Absolute putting forth the effort
 

As I've indicated on several occasions in the past, I am impressed with the effort that AP displays in trying to attract and keep customers.
I have also stated several times that I might be interested in playing there if their software didn't bring my computer to a screeching halt for whatever reason.

I went back today and it still behaves VERY sluggishly on my computer. I know virtually nothing about computers...so any of you who have similar issues who actually know something about computers feel free to chime-in with why you think this occurs.


Anyway - absolute contacted me clear out of the blue to ask for my opinions on this matter which I found to be VERY interesting.
Their software has problems...but they monitor the forums and they are trying to fix the problems which I think is definitely a step in the right direction.


Anyway....here's some of the correspondence I've had with them of recent:


[ QUOTE ]
Hi Bob,



I’ve been with Absolute Poker for two years now and I frequently monitor the various poker forums for feedback and information about Absolute. After a little investigation, I’m making the assumption, hopefully correctly, that you’re MICROBOB on 2+2. I’ve seen many of your posts and recognize that you’ve had a number of problems with our product.



Anyhow – the reason for this email is to ask if you’d be interested in participating in a one person focus group with the end goal of making your computer and AP function together in perfect harmony. We recently (yesterday) seem to have fixed the lag problems that were plaguing our players and if you’d like to call me I will tell you more about the changes that are taking place at AP. We would be happy to compensate you for your time.



Please feel free to reach me at any of the numbers below. (Please don’t post these as they are my personal numbers)



I look forward to hearing from you at your earliest convenience.



Cheers,



Brent



Brent Beckley

Team Absolute ~ Director of Client Services



[/ QUOTE ]


[ QUOTE ]
Brent -

I am indeed microbob.
I am extremely impressed that you contacted me and that you are interested in trying to fix the slowness issues that I have encountered there. I think others have experienced the same problems.

As you know, I'm one to speak my mind with regard to a given poker-site.
I have stated many times that I think absolute is trying to go in the right direction but that their software became an issue for me.

There have been several instances where a site has done something well and I have written about them postively. I would be interested in doing this at 2+2 with regard to your site.
Just the fact that you took the time to contact me has impressed me.

Anyway, I'll check out the site and see what I think and will get back to you at some point.

Let me know if I may post your e-mail to me on 2+2 (without your phone numbers).

I haven't been playing at absolute lately and haven't been keeping up with it that much...but I think some of the 2+2'ers would be interested to know that you contacted me like this.

If you would like to keep this correspondance confidential then I certainly understand and that would be fine too.

Either way, I'll get back to you when I get a chance to check it out and will give you some of my thoughts.

Sincerely,
Bob Rotruck


[/ QUOTE ]


[ QUOTE ]
Hi again Brent -

I have just downloaded absolute again and I can't say that I detect any improvement unfortunately.
After opening just 1 table my mouse was noticeably sluggish. This is not a problem that I have at party or stars or ub.
I can't tell you why I have this problem...but the fact that I could see it after just opening 1 table is obviously an issue still.

I have 3 tables open right now and am playing on 1 of them (.02/.04). I'm able to play fine...but the mouse is still dragging and even the cursor as I type this e-mail occasionally gets weird.

The problems I've encountered in the past seemed to get exaggerated with continued play.
And that might be happening a little bit here even after just a few hands (actually...I think this is the case...it's dragging more already).

Wish I knew more about computers so I could give you some ideas. Because there's no way that your other players would have these problems as much as I do (because they probably wouldn't be playing there). I do think it's a problem that affects some people more than others for whatever reason.

More thoughts later.

- Bob


[/ QUOTE ]


[ QUOTE ]
Hi Bob,



Thanks for your response. I’m glad that you are actually MICROBOB. I figured that it would be pretty uncanny for there to be two Bob Rotrucks out there anyhow.



I don’t mind if you post my email, but please have my email address and phone numbers omitted (who knows what kind of unnecessary work that might create). We’ve made it a company policy to stay off of the forums for a few reasons, but I don’t mind you posting our correspondence. We monitor the major forums daily for feedback and criticism, but have decided to not officially post regarding topics.



I have credited your account with $50 for your help with these software issues, but please let me make it clear that this gift is NOT in order to win favorable postings on a forum. That would defeat the purpose of this and it isn’t how we want Absolute Poker to earn positive feedback.



I really appreciate your willingness to help us identify your problems with our software and your computer. While we have made numerous improvements, we’re the first to realize that we’ve got occasional hiccups. Building scalable multi player poker software isn’t the easiest task out there, but hopefully with your help we can make some solid improvements (with your issues, anywaysJ).



I’ve emailed our tech team and have asked them if they would do a net meeting with you. If you’re unfamiliar with a net meeting, it is basically when they connect to your PC and monitor the issues that you’re having. Are you willing to participate in a net meeting with our software engineers?



I hope to hear back from them either tonight or tomorrow. I will be sure to keep you posted on what they say.



Thanks again for your help.



Sincerely,



Brent



[/ QUOTE ]

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

This is great on their part. I've never played there, butI'm warming up to the idea.

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

This alone is worth signing up. Just ordered mine.

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

I, too, love Absolute poker and hope that more people start playing there (especially Omaha players), but they ignored my last e-mail to customer support about fixing my rakeback problem, and that makes me a sad panda.

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

Wow, the e-mail they sent you is very impressive. I truely believe that Absolute Poker is set on making their customers happy. Hopefully we will see some good changes coming up in the near future.

BTW Bob, I'm far from a computer expert but it sounds like your problem might be coming from your equipment rather than Absolute's software.

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

No, I have top o' the line, and my computer freezes after 500 hands like clockwork. I like it though, it reminds me to get up and eat.

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

maybe. I have no idea.

I just know that virtually every other site runs fine and dandy on my computer (with occasional problems from pokerroom but I haven't been playing there for awhile so I don't know).


I did nothing different to my computer.
It's a Dell Inspiron 5100 that I got in Jan, 2004.

I know that not everyone has the same issues that I have with absolute....but I think a few players have reported similar difficulties with slow-downs when they play there.


If they want to help me specifically figure out what I need to change about my computer then I'm more than willing to have them help me.
I certainly wouldn't mind playing the occasional tourney there (and maybe some ring-games). And if they can figure out what the deal is with my computer related to AP then they should hopefully be able to offer constructive advice for other players experiencing similar difficulties.


Mostly I'm in your camp as I indicated in my e-mail to them: I'm just impressed that they would go out of their way to contact me as they have.

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

[ QUOTE ]
No, I have top o' the line, and my computer freezes after 500 hands like clockwork. I like it though, it reminds me to get up and eat.

[/ QUOTE ]

Fortunately I have not had to deal with this, just the "other" AP nuances.

1. 3 table max
2. eyestrain due to the color schemes
3. generally slow software

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

I was going to whore them a few months ago, so I deposited $1.5K. I played MAYBE 100 hands and just couldn't take it. They called me out of the blue a few weeks ago. I was shocked. I think they smell blood in the water.

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

[ QUOTE ]
I figured that it would be pretty uncanny for there to be two Bob Rotrucks out there anyhow.


[/ QUOTE ]

Little does he know about the double Bob's [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] (see his blog for a funny story on this)

Anyhow I have had nothing, but positive experiences with Absolute. I am not just saying that since I won the first ever ARP freeroll.

-Joe

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

I would significantly increase my playing time at Absolute if:

1) They allowed 4 tables max or more.
2) They fixed the color scheme or allowed skins so it would be more easier on the eyes. (Cool smooth colors please)
3) If it didn't comepletely freeze after 500 hands or so. Kind of annoying especially when your in the middle of a hand with trip Aces.

But they're doing just about everything else right.

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

Strangely I had forgotten about that when he mentioned it (just kind of skipped past it i guess).

The story goes:
in my small hometown in Ohio there is another Robert Rotruck which is just VERY strange (to the extent that I should really hire a PI to see if he hasn't stolen my identity somehow. It's a very uncommon last name obviously).

Anyway, this 'other' me seems to keep popping up in the newspaper for criminal-trespass, helping others steal cable, etc etc. Kinda weird.

since the paper in my home-town comes out weekly and virtually nothing ever goes on there most people in town actually DO read through the police-report on the back pages.

when I was 18 and got a speeding ticket for going 37 in a 25 I had a LOT of people make various 'lead-foot' jokes to me when it appeared in the police-blotter of the paper. That's what you do....look through the police-report and find people you know so you can make fun of them.


Anyway, there are certainly SEVERAL former teachers (high school AND college) and colleagues of mine who are wondering why the hell I'm getting into so much trouble.

It's kind of embarassing and I haven't bothered to go back and clear my good name or figure out if this guy who has my same name is the real deal or if it was somehow stolen.

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

The only problem I have had with AP is taking $30 of bonus money away and e-mailing 8 hours before the fact.

Its not like killing my dog. [img]/images/graemlins/blush.gif[/img]

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

How much RAM do you have? AP was a dog until I bumped up to 1 GIG. God knows I've sent them a list of problems (and they respond like they are trying to do something). Other potential causes of grief - video card (the site is graphics overload) and spyware (because of the absurd overhead AP software has).

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

I'm telling you folks 1 GIG of RAM does wonders. I haven't had lockups since. Occasionally, I'll get booted from the server (I usually have a zillion things running), but the lock ups stopped.

It's still slow and cluttered.

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

[ QUOTE ]
How much RAM do you have?

[/ QUOTE ]


I have no idea. I'm not kidding.

Does this give you an idea of what I mean when I say "I'm a computer-moron"?

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

I just looked up that model. If you didn't upgrade, it's right where I had so much grief from AP.

Does it happen with ONE table? Two? Three?


Sorry to be questionful, but AP tech support has been unhelpful at every turn for me.

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

LOLSCOK,

OK, start, control panel, system. It's at the bottom of the first screen.

I'm betting it's 256 or less (video taking some).

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

I opened just 1 table and noticed the sluggishness issues right-away.
I was on a high-speed connection and all I had open at the time was 2+2 on mozilla and my e-mail on outlook express.

I have norton security and probably a couple other things that might be a minor factor.



So do I just go buy some more RAM for my baby or what? Sounds like that is the way to go.

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

My rakeback problem stems from the fact that I signed up over Firefox and I was never credited to the affiliate I had contacted.

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

I had 256 (your notebooks base) and AP was painful. I jumped to 1gig and it's happy (still SLOOOOOOOW). I can 3 table AP, 2 table GamesGrid, sweat 2 on UB, mine 2 more on UB, and mine 4 at Party.

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

I agree with you 100% Bob. Best part is that they have super-nice (non-India call center) customer service that will call you regarding things. I have been called by the vip host to see if there was anything they could do to get me to start playing there again (even though im still lower stakes, it still make me feel valued). Then they called me a few times to make sure that they could help me out as their Purdue rep (including fully sponsoring $300 or more live person freeroll tourneys). Their customer service is none like I've ever seen from an online poker site. I think their customer service gives them a serious competitive advantage over competing poker rooms even though their tables aren’t that amazing.

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

The thing that drives me batty about absolute is the when you are on a waiting list for more than one table, and you join a table off of a waitlist it kicks you off all the other tables you are waitlisted on. I can't stand that.

Oh, it also won't let me bring a fraction of a dollar to the table by just typing in (for example) 30.75. I have to highlight just the part behind the decimal, type in 75 then highlight the part in front of the decimal and type in 30. Thats kind of ridiculous, but doesn't bother me as much as being kicked off my waitlists. I mean, c'mon, I wanna play 3 tables don't make me go to the end of the line on the other tables everytime I join one table.

--Zetack

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

I agree that there are aspects of their cust-service that are particularly impressive...especially of late.

But I have had issues with their cust-serv in the past (it may all be fixed by now for all I know...but I've read others report having difficulties getting e-mail responses from them on occasion).


I sent them an e-mail on time just to praise them for all the bonuses and freerolls that they were offering.
I made it pretty obvious that I thought they were on the right track and that I that they should keep up the good work. That was pretty much it.
They responded by saying that they didn't understand my question.


There was a an issue I had with a deposit there that didn't go through. Neteller had timed-out in the middle or something.
I e-mailed them 3 or 4 times and never got a response.
Then e-mailed them again just to ask 'Are you guys getting my e-mails...are you able to respond? can you try me at this address instead because I don't think the responses are going through'
They responded to that VERY quickly at my first address and said 'Is there something we can help you with?' and I responded that my previous 4 e-mails had pretty much detailed my situation.


I also got a phone-call offering a bonus there....why haven't i been playing at absolute...etc etc. This was a few months ago.
I told them that the software was VERY slow on my computer. Support person told me she had never heard anyone have this complaint before.
Anyway...she sent me an e-mail thanking me for my input.
I e-mailed her back and said 'the slowness issues are something that we have discussed many times on the 2+2 forums. if you would like to participate in these discussions we would welcome you at the 2+2 internet forum' or something like that.
I never heard back.

Until today that is (although this e-mail may be completely unrelated...but this occured SEVERAL months ago as I recall) and I was wholly unimpressed that my e-mail to the support person I had talked with went unanswered.


So....while I am very impressed with the phone-calls and e-mails that many of us have gotten as well as some of their other efforts in cust-service of recent there have been some really strange issues regarding their e-mail support there that have left me scratching my head a little bit.


I acknowledge that they are possibly growing faster than their support can handle or that there is some other issue that gets in the way...but I also know that I'm not the only one who has said "I e-mailed support 2 or 3 times about something and never heard back."


Hopefully they are making efforts to correct those problems as they obviously can leave a bad taste in the customer's mouth.
And again, in my case, these issues happened several months ago so may not be issues there anymore.

Re: I want to like them but
 

I signed up there through an affiliate last month. When I didn't get paid on the 15th of this month I emailed my affiliate and was told my account was not linked to him. I've done some reading and apparently this is a common problem. So I emailed customer support and got a reply that said I must have signed up wrong and nothing could be done.

So I played there even when the hand histories were so screwed up they were useless (they are still not perfect). And I played there even though their wait lists do not work properly. I did find a way around the wait list problems though. Thinking that it was a good deal since I was getting rakeback+bonus, then a couple thousand mgr later I find out I'm not getting rakeback. The bonus clears pretty slow there, it's decent but there are many better. Playing 5/10 the rakeback makes a big difference.

I read a thread about making a new account there to get rakeback, but I didn't want to be sneaky about it. I just wanted them to fix it. I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that I signed up properly. It's hard to mess it up.

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

[ QUOTE ]



I sent them an e-mail on time just to praise them for all the bonuses and freerolls that they were offering.
I made it pretty obvious that I thought they were on the right track and that I that they should keep up the good work. That was pretty much it.


[/ QUOTE ]

I just saw that they have a freeroll coming up that'll pay for your college tuition for next year. I'm not in college, so too bad for me, but that's a supersweet promotion if you are. Apparently you don't even have to have a real money account to play in the freeroll (but don't quote me on that cause I didn't look at it that closely.) I don't know if they have any limitations, like they won't spring for one of your high tuition ivey type places or anything, but I didn't spot anything like that.

--Zetack

Re: I want to like them but
 

[ QUOTE ]
I signed up there through an affiliate last month. When I didn't get paid on the 15th of this month I emailed my affiliate and was told my account was not linked to him. I've done some reading and apparently this is a common problem. So I emailed customer support and got a reply that said I must have signed up wrong and nothing could be done.

[/ QUOTE ]

If they would remedy my similar situation by acknowledging that this is a common problem rather than accusing me of being too stupid to click a link I would dub them my favorite site.

Re: I want to like them but
 

This does sound familiar to me.

So you know that this is a fairly common problem there...but AP just keeps you giving you the party-line (no pun) that you must have not done it correctly??

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

Okay, this correspondance has extremely upped my chances of playing there again.

Absolute: Your software is clunkier and slower than most, if not all, major poker sites. If you could fix this, you could greatly elevate your standing in the industry.

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

A few questions for you:

When you say sluggish, is it just the mouse movement or is it all computer activity?

Can you Alt-Tab between progams with a reasonable amount of responsiveness when this is happening?

How many processes do you have running when your computer is sitting idle? (You can get this by hitting Ctrl-Shift-Esc and going to the Processes tab)

WiteKnite
IT Dork

Re: I want to like them but
 

Yes. Well actually, they have just ignored me, but they told my affiliate that I was out of luck. I figure it is costing me $2/hr. It is too bad, because it is not in-line with the effort they seem to making towards you. It wouldn't take anything for them to connect me to my intended affiliate. I continue to play there around 30/hrs a week, so I wish they would reward my loyalty.

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

it's the whole computer that slows down.
typing the e-mail to AP while I was playing was actually kind of difficult.

even if i don't have any other processes running it becomes a problem.
If I try to play on AP and party at the same time it becomes EXTREMELY sluggish.


I didn't know you could alt-tab between programs.


right now I'm playing on stars and it says I have 60 processes running. CPU usage varying from 7-12%.

I haven't noticed what this is when I have AP running.


I'm playing elsewhere right now and can't afford to open AP to check.

Re: I want to like them but
 

If you don't use IE it's pretty easy to screw up. Asking Tech Support for help is a waste of time. You and your affiliate need(ed) to deal with CS.

rakeback screw up ?
 

Question: Are you people dealing with tech support or CS?

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

Bob,

What I told a rep this afternoon, was that if they had Hand Histories saved directly to the hard drive, I would pretty much increase my play 100%.

Right now I think I log 2000-2500 a month usually weekend days playing 2 tables short-handed. If ther hand history thing was straightened out. I would probably end up playing closer to 4500 hands a month there. (I am basing this estimate off of how often I play PokerStars, although with my rakeback deal at Absolute, I would probably intentionally force more hands through.

As it is right now it is a little too much fumbling around to play my normal game there with other sites open. I have to request HH every 10min manually, then since I am usually playing UB at the same time, I have to also manually tell PokerTracker to download the histories (the auto-import is tied up monitioring the hard drive histories from UB and PS). These are 2 extra steps I don't need when I am playing alot of hands.

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

I play almost exclusively at Absolute. I guess it fits me. I've played at Party, UB, Empire, and GamesGrid, and even with its quirks, Absolute feels like the best fit for me.

Having said that, there are some things that they really need to address. They are, in no particular order:

1. Don't embed images in the executable. This should make the software run faster, as well as give the end user the ability to modify the appearance of the window.

2. Make the carpet a solid background. Forget the pattern, it's too busy.

3. Allow the option to globally turn off all user icons.

4. Allow the option to globally turn off the chairs and tables.

5. Allow for 4 tables instead of 3.

6. Save hand histories to the hard drive.

7. Find a computer with a 700mHz processor and 128 megs of RAM. Make the software run on that computer, 4-tabling. If it'll run on that, it'll run on most anything.

8. I play tourneys, almost exclusively, and I've noticed that the SNG listings are usually out of date. It'll be showing a table with 3 people, but when I try to join, the table is already full. Perhaps updating the table listings could be faster and more accurate?

At least the interface at Absolute isn't as butt-ugly as the one at GamesGrid. Good Lord! I tried to play there, but the interface was so ugly that I actually got mad while I played!

It's good to hear that Absolute is doing something to try to address the problems that folks have with their site. It sounds like ultimately, the speed of the client is going to be the big speed-bump that they have to get past. Coming from an industry where software performance is one of the utmost considerations, it baffles me how they could let such laggy software go. I run a Presario 3gHz 64-bit laptop with 512 of RAM, and while I've never had Absolute completely lock up, I do notice a lag sometimes when I click a button and it takes 5 seconds for the action to take place.

I think they're on the right track, and to be honest, I'd be willing to help them out for free, since I love playing there and want to see them grow. My knowledge of PC-based programming is so limited, though, that they would be getting exactly what they paid for. I can give suggestions, though. [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

Just having the option to turn off a bunch of graphics could be quite useful. For example, how much resources does the timer in the bottom right tie up?

I agree that resource hogging is the biggest issue at absolute (the 9 player limit is the second biggest issue).

Also, what is the deal with the multiple popups? If I click on waiting list, I get 3 popups, including popups that tell me I'm already on the waiting list the moment I sign onto that waiting list. And when I sit at a table, I don't need a message that I am now off of that waiting list, that is self-evident from my sitting at the table.

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

I say each and every one of us pastes the link to this thread in an email and sends it to them.

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

[ QUOTE ]
5. Allow for 4 tables instead of 3.

6. Save hand histories to the hard drive.

[/ QUOTE ]

These alone would bring me back. The rest are all excellent suggestions and there is no reason why Absolute couldn't be a monster force in the industry.

Re: Absolute putting forth the effort
 

[ QUOTE ]
with 512 of RAM, and while I've never had Absolute completely lock up, I do notice a lag sometimes when I click a button and it takes 5 seconds for the action to take place.

[/ QUOTE ]

Okay, one more step. 256 is a lockup waiting to happen, 512 runs, but still lags, 1gig runs fine just slow.

AP is worse than M$ crap for being a resourse hog.