R-
Your first sentence is correct - ALex does need to work on improving his customer relations with the general public. He realized this and that is why Brent Rainwater was his CS laison until several months ago when Brent had some health issues and had to quit.
Your second sentence, however,is incorrect. He returned both calls and e-mails to many of us in November and December up until x-mas week, and also worked on a number of our machines. These are just the facts, not rumors, not guesses.
In this crazy hobby, it takes all sorts, some more reliable than others. There are sometimes trade-offs involved in getting cutting-edge performance. While customer relations is important to me as well, I've never really had any problems with Alex. The few times a laser has gone out or I've done something stoopid (like trying to inadvertently put 2 cd's in at once...), he's always managed to get the repair work done promptly. I realize others may have different experiences than I, but those have been mine. In return, I am currently enjoying arguably some of the best digital front end sonics around, without having to break the bank or sell a kidney.