Tuesday, December 21, 2010

how to be assertive

(i'm at jb hifi and i'm getting the speech about how i need a $190 hdmi cable. sales guy is tall, charismatic and smooth-talking, and apparently some kind of sales savant).

sg: so what we normally do is give you an upgraded hdmi cable so that the full hd works with the 3d and the ps3

me: look, i've got a few hdmi cables at home, i think i'll be fine thanks

sg: let me tell you, i used to be the same way. then i got my new tv and i needed to upgrade all my cables. seriously, if you don't get one you can't play the 3d with the dual 1080p signals. you need one because the tv is the highest quality so you have to get the good cables

me: a digital signal doesn't really lose quality that way. so i don't think that's likely. thanks anyway.

sg: look at this eye diagram showing the signal degradation. this cable has silver oxide nano-ferrites. the connectors are plated with bio-unobtanium. this means you will get the best quality signal with this cable.

me: [reads back of box for a while]. um, look, thanks, i'll probably just, um... give it a try with one of my cables and then just...

sg: LISTEN TO ME. YOUR TV PROBABLY WON'T EVEN WORK. YOU MIGHT AS WELL JUST GO BUY ONE FROM ALDI. IT IS VERY HIGH FREQUENCY. JESUS WEPT, etc

me: um... i... think...

sg: these are not the droids... I mean, this is the cable you need to buy

me: ok, i guess i'll take this one

sg: alright, i'll ring it up

me: cool, thanks

So, the story has a happy ending though. A day later when the effects wore off I returned it for store credit. It required some very careful sticky taping of the impenetrable plastic packaging, you know the kind. (Store credit at jb hifi is almost as good as cash to me at this time of year).

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