Busy bee

Look guys (and gals?), the backup list is not infinite. I closed the preorders for a reason – there are only so many GDEMU units to be made in this run and that’s it. One person asks for my mail and a day later I get more than 20 late preorders. And this is in addition to the people already on the list.

I got a bit of a house remodeling going on right now, this will last up to 2 weeks. Thanks to that the cold I caught has gotten worse and now I’m pretty much ouf ot action. This week is probably not going to be very productive. Also, I’m not checking my gmail as often now.

So, with all that in mind, I’m going to change the payment and shipping rules a bit, at least for now. So far I’ve only send payment request when I had something to sell packed away in a box, or I knew it could be ready in few hours. This approach has a drawback I already explained – if people are late with answering (or worse, don’t answer at all), you all have to wait more for your turn. From now on I will issue more requests then I have units ready, this will allow for faster shipping at the risk of some of you having to wait up to a week or so between paying and shipping. If you’re unhappy with it I can always return the money instead, all you need is ask.

One last thing – I’ve been asked, again, to host or join a forum. I don’t do that. There’re a lot of people out there with good ideas (or what they think are good ideas) but zero knowledge and/or experience, coupled with even shorter temper than I have, not to mention poor communication skills. So basically it’s an explosive mixture, and the fireworks are fun but a waste of time. In other words, I could be spending time on forums, or I could be working on my projects. Take your pick.

Any color you like

Spot the differences:

Black PCB will be available soon. I’m sorry but there is no choice of what you’ll get – unless you ordered 2 units and received only 1 so far, but in that case you got my mail and decided already. Other than PCB mask color the units are identical, all v5.3 models.

I’ve resumed shipping but after this unplanned pause people stopped checking their mail and/or PayPal account and respond only after a few days – which means I’m sitting on a bunch of units but can’t sell to another person until a week passes, since obviously I need to give the original buyer some time to act. This is partly my fault to begin with so again, I apologise. I’m about 50% done but I’ve ordered some more PCBs and parts to try and cover all the backup list entries.

The sun, it burns

Some of you are getting impatient waiting for GDEMU payment request to arrive. Sorry about that – the plan was to do it faster this time around but the recent heat wave has put a stop to it. I have quite a few units assembled in 70% but that’s it. Finishing that, plus cleaning, plus initial program upload, plus testing – that takes time too. You’ll have to wait some more I’m afraid.

About the payment itself, it’s not 100% safe so to speak. I send the payment request from different mail address than the one you used for preordering. In itself it’s nothing strange but it raises the question – how do you know the request actually came from me and not someone else who is about to scam you out of your money. Well, if you have any doubts about that feel free to contact me first to confirm.

Also, do not send money to the preorder address. That email is not registered with PayPal – not only will I not claim that transfer, I have no way of promptly rejecting it either. That means it will be stuck for 30 days in PP system (and returned automatically to you after that time) as well as possibly prevent you from paying when I actually send the request – as you might not have another 100 Euro for that. Remember, I do not take any money up front, only when I actually have the GDEMU unit ready will I send the request. The lower you are on the list the longer that will take.

Lastly, I’ve decided to stop sending the paper inserts warning about possible dangers of installing the screw improperly. All this is explained on the Installation page, you are required to read all of that (and everything else I’ve prepared). In other words, if you manage to damage your Dreamcast or GDEMU because you couldn’t be bothered to read the instructions, I will laugh at you and call you stupid. So that we are clear on that. I’m happy to report that while there have been some minor accidents and issues with GDEMU, so far nothing that would actually break the device and/or console permanently. Please do try to keep it this way from now on as well.