or any answers from them... So Last Friday I decided to just make an print screen of that email, and send it to DHL, they replied fast saying it's ok and Customs are about to give their sentence. One hour later I received another email with this:

"Your DHL Express shipment with waybill number XXXX from TERRAONION S.L. has arrived in the country and cleared customs. There is import duty/tax due on your shipment. The amount is € 126.77.

To avoid any impact on delivery, please pay us this amount securely online now. Click here to pay, view the duty/tax calculation and download the relevant documents."

Looking at all the posts in their forum, this seems the largest amount received. It's not surprise on a country with 23% vat, and pos IMF. But for me this would never happened if TO have been fair since the beginning...

Sadly this will be my first and last purchase from them. Even if they continue to develop great products like this one seems to be, I can afford to buy directly from them.

I wish them best of luck, but I'm afraid the costumers are all around the world, in European Union, US, etc. not in the little Andorra which is best know for tourism.

Happy gaming everyone
To make it short, guy within the EU was stuck paying around 127 EUR (141 USD) in import charges (which was not originally mentioned on Terraonion's website when he placed the order) on top of the price of Mega SD + shipping costs and that's on top of the hidden price increase mentioned by Fudoh earlier in this thread. Meanwhile Americans who could be living as far as 10000 kilometers away from Terraonion's location will just pay for the Mega SD and shipping costs.

So all in all, you will have to pay 232 euro for the Mega SD + around 18 euro shipping + a certain amount of euros for the vat (depends on the country vat percentage) all in all the Mega SD will actually cost you way more than 250 euro in total.
Last edited by Lawfer on Mon Aug 26, 2019 8:42 am, edited 5 times in total.
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Fudoh
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Re: Mega SD

Post by Fudoh »

I'm pretty sure that in this case DHL screwed up the calculation. This can happen when they don't have the invoice on hand and assume they the declared value doesn't include shipping costs.

Import charges are rather unified in the EU, just varying a bit by different VAT rates and possibly SLIGHTLY differing fees by DHL for handling the customs procedure. With 19% VAT in Germany, we all paid 62.xx EUR in total fees. My advice to the author* of that text is to get in touch with DHL and verify the fees. It's no problem to get back the parts of the fees that were overcharged.

* not sure if it was your text (overkill), or if you did quote this from somewhere.
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Lawfer
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Re: Mega SD

Post by Lawfer »

Fudoh wrote:I'm pretty sure that in this case DHL screwed up the calculation. This can happen when they don't have the invoice on hand and assume they the declared value doesn't include shipping costs.

Import charges are rather unified in the EU, just varying a bit by different VAT rates and possibly SLIGHTLY differing fees by DHL for handling the customs procedure. With 19% VAT in Germany, we all paid 62.xx EUR in total fees. My advice to the author* of that text is to get in touch with DHL and verify the fees. It's no problem to get back the parts of the fees that were overcharged.
Yeah it's possible as it's a seems a bit higher than it should be, though he did mention that the vat for the country in which he is residing is 23%, also companies like DHL do charge money as "processing fees".

Fudoh wrote:* not sure if you was your text (overkill), or if you did quote this from somewhere.
It's possible, the vat for Portugal is 23%.
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Fudoh
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Re: Mega SD

Post by Fudoh »

His total fees should be in the 75 EUR range.
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Lawfer
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Re: Mega SD

Post by Lawfer »

Fudoh wrote:His total fees should be in the 75 EUR range.
Yeah, seems about right, if for example you want to place an order from amazon japan for a Switch (which is more expensive than a Mega SD) for shipping to your location, the import fee deposit is about 75 EUR too.

Overkill (I assume it's him) should contact DHL and try to see if they can refund him the difference for the overcharging.
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Overkill
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Re: Mega SD

Post by Overkill »

Yes, it's my own story, and in Portugal :(

I normally calculate customs like this:

Item value x 1.23 - item value = VAT I have to pay, plus Customs service fee for handling, etc. (around 15€ the last time I remembered).

So I thought in something like 53.36€ + around 15€ = 68.36€ And that will be around the same I payed at the time of XRGB3 release, and later for the XRGB Mini coming from Solaris Japan

Now this guys are asking for 127€, it's more than 50% of total value of the goods I bought. Someone is stealing me or because I was unable to send the invoice in PDF (Because TO never sent, or replied to my request last week), maybe they didn't believe and thought my print screen was just an fake value made in Paint :roll:

But reading OT support forum I see other people around EU with 100€ more to pay also.

Calling DHL since early morning to understand why is my shipping still stuck with no prevision on delivery, but no one answer the phone, just the record machine saying all lines are unavailable. Sent an mail, but no answer yet.
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Fudoh
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Re: Mega SD

Post by Fudoh »

But reading OT support forum I see other people around EU with 100€ more to pay also.
here in Germany (judging from the german message boards I'm on), DHL wasn't able to process any parcels without additional documentation, so everybody mailed in their shopping receipts/confirmation emails. Most got processed this way, some others didn't and I'm not sure if TO did anything to help these to get processed eventually.

Why TO removed any invoices from the online customer accounts is beyond me.
broken
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Re: Mega SD

Post by broken »

We attach 2 invoices to each package as this is required by customs and all invoices are scanned by DHL. A package can't pass customs/get a DUA without an invoice. Whatever Germany customs is asking for (BTW it looks like Germany customs are the only ones having issues) its not the invoice for sure.
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Fudoh
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Re: Mega SD

Post by Fudoh »

DHL likes to complete the customs process before the parcel hits the destination country. That's why "attached" invoices tend to delay customs clearence. DHL automatically triggers a delayed customs procedure, when the invoices aren't submitted online as well. But you're right, while some parcels easily cleared with or without submitting additional infos, the ones hold for another week didn't make much sense.

It would still have been more streamlined and easy, if TO didn't remove the feature to download invoices from the account page.
KonradKlaus
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Re: Mega SD

Post by KonradKlaus »

broken wrote:We attach 2 invoices to each package as this is required by customs and all invoices are scanned by DHL. A package can't pass customs/get a DUA without an invoice. Whatever Germany customs is asking for (BTW it looks like Germany customs are the only ones having issues) its not the invoice for sure.
Any update on DHL's progress on getting through the initial batch of preorders? I live in the USA and have no idea when it will arrive. I am looking forward to the MegaSD. I was a little confused by the initial email about a tracking update and it not working still, but think I have a grasp on why now.
AceFan84
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Re: Mega SD

Post by AceFan84 »

KonradKlaus wrote:
broken wrote:We attach 2 invoices to each package as this is required by customs and all invoices are scanned by DHL. A package can't pass customs/get a DUA without an invoice. Whatever Germany customs is asking for (BTW it looks like Germany customs are the only ones having issues) its not the invoice for sure.
Any update on DHL's progress on getting through the initial batch of preorders? I live in the USA and have no idea when it will arrive. I am looking forward to the MegaSD. I was a little confused by the initial email about a tracking update and it not working still, but think I have a grasp on why now.
I'm in Illinois and I just got my shipping info updated last night, it's supposed to be here on Friday so you might want to check your status again!
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Overkill
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Re: Mega SD

Post by Overkill »

DHL replied yesterday in the afternoon, they asked for apologies for the delay and promised to deliver it today. Just made the unboxing, and it brings one TO invoice, so don't know why customs asked again for it to me, but maybe they want to compare and look for discrepancies, to avoid companies declaring low value so the customer pay less VAT. Don't know...

Checking the DHL invoice I can now see each value:

66,64€ customs

Extra 49,70€ DHL services for taking care of the customs clearance.

So first value it's inside expected range and it's DHL who ripped me off.

Now, for the good part: Mega SD seems very good built. I just connected it to my MD just to confirm it's working and to be able to get SN. Now I'm going get the last FW and prepare an micro SD card. But only during the weekend I can give it a try :)
broken
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Re: Mega SD

Post by broken »

Glad to hear it arrived safely.
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KonradKlaus
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Re: Mega SD

Post by KonradKlaus »

AceFan84 wrote:
I'm in Illinois and I just got my shipping info updated last night, it's supposed to be here on Friday so you might want to check your status again!
I got my update today, it is supposed to come Friday, yay!
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