I bought a minilab3 less than a year ago with the box clearly saying 5 year warranty. well two of the midi key are now not working and when I try and get support it says that the product is no longer supported. this is crap and they need to get called out to let others know that support for the hardware products will get dropped when Arturia feels like it I guess and the warranty isn’t worth the paper it is written on.
well. now it is totally dead. When I noticed the #5 & 6 midi encoders stopped working, I dedcided to exit Logic and run the MCC program to see what was going on. When I loaded it, the Hold + Octive + - keys turned blue. it was unresponsive so I decided to RTFM and it said to do a firmware reset to clear the memory and reset back to default settings to unplug and press and hold the Octave + - when plugging in the USB-C. So I unplugged it and did what it said. NOTHING. Now there are no lights on the unit. the MCC doesn’t even recognize the controller. The only saving grace is that I purchased it from an authorized music store and they have in-house 1 year warranty so they are going to see if they can get parts to get it repaired.
But it really looks bad on Arturia if they won’t even give a single year warranty or support on their own hardware products.
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Hi,
I understand how upsetting it is when things break.
I think you will have at least a years warranty (2 in the EU) depending which country you are in. In the UK, you have consumer protection for up to 6 years in certain circumstances. As you bought it from a dealer, it is their obligation to fix it under warranty and you say they are honouring that - so its ok.
I am in Caanda,. The silver lining of luck that the unit completely failed in less than a year so the dealer is hopefully covering it is no consolation. The return for repair tag that I got from them says that there is a $35 minimum repair cost if no issue can be found or the item is outside of warranty. Now the dealer says that it for if someone returns an item that has been abused or from neglect.
this still does not address the fact that inside of my profile that Arturia is saying
so I have tried to contact Arturia without linking their hardware that isn’t working with their software. I am left not knowing if they will issue an RMA for replacement parts for the unit. I can’t tell if the Encoder #5 & 6 not linking to the Distortion and Phasor macros inside Analog Lab is a fault of the software or hardware considering that the remaining 6 encoders and 4 faders work perfectly. It is as if Arturia has abandoned me a paying customer who has spent well over $1000 with them in the past year.
To say it is the responsibility of the dealer to figure it out with Arturia if it will or will not honour the printed 5 year warranty that is on the box and thus was advertised by the dealer saying it has that warranty does little for me. If I knew that Arturia was going to pull this S!%^ then I might have taken my $189 after taxes and bought a controller from a different manufacturer. All I can do is now I guess is vent here from what I can see. Hope that they change their tone or fix their system if it was a mistake, and warn any other potential purchaser here in this forum that this is what Arturia has done to me so they know it is something that could be done to them as past actions of a manufacturer is a good indication of future actions.
I do hope this is just an error and if it is I will gladly document that inside this post, but until a resolution can be found, this is just a post of FACTS.
So the dealer charges a fee IF there is no fault found and the item is working properly. We could debate whether that is fair or not but the main issue is to ensure you have tried everything on the software front before returning it.
I find it had to believe that such a recent product is not supported and I would question Arturia about this.
I would also retry the firmware update, perhaps using an another USB cable and another USB port to rule out any problems there. Also, if you are using USB hub to connect it, try connecting it directly.
Have you tried boot loader mode? For the Minilab 3 it is:
Hold "SHIFT " + "Hold " buttons at the same time while powering ON the unit.
I believe you will have to manually download the Firmware to your PC/mac to carry out the update using bootloader mode.
Try all these before returning for repair and contact Arturia to establish a means to log a support ticket.
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This is illegal in Canada. Whether it’s worth pursuing is up to you. Here is where you could start:
The policy it seems from Arturia is that they do not do hardware support or repair. that is the customers problem and needs to be taken up with the dealer that you purchased through. Word of Wisdom, NEVER BUY FROM AN ONLINE STORE. if it breaks then you can get screwed over. IE. Amazon isn’t a good idea.
I purchased through a big music chain. Long&McQuade and they do have their own 1 year warranty but it seems that Arturia doesn’t want to support them either. After 4 weeks it was decided that the 9 month old MiniLab3 is obsolete because it is Alpine White, and although it is the exact same unit as the White Black and Green versions that are still for sale, because the unit was made out of white plastic is cannot be fixed. All the components inside are obsolete and irreparable. So this will indicate either that the unit itself is a non repairable item, so if anything breaks, it will be replaced with a totally new unit as fixing it is not possible. If that is the case, then it’s not unreasonable to wonder why they don’t just offer a white, black or green unit in exchange. But no. So we are back to the premise that Arturia does not honour their 5 year published warranty as it is impossible to get the unit fixed or repaired and no party inside the Arturia company wants to honour what they published on their web site and it comes down to is it worth hiring a lawyer for $300/h to sue for a $99 keyboard to get fixed or replaced.
Sad state of affairs really.
I am confused.
I am in the Uk but if a dealer fails to repair under warranty, you should be offered a replacement or refund.
If its not able to be repaired, are you being offered a replacement or failing that, a refund?
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your comment now transfers the failure of ARTURIA to honour their published 5 year warranty onto the seller who now is stuck with the outcome of the manufacturer not honouring their own published warranty.
In my case the dealer has gotten back to me saying that Arturia or more to point in my case Jam Industries the North American (Canada) distributor has said that the product is no longer supported and no parts are available to repair the unit and Arturia does not offer any support or warranty for this unit. It’s sort of a who will blink first.
The dealer has said if I want the broken unit back it will cost me $99. But as there are no longer any parts or support offered for this unit. I guess I have to wait and see if the distributor is going to do something, but as it stands I just don’t know. Here in Canada, we too have consumer protection and other laws, but reality is they are pretty toothless and do little to protect the consumer. So in the given example, yes the dealer is required to honour the warranty given from the equipment manufacturer. And in this case they have tried and Arturia has said sorry no. So the dealer now has to sue Arturia for not honouring their warranty, that they are totally unlikely to do. So they turn to me and say sorry it’s not covered. So what option do I have? its illegal for me to open the cash register and take my money back. It’s illegal for me to just walk to the piano section of the store and take a new MiniLab3 box off the wall and walk out the store. I can’t even yell at them and demand that they give me my money back, as that is illegal too. The only option I have to to take them to court and sue them for failure to meet the consumer protection act. that option is far more expensive than just buying a new one. But posting about what is going on here on the Arturia Forum if free, and hopefully they will read this and say, the bad publicity is far more expensive to the brand than simply giving him a replacement, or better yet, lets just send him a KeyLAB and show tremendous good will towards the customer… but I can always dream can’t I
But as it stands, until they send that KeyLAB, my comment still stands true, Arturia doesn’t seem to honour the 5 year warranty on the products they advertise.
I am just trying to understand your situation.
I had to reread the thread but can’t see that you have contacted Arturia directly. Their Canadian dealer and distributor seems to be renaging on the warranty.
What do Arturia have to say about that?
I did hear back from Simon at Arturia. He has indicated that the internals for the MiniLAB3 are the same for all the colour models and it doesn’t make any sense why mine was not fixed.
The tone of the email was that it was my issue and responsibility to resolve as Arturia doesn’t have any problems with other dealers across the world.
The music store I purchased through has decided as a good will gesture to simply replace my defective Alpine White unit with a different colour model. Functionality wise it is the same thing so I can use the new miniLAB3 to make music. it just is a different colour and not the limited edition model that I had purchased.
It is sad that Arturia seems to be a shrug and point the finger type of organization rather than roll up their sleeves and figure out what went wrong and fix it. If I got one of those surveys asking how likely I was to recommend Arturia to colleagues or others, I would likely be saying unlikely. Not because they don’t make great products. but purely on if something goes wrong they as a company don’t care to the point of total indifference .
Firstly - great, it’s being replaced for a new unit which differs in colour scheme only.
I suspect that is not a gesture of goodwill on the dealers part, more contractual obligation.
I have never run an international company but I would think Arturia engages distributors and dealers to carry out distribution on their behalf in other parts of the world and that part of that contract is to deal with warranty issues. So, the first port of call is the dealer and they should be responsible for resolving your issue. We dont know what happened behind the scenes but maybe Arturia reminded the dealer of their obligation.
Anyway, all sorted now.
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Just to jump in briefly, i used to work quite closely with Trading Standards in this country quite a few years ago, and @Funtmaster is correct with respect to UK Consumer Law.
The setup he described is pretty much the standard way ALL companies work when selling outside their country of origin, i.e. they have ‘local’ distribution contracts with ‘local’ distributors, part of which is dealing with issues such as The OPs.
Obviously, i cannot comment on Canadian Consumer Law though.
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i thank you for putting in your thoughts. however here is where i feel the “system” has let me down
- the product is shipped in a box wrapped in plastic with a small card with a serial number and unlock ID + a usb cable. that is it.
there is no written pamphlet saying what the warranty is, or how and where to obtain it. this is a Standard Practice here in North America.
i get that Arturia isn’t located here in North America but when selling in another country then it would be best to follow local standards
- the website co trolled by Arturia for some reason still shows that the MiniLAB3 alpine white is unspupprted! and you cannot link your product to get any technical suppprt for the product.
as the minilab3 doesn’t come with any description or how to get hardware rma or warranty that it would come to thinking that maybe arturia would let you know but you want as they won’t let you submit a trouble ticket.
3 it is fine to say that the support and repair is provided by a distributor outside of France i guess. but when the distributor doesn’t meet those terms of service why is it not Arturia obligation to get involved. to say you the customer has to sue the distributor for not providing warranty seems a bit too much for me
—UPDATE—
Simon from technical support has gotten back to me since this post and offered a few more points that I didn’t know before.
The Music store I purchased through is a big CANADA wide chain with 30+ locations. Arturia had been in co tact with someone from Long&McQuade but not necessarily my store location. So expectations of them knowing how to handle the rma from Arturia side might have exceeded my particular store’s understanding.
In Canada the distributor of Arturia is Jam Industries that is affiliated with many brands that Arturia is just a small brand inside. They have had issues in the past with Jam not fulfilling their obligations but are short of stuck to do anything about it.
Simon has agreed that things didn’t go as smoothly as preferred and some departments haven’t been as forthcoming as preferred in correcting issues pointed out. To me that is a giant step forwards in and resolution and I will work with him to make sure all sides feel satisfied.
Arturia makes some fantastic products and my pointing out issues here is not intended to burn bridges or place blame but to facilitate resolution and help anyone else that might get stuck in a similar situation to navigate forwards
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That’s great that your issue is being resolved now and that you’ve managed to identify where in the chain things have gone wrong.
As you’ve discovered, most distributors do in fact act as ‘agents’, in effect’ for more than one company, and they might not all be massive multinationals.
It’s great that this has been brought to Arturia’s attention also as it demonstrates that sometimes things are, unfortunately, out of their control.
Of course Arturia, and their employees care deeply about their products, their customers and their reputaion and are not happy when situations such as this crop up, fortunately it’s not THAT common, else we would be bombarded on here.
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I get where you were coming from regarding your controller seemingly not supported just because it was a limited edition colour. But this should have always been an issue raised with and solved by your retailer, especially within the 12 month warranty period.
However Arturia do need to be called out, but for different reasons. They have apparently stopped supporting your version of the controller just because it was a limited-edition colour. That can’t be how it works, but they’re sort of relying on you not challenging them because as you say $300ph solicitor for a $99 product is not worth it. But that doesn’t make their practise less unethical. They need to stock a reasonable amount of model-specific parts for their limited edition items so customers can reasonably expect like for like replacements or repair within the warranty period.
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Now that I see you ordered from Long and McQuade, I’m much less surprised.
I’ve dealt with Long and McQuade for years and I would say, at best, the service is inconsistent.
I bought a $2500 Mesa/Boogie from them years ago. The reverb tank didn’t work. I took it back and they sent it away (or perhaps did nothing) for months. They didn’t contact me at all until I eventually went in and demanded a new amp. Which they finally agreed to.
Seeing it had been under a year, in my opinion, they should have given you a new one off the shelf and dealt with the return/referbish on their own. I’m sure the colour thing might have been an issue, but they should have made the offer right away.
I avoid them when I can.
