If you're going to buy a component for a computer, please research before you wander in and make yourself look like an idiot. It is not possible to "take SATA drivers out of the BIOS" in order to install XP on a machine that previously had Vista. Two reasons why: 1) The BIOS does not have any drivers that you can remove, and 2) Anybody who claims to have done such a thing is fibbing.
The user in question now wants a motherboard in Socket 775 in Pci-Ex with two PATA ports on it. The scary thing is they only have two IDE devices and a SATA hard drive. Quite WHY they need two IDE ports will probably never be explained, even though the machine was only three weeks old and now they want to replace the board... Sometimes it's just not worth asking.
Strange requests go with the terrority - "I got a computer, it's all screwed up, yes you can probably wipe it but I need all my data and I need all my programs." When asked as to what they do with the system the standard reply is they haven't a clue what they use to do anything. Couldn't even find out what they were doing - "bits and bobs". Apparently I'm supposed to know what they're doing with their computer.
The other strange request of the day was the computer user who wants a power supply simply for running a graphics card. It was a six year old Dell machine with unique wiring from the PSU. The user wanted to run a juice-hungry 9600 series graphics card (one of those that feeds from the six/eight pin connector) purely from a power supply on the outside of the case, and feed the rest of the system with the built-in PSU that's uniquelly wired on the PSU and the board that's non-standard.
For the unitiated most power supplies have a need for a minimum load, otherwise they'll either not work at all, work ineffectively or worse, burn themselves out. I refused to condone such behaviour, perhaps understandably.
Saturday, January 31, 2009
Saturday, January 24, 2009
Vocal Diagnosis
Diagnosing a computer over the telephone is pretty much not possible at the best of times when the person on the other end doesn't know how it's ended up in the state it has. Therefore even attempting to figure out why it's fell over is often fruitless, though the usual cause of the problem is that it sits between the keyboard and the chair.
Calling up somebody who works with computers and saying to them, "My computer has [symptoms], and what it was... [insert totally random concoction of completely irrelevant anecdotes that that has absolutely nothing to do with the state the computer's in at this moment in time]. What do I do?" will usually generate the response "Bring it in."
When was the last time you phoned up a garage and said, "My car won't start. What it was, like, I saw a dead bird on the by-pass, swerved to avoid it, like, nearly hit another car because I cor see jack shit out my near-side mirror as next door's kid hit it with his bloody football. So then after I went round the roundabout to go back and scoop it up to chuck it in the field, like, I saw Paul's red Ford Zetec coming down the road. You know Paul, from the Red Lion pub who bought the Zetec 'cos he wrapped his Toyota round the lamppost last Christmas? Anyway I later saw him down the pub, he was totally pissed out of his head and to cut a long story short, my car won't start. What do I do?"
The scary thing is, these people turn up with the PC under their arm, and proceed to tell exactly the same story again complete with a sheet of A4 paper with copious other issues with the computer that lead to more anecdotes that basically boil down to "the computer's infected with malware and viruses because your Norton ran out eighteen months ago and somebody's put Kazaa on it." Now if you'd said that on the phone you'd have probably had it back by now!
Calling up somebody who works with computers and saying to them, "My computer has [symptoms], and what it was... [insert totally random concoction of completely irrelevant anecdotes that that has absolutely nothing to do with the state the computer's in at this moment in time]. What do I do?" will usually generate the response "Bring it in."
When was the last time you phoned up a garage and said, "My car won't start. What it was, like, I saw a dead bird on the by-pass, swerved to avoid it, like, nearly hit another car because I cor see jack shit out my near-side mirror as next door's kid hit it with his bloody football. So then after I went round the roundabout to go back and scoop it up to chuck it in the field, like, I saw Paul's red Ford Zetec coming down the road. You know Paul, from the Red Lion pub who bought the Zetec 'cos he wrapped his Toyota round the lamppost last Christmas? Anyway I later saw him down the pub, he was totally pissed out of his head and to cut a long story short, my car won't start. What do I do?"
The scary thing is, these people turn up with the PC under their arm, and proceed to tell exactly the same story again complete with a sheet of A4 paper with copious other issues with the computer that lead to more anecdotes that basically boil down to "the computer's infected with malware and viruses because your Norton ran out eighteen months ago and somebody's put Kazaa on it." Now if you'd said that on the phone you'd have probably had it back by now!
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Passwords..
If you're going to put passwords on computers then leave them with computer technical folk, please tell them: a) it has a password, and b) what it is.
Windows passwords are easy to get rid of; boot passwords and what not are not. As intelligent as we may be we don't have time to perform dictionary-based attacks for something you should have told us before you went out the door.
You don't take your car to a garage and then walk off with the keys, do you? A more aggravating situation is the user who puts passwords on the Administrator account in Windows XP. Aside from the fact you only ever see this account in Safe Mode and if you're using said account the system's typically screwed anyway.
Windows passwords are easy to get rid of; boot passwords and what not are not. As intelligent as we may be we don't have time to perform dictionary-based attacks for something you should have told us before you went out the door.
You don't take your car to a garage and then walk off with the keys, do you? A more aggravating situation is the user who puts passwords on the Administrator account in Windows XP. Aside from the fact you only ever see this account in Safe Mode and if you're using said account the system's typically screwed anyway.
Sunday, January 18, 2009
No It's Not!
Come hither, and understand once and for all: Microsoft Word does not come with any version of Windows whatsoever. Windows does come with Wordpad (formally Write) which is effectively a cut-down version of Word.
Many exchanges often occur because people think Word is part of Windows. This situation has been perpetrated by the common trend over the last ten years by the big manufacturers to bundle Word (or increasingly Works) with a computer. When the system has to be wiped eighteen months later because somebody put Limewire on it and screwed up the recovery partition, said exchanges occur. It usually later transpires that the Word in question was only the 60 day trial anyway and it'll be some more money to replace it with one that doesn't time out in two months time.
Many exchanges often occur because people think Word is part of Windows. This situation has been perpetrated by the common trend over the last ten years by the big manufacturers to bundle Word (or increasingly Works) with a computer. When the system has to be wiped eighteen months later because somebody put Limewire on it and screwed up the recovery partition, said exchanges occur. It usually later transpires that the Word in question was only the 60 day trial anyway and it'll be some more money to replace it with one that doesn't time out in two months time.
Thursday, January 15, 2009
The Post-Purchase Situation...
One of the strangest situations that occurs in this field is the user who gives you money for a PC and then asks what you get for said amount of dosh. Would this have not been a better question to ask before they said "Okay, I'll order that then"?
When was the last time you went to a Ford garage, gave them £3,000 and then asked whether the car you've just bought has power steering or not?
The situation of "Have you Got...?" comes up regularly. For something small like an extra mouse for another computer, not a problem. When they just given you £200 for the budget computer and then ask if they can play World Of Warcraft on it.
When was the last time you went to a Ford garage, gave them £3,000 and then asked whether the car you've just bought has power steering or not?
The situation of "Have you Got...?" comes up regularly. For something small like an extra mouse for another computer, not a problem. When they just given you £200 for the budget computer and then ask if they can play World Of Warcraft on it.
Sometimes They Just Don't Mix...
On occasion a computer and a user do not gel. They will never gel, typically because the computer is smarter than the user.
It is a well-known fact of life amongst those work in the field of computer support than even the most intelligent person on the planet can sit in front of a computer and suddenly lose all grasp of logic and knowledge.
Some of these shall be explored at some point. Such as the user who downloads everything for nothing and then wonders why the computer takes all day to do anything.
It is a well-known fact of life amongst those work in the field of computer support than even the most intelligent person on the planet can sit in front of a computer and suddenly lose all grasp of logic and knowledge.
Some of these shall be explored at some point. Such as the user who downloads everything for nothing and then wonders why the computer takes all day to do anything.
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