Never buy an X-rite product

For all of my friends in the photography business...NEVER buy a monitor calibration product from X-rite. Their customer support and support for their products is the worst I have ever seen the computer industry. By far the most rude and least helpful tech support EVER!

I have an X-rite display 2 calibration device. After a hard drive crash I had to re-install Windows on my machine. Now all of the flesh tones on my screen look awful even after calibrating the screen. X-rite wants me to pay them $30 per half hour because they have replaced that model with another one. So basically they just stop supporting their hardware the minute there is another version out. Can not even tell you how rude they were about it on the phone. Bunch of A-holes.

Go with Spyder or some other brand.

MD Steelerfan wrote in post #16514333
For all of my friends in the photography business...NEVER buy a monitor calibration product from X-rite. Their customer support and support for their products is the worst I have ever seen the computer industry. By far the most rude and least helpful tech support EVER!

I have an X-rite display 2 calibration device. After a hard drive crash I had to re-install Windows on my machine. Now all of the flesh tones on my screen look awful even after calibrating the screen. X-rite wants me to pay them $30 per half hour because they have replaced that model with another one. So basically they just stop supporting their hardware the minute there is another version out. Can not even tell you how rude they were about it on the phone. Bunch of A-holes.

Go with Spyder or some other brand.

Brian,

As a business owner, I can tell you that post-sale customer support tells you all you need to know about the people behind the corporation. We strive to treat all of our customers exactly the way we want to be treated as consumers.

Two great companies IMHO:

1) Datacolor - Spyder
I have the Spyder3 calibration system and when I tried to upgrade the software from V3 to V4 ($19.95 price), my PC would not cooperate. My first contact with them got my payment refunded since I thought the new version was incompatible for some reason. They got back to me in about 3 days and had me try a few things that didn't solve the problem. They finally got it going and told me not to bother remitting the fee again for all the problems I experienced. If you do need tech-support from them, they may indeed take a while to get back to you, but once they do, they'll do all they can to help out.

2) Linksys - Cisco
I purchased a wifi receiver recently to get a computer going on the opposite side of my home. The best signal strength I could get was 38% so I purchased their range extender. Could not get it to configure so called their support; it took about 30 minutes of work but we now have a 100% signal.

YMMV with these 2 companies, but in my cases, they stood behind their products 100%.

Nicholas
www.copperhillimages.c​om

MD Steelerfan wrote in post #16514333
So basically they just stop supporting their hardware the minute there is another version out.

That's odd. That wasn't the case with my original i1 Display 2. Granted that model has been discontinued for a while but when the Mac/Lion issue came up they actually went and wrote a new set of drivers so the old model could work on the new OS. That's going above and beyond in my book as the i1Display 2 was already discontinued and the companies have no real obligation to make the product work for an entirely new OS that was released after the product was discontinued.

The i1Display 2 has basically been done with for two years now. Time to start looking at an i1Display Pro. Color calibration stuff degrades in accuracy over time anyway.

Actually, my friend had the same issue with the Datacolor Spyder. He upgraded his Windows software and Datacolor wouldn't supply the upgraded software for it. They made him buy a new spyder.

OMG... the display2 model came out almost 13 years ago. C'mon, you can't fault a company not supporting a product that's not technologically capable to support recent advancements in display technology. How old was your hard drive? I'd be it's no where near the age of this X-Rite.

EmaginePixel wrote in post #16517010
OMG... the display2 model came out almost 13 years ago. C'mon, you can't fault a company not supporting a product that's not technologically capable to support recent advancements in display technology. How old was your hard drive? I'd be it's no where near the age of this X-Rite.

hahaha the "other side of the story"

Sorry for my absence...

I don't care when the product was introdued. They only stopped making them a year ago...this info came from x-rite. They didn't really change or improve their subsequent offerings. If the hardware on a newer one isn't significantly better why buy a new one?

My point was that their people were so rude that I wouldn't want to do business with them or suggest anyone else does either. Had they even tried to helpful I would have been happy with them and perhaps bought a new product from them but now I will not do that.

Btw...bought a Spyder Pro and suffice it to say it was a vast improvement.

EmaginePixel wrote in post #16517010
OMG... the display2 model came out almost 13 years ago. C'mon, you can't fault a company not supporting a product that's not technologically capable to support recent advancements in display technology. How old was your hard drive? I'd be it's no where near the age of this X-Rite.

Curious about "not technologically capable to support recent advancements in display technology."

I'm still using a Monaco Optix and do not have any issues in a Win 7 64-bit machine. While display technology has changed significantly over the life of my calibration puck and software, I fail (currently) to see how color calibration has changed.

If you could shed some light on how my calibration device no longer is capable of reading the color it profiles (unable to support recent advancements in display technology), or how it can't handle gamma or brightest (unable to support recent advancements in display technology), I'd be most appreciative....

while older versions may work within a new OS, it doesn't mean they're supported. Big difference. The fact that they quit making them a year ago is insignificant as the OS changes tweak various hardware paths as well as requirements.

You're right, there might not be much difference between X or Y as far as quality or technology except that Y is supported on the current software path, therefore an upgrade is required. Its the facts of software/hardware requirements. You've gotten your money out of the original, pony up and buy a new one.

*note: I work as an application engineer for a large software company so my take on these things is a little different and maybe better informed. :/

Sorry you've had a bad experience but I love my Xrite products. The i1 Display Pro is my favorite tool of theirs and well worth the money I spent on it.

Bearmann wrote in post #16516601
Actually, my friend had the same issue with the Datacolor Spyder. He upgraded his Windows software and Datacolor wouldn't supply the upgraded software for it. They made him buy a new spyder.

Really depends on what version of Spyder he has. At some point software companies need to drop support for older OSes / devices. I have a Spyder 3 which appears to have been released in 2008. It works well in Win 7 (2009 release) and Win8/8.1 (2012/2013) release. I'll be perfectly fine with Datacolor dropping support for Spyder 3 on the next generation of Windows OS.

Andrushka wrote in post #16517038
hahaha the "other side of the story"

So true. There are always two sides to every story. Leaving out key facts in order to strengthen the op's case against x-rite. Failing to understand hardware/software changes and upgrades, and that this happens with every single piece of computer hardware ever made. Leaving out the fact that the product in question is really old and has been discontinued for well over a year now. Blaming X-Rite because the discontinued product doesn't work on software that was released well after the product was around, supported and ultimately discontinued. The OP just wants someone to blame. It's not right to throw X-Rite under the bus like this publicly just because the OP doesn't understand computer technology progression.

I have been using X-Rite products for several years now and have been very happy. The fact that they released a driver update so my old I1Display2 could work on Lion was going above and beyond as the new OS came out after X-Rite discontinued the Display 2. I now own the I1Display Pro and have been happy with it as well. Happy X-Rite user. Commercial product, freelance photojournalism and motor-sport photography uses.

Hello all; occasional visitor from the glorious dark side here. I just want to mention that X-Rite also makes the ColorMunki line, including the ColorMunki Photo that I use and love. These products are uniquely affordable, simple to use, and fully satisfactory for us advanced amateurs. In combination with my reasonably good monitor (a Philips) and Epson 3880 printer, the ColorMunki has given me calibration and paper profiles that result in beautiful, colour-faithful prints consistently. For this reason, I am pleased about the existence of X-Rite (and no, I am not affiliated with them in any way).

MD Steelerfan wrote in post #16546606
I don't care when the product was introdued. They only stopped making them a year ago...this info came from x-rite. They didn't really change or improve their subsequent offerings. If the hardware on a newer one isn't significantly better why buy a new one?

I do not believe the i1Display 2 supported calibration of wide gamut monitors. Where as the i1Display Pro does. So this would suggest that the hardware did in fact change.

As far as customer support, it's unfortunate that was your experience. I myself have never had an issue with their customer service. So to suggest that everyone stop using their product based on one bad experience it's really justified in my opinion.

When I bought the i1Display 2 I felt like I was taking a chance because of all the posts like this.

As it turns out 64-bit Windows 7 was supported after all and it has worked well. The only thing that bugged me was not knowing which monitor it was going to calibrate until it started. I believe a later version of the software resolved that.