Buttons and Switches

Monitors do not power on a computer. If a technician asks you to press the Reset button on the computer case, please do not start pressing buttons on the monitor and asking whether V-Setting or Clock or "color settings - warm, cool or custom" will do the same thing because it won't. Believe me, I've tried.

Obvious exceptions to this rule include those Sony/Advent units where everything is built-in to a huge monitor (very nice but a pain in the arse to fix when they break) and branded computers that don't have reset switches. Reset switches are probably a computer user's best friend since Windows does tend to show you a blue screen for no apparent reason whatsoever. Yet Dell must get support calls saying "I pressed Reset and it started coming on again" which may explain why they took the reset buttons off their cases.

One of the most ugliest phrases you hear is when customers use the phrase "coming on". How can a computer be "coming on"? Either it's on or it isn't, or your computer is flirting with you. If your computer is flirting with you (or vice versa) something is very wrong somewhere.