One of the 7 Habits of Highly Tech-Addicted People is the desire to have the latest and greatest the moment something debuts on the market. Trade news, pre-releases, early reviews from tech news sites, demos, and booths at trade shows like CES, E3, PAX, and Mac World Expo have early-adopters watering at the mouth for the latest technology gadgets. What a lot of people don’t realize is the first consumers of a product are usually the last line of beta testers. Manufacturers and publishing companies often set unreasonable deadlines for developers and QA testers, which leaves them putting out a half-baked product that looks cool, but often has intuitive features missing or quirks and bugs that leave first-round consumers upset.
Are the corporations thinking that the number of returns and bad reviews is insignificant compared to the sales they’ll post for that quarter? It seems like a shame they’d rather put out a shoddy product and fix it than to release a little late.
You can save yourself the frustration, and maybe even a few bucks, by waiting. If you wait until just before or just after the second generation of a product comes out, you can often buy the first generation for cheaper, and it’s likely to have firmware updates that address most issues.
I purchased the LG VX9900 cell phone just last Fall, when it had been out a while. Just after I bought it, I saw they released the new “Voyager” that had the touch screen just like the iPhone. Since my phone was considered “old” - it was on sale with a rebate, and had the latest software for that model.
The same thing happened when I purchased my television. My 55″ Hitachi HDTV was going for around $1500 and on Memorial Day weekend I made the leap and bought it, because the price dropped $500 for that weekend only. I like to sit in front of it while I watch my blu-ray movies and think about how this could have cost me $500 more if I’d waited any longer.
Good things happen for those who wait - on the other hand, you have to sit around and be jealous of your friend’s new cool gadget.
Are you an early adopter, or do you like to wait and let others try things out before you buy? Let us know in the comments.
