MOTM

As you know, 2 months ago I changed "real jobs". Over the last 5 weeks or so, I 
have been quite busy getting "settled in", going to product training, etc. There 
has not been a lot of pressure because I had no immediate boss. However they did 
hire me one (bound to happen eventually) and now, *his* boss wants the 2 of us 
to really "actively engage with the customer" as we used to say in 1999 
.com-speak.

Looking ahead to my work schedule, the next 6 weeks is pretty booked up. 
Therefore, there will be a slowdown (even more so that my usual slow pace) in 
shipping. This is *not* to say the shipping will stop completely. Rather, I will 
say that instead of shipping an average of 12 orders/week, I will ship 4 to 6.

I do expect the work load to ease up at the end of May.

Also: I am going to use the month of June *primarily* for the AudioEngine 
development boards. These are "real hardware" boards that we can use to write 
firmware (both Verilog and C for the ARM) to get the Cloud Generator ready for 
shipment. The board is not necessarily "hard" or "complex", but it is very *time 
consuming* because of the SMT, it is a 6-layer pc board (like the '650 is) and 
you have to carefully place certain parts on certain power/ground planes and 
then route certain signals a certain way :)

Now, let's talk about 2 things: email and 'shipping order'.

I'm sorry if you think just because you send me an email, you expect an answer 
quickly. I *read* all the emails fairly quickly as a rule. However, if I am at 
say Raytheon Aerospace for a 2 day meeting, then 2 days may pass before I can 
read or reply. Why? Because I am not allowed to have a cell phone OR computer on 
the property.

Also, as some of you have discovered: if you are emailing me just to 'chew me 
out" I tend to ignore those completely.

Sometimes, your email is blocked coming or going. This happen recently with a 
customer in the UK. I could see his emails, but his ISP blocked all of my 
responses.

If you suspect email is not getting through, try this alternate address: 
syntht@... with the understanding I check this email maybe 3 times a 
*week*.

Lastly, several folks are surprised that I do not "ship in order", meaning order 
#344 is shipped, then #345, #346, #347, .........

I have *never* done this, and for many reasons, including:

a) best use of available time. If say it's looking like all I will have next 
weekend is 3 MOTM hours to 'use up', it that 3 hours better served building 
*one* assembled MOTM-480 or shipping *14* MOTM orders for CEMs, blank boards, 
etc?

b) cash flow, which is part of (a). If I can ship 6 orders at $200ea in the same 
time as 1 $349 order, and sitting over in the Bills holder is $1100 worth of 
Mouser/Digikey invoices, what would you do?

c) parts being out of stock. I didn't have mounting rails for like 3 months. I 
am just now clearing out mounting rails orders form late last year.

The bet way to "deal with me" to get your stuff is to patiently wait. Believe 
me: I am *painfully aware* of orders that stretch out month after month after 
month. Every 2 weeks or so I look at *every single order* in the backlog. If you 
have an order using the new shopping cart, it's assigned an Order Number and I 
have a nice Excel spreadsheet with all the details. I can see when you ordered, 
what you ordered, and how long you have been waiting.

If anything, I do not want *anyone* thinking that I have 'singled you out' and 
put you at the "bottom of the pile" for being a pain-in-the-rear. It's *ME* that 
is the pain-in-the-rear. But the important message is that it is *not by design, 
but out of necessity*. I'm going as fast as I can, in a way that maximizes the # 
of orders shipped in any given time frame that I have to balance against my cash 
flow situation. Is this any way to "run a business"? Not at all :)

Looking at the backlog: the majority of modules are -

a) VCOs (both kits and assembled)
b) MOTM-510s (kits and assembled)
c) MOTM-440s (mostly assembled)
d) 'leftover' kits that Indiana was *supposed* to ship by Dec 15th but failed to 
do so.

These 4 things (and Frac modules to AH) is what I will focus on between now and 
when AudioEngine development starts. If you are owed something not in this list, 
chances are it will be *July* until I can ship.

Paul S.