Enter SanDisk’s new “concierge service,” where the company will walk a skittish person through an upgrade to the promised land of SSDs.
Why this matters: For a lot of basic computing, an SSD upgrade pays huge dividends in overall responsiveness, but the vast majority of consumers would never open up a laptop. Sandisk’s new service could let people squeeze another few years of usable service out of an old laptop rather than buy a new one.
Those who buy a Sandisk SSD can pay an additional $40 for the service, which nets them the tools, software, and real-time help to clone their old drive to the new SSD. What do you get A USB to SATA cable, a magnetic-tipped screw driver, an an appointment for a tech to walk them through the process via video conference.
Since there’s a good chance that you’ll be upgrading your only computer—which will have to be shut down during the process—Sandisk can do the video conference via smartphone, too.
The service may seem pricey to old salts who can do the swap and imaging on their own, but for those who have never opened a PC, it’s not a bad deal. Just adding a hard drive at most big box chain stores as a service is $50—and that’s not imaging your old drive to the new one.
But what if the person breaks something during the upgrade Sandisk officials say the person can then contact Sandisk for further support, but didn’t say they would cover the cost to repair the machine. Most likely the cost of actually paying a tech to repair it would be absorbed by the consumer.