I have been fixing and building computers for almost 20 years now. I have heard it all. The fix is usually easy and is caused by the user being mentally unfit to complete even the simplest of computing tasks.

I am usually called in to fix one specific problem. For example, I setup LOTS of wireless networks for people. I have arrived at a customers house to find a beautiful wireless router, just waiting to send its signals throughout the house, only to find out they don’t have a computer with a wireless card. When I cordially explain to them that they need to buy yet another piece of hardware to get the whole thing running, I often get a response like this, “That damn wireless thingy cost me $100. Now you are telling me I need to buy something else? I don’t want to spend anymore money.”

I also get a lot of, “My computer is running slow.” In this case I usually find they have filled their hard-drive to maximum capacity or have 30 viruses on their computer. What people don’t understand, especially older people, is that their 7-year old computer was already slow and due to this fact, it will take me that much longer to fix. I charge by the hour. They get pissed.

Another time, I set up a wired network for a small business. They wanted to spend VERY little money and wanted me to do everything I could to use the hardware and software they already had in place. I had an internet connection, an old 10MBit router with 4 ethernet ports, a lot of ethernet cable and 3 computers - two of which still ran Windows 98 - to work with. Easy enough, right? They just wanted printer sharing and the ability to share a few files now and again. I set up the network (with no central server to speak of) using Windows Workgroups. I warned them that in an environment that mixed XP, Windows 2000, and Windows 98 should work in theory, but they might not “talk” to each other all the time. I get it all setup and working properly. I get a call a few days later saying that they can’t print from any computer and the internet isn’t working. I went in to see what was going on and found myself facing a fairly pissed of customer. I checked things out and informed him that his router had bit the dust. He strongly disagreed with me and said he was just going to call the internet company to come check it out. I called a few days after for a follow up and he informed me that the internet company had said his internet connection was fine but his router was no longer working and he needed a new one. They also recommended upgrading his computers so they would be fully inter-operable with each other. The next week he had be configuring a new server and a couple new desktops. Funny how things work sometimes.

My point in all of this rambling: if you want your shit fixed right, pull your pocket book out of your ass and listen to me!

Filed under: Internet, Lessons Learned, Rants, Tech