From 4d0b46984bdea071de2266769d202447e0f84db4 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Adriano Caloiaro Date: Sat, 24 May 2025 11:05:06 -0600 Subject: [PATCH] update the updates --- ...mart-grill-is-neither-smart-nor-essential.md | 17 ++++++----------- 1 file changed, 6 insertions(+), 11 deletions(-) diff --git a/content/posts/asmoke-essential-smart-grill-is-neither-smart-nor-essential.md b/content/posts/asmoke-essential-smart-grill-is-neither-smart-nor-essential.md index bc9249b..672c9fa 100644 --- a/content/posts/asmoke-essential-smart-grill-is-neither-smart-nor-essential.md +++ b/content/posts/asmoke-essential-smart-grill-is-neither-smart-nor-essential.md @@ -68,13 +68,7 @@ While I watch ASMOKE drag its miserable feet, let's take a dive into my contempo ## Everything is wrong with ASMOKE the company and the ASMOKE Essential grill -The fact that I made contemporaneous notes should tickle your spidey senses. - -> Why was this guy keeping notes about this product and company? Is he just another salty consumer with unrealistic expectations and an internet to yell into? -> ... you should ask - -Perhaps, but let's dive into the ASMOKE Essential's problems, and you tell me if I'm just a salty consumer with unrealistically high expectations. - +The fact that I made contemporaneous notes should tickle your spidey senses. But here is why: I noticed that ASMOKE had been deleting comments/cries for help from their Instagram account. It appears that they either delete comments, or delete entire posts and then replace them with the same image and a bunch of fake "likes". Either way, it's not the sort of thing companies do when everything is above board. So I started taking notes. ### Hardware problems @@ -173,17 +167,18 @@ Cheers, and happy dreaming of smoked meats this summer. ## Updates -### Update 1: The new control board _did_ arrive! +### The new control board _did_ arrive! (05/16/2025) -*May 16th, 2025* Hey, I'll be the first one to admit when I'm wrong. On May 16th, the new control board arrived. But consistent with the rest of this story, it arrived without any of the directions that were promised. Luckily, the installation is a simple matter of popping the old board/screen off, unplugging some wires, and plugging those same wires into the new board. Voila! The grill is functional again, and the firmware update to version `0.6.1` fixed the WiFi issues, and also allowed the iOS app to connect and monitor the grill temperature. The app is still very, very buggy, and all the marketing images of it are fake. The one thing that does work, which is quite useful, is remotely monitoring grill and probe temps. Every other feature doesn't work. -### Update 2: The grill _did_ die again 8 days later! +### Update 2: They asked me to remove my Amazon review (05/19/2025) -*May 24th* +It should come as no surprise to you that I left a [slightly salty](https://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/RKS99Z18WZH1J/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_rvw_ttl?ie=UTF8&ASIN=B0F23XHYD4) Amazon review. ASMOKE offered a 20lb bag of consolation pellets in exchange for removing it. To their credit, they sent the pellets before I responded. But the fact that they asked confirms my hunch that the only information you find about this grill on the internet is astroturfed/curated influencer garbage. ASMOKE works with a firm named Banda Labs that bills itself as "YOUR TRUSTED GLOBAL INFLUENCER MARKETING BUSINESS PARTNER". So just know that any positive content you see is likely coming from this arrangement, and possibly others. + +### Update 3: The grill died again 8 days later! (05/24/2025) Well this wasn't a surprise. In the middle of cooking a 14lb brisket, the auger that feeds pellets into the burn pit stopped functioning. The motor visibly turns, but it appears to have unattached from the worm gear that actually feeds the pellets into the pit.