The Sharp XE-A407 is a great little register with the exception of one big honking showstopper... The two that we purchased are being sent back and negative customer feedback being left.
We had been using three of the previous model - the XE-A506 - and were really happy with them. They are six years old and one of them is starting to act a little flaky. All three units lost their backup battery within a few months of each other so it was decided to retire them to backup status and do a "technology refresh" at the store.
We were happy with the XE-A506's so we decided to stick with SharpUSA and we bought two of their XE-A407's.
One of the things that attracted me to the earlier model is that there is an app that you can run on a laptop to program the register. Set the laptop next to the register, connect a USB cable and bingo! Any changes (tax rates, departments, function keys, machine settings, etc), bring out the laptop and this is a matter of five minutes to make the update on all machines.
On unboxing the new machines, I saw that there was only an SD Card for programming. It would be too much to expect some kind of cross-compatibility between the two machines so I sat down and programmed the new XE-A407. This software was definitely written by the lowest bidder. It is crap. Version 1.0.0.1 dated 2011. You can set up the individual departments, PLUs, Clerks and logo display but nothing else - none of the function keys, none of the machine settings. You can program about 60% of the machine but you are stuck with obscure keystrokes for the remaining 40%
Writing to the SD card takes about five minutes. Literally... This is for 2.28MB of data. Reading? The same... This is a SanDisk Extreme SD Card that can stream video at 45MB/Second.
I got it programmed and everything was set up with one exception.
When entering a sales transaction with multiple items, sometimes the clerk gets distracted and loses their place. With every other cash register I have seen, they can look at the journal tape and see the last couple items that were keyed in.
With the new XE-A407, the journal tape only prints when the sale has been completed and the Cash button has been pressed.
There are some scrolling arrows that allow you to go forward and back in the transaction but it only displays the name of the department, not the quantity or the sale price. Useless.
I spent 45 minutes this morning on the phone with them and there is no solution to this basic omission. Every other register system I have used or set up operates this way - key in a sale item, the journal prints the sale item. What Sharp was thinking when they decided to batch all the printing and do it at the end of the sale makes me wonder about who they have doing their programming.
The mechanical stuff is great - nice clear screen, good keyboard, crisp fast printer. The software sucks donkey balls...
set rant=off
Time to buy a Casio.
