what kinds of computer questions do you still get?

[tnf]

I'm sure there are several of us here who are the go-to tech support person for all sorts of friends, family, and others. I've got one guy who I've probably spent over 10 hours with in the last 3 years, showing him everything from burning cd's to organizing files, to installing memory, etc. etc. etc.

Todays call: Now, how in the world can I get this resume I saved on my desktop computer over to my laptop?

Another friend called because his machine was so overrun with pop-up ads he couldn't use it (he had those ones that pop up when the computer is on no matter whether you are browsing the web or not.)
What gets me about those type of questions is the lying people do to cover up how all the shit got on their machine, insisting that they "only use it for email, Word, and maybe checking the news or sports websites." Nobody will ever admit what their surfing or download habits really are.

what are some of the gems that you've had to take care of for people?

And does anyone else notice that when you do stop by someone's house to help them out, something that should take 15 minutes invariably ends up taking 3 or more hours?

[SOAPboy]

ROFL!

My fav is still "My computer runs all slow and i dont know why! I only ever check my email."

Run adaware, finds all kinds of porn cookies and shit.

[AmIdYfReAk]

"i'm looking to buy a new computer... but what happened to the pentium?!?! they are the best right?"

[Captain]

Friend: "Hey I just bought a new computer from Dell and the guy said it was meant for gaming."
Me: "What kind of video card?"
Friend: "Radeon."

[tnf]

ROFL!

My fav is still "My computer runs all slow and i dont know why! I only ever check my email."

Run adaware, finds all kinds of porn cookies and shit.

Yea, funny you mention that because that was part of this mornings call as well. But the reason he gave for it running slow is that he took it down and moved it to another room because they were painting. WHen he plugged all the cables back in, everything went really really slow.

I can't tell you how many times I've cleaned this guys computer from spyware, trojans, et al. And each time I explain to them that they can't go downloading every free screesaver they see or clicking on those ads that pop up asking if you 'want to remove spyware.' But every time I go back, the damn thing is completely bogged down with shit...they'll have 40 or more items in their startup...you know the drill.

[AmIdYfReAk]

Those are by far my favourite.

[seremtan]

my old boss: "where's my # key?"

what bugs me is being asked how to do the same fucking thing over and over, usually by people who consider such skills beneath them, yet find they need them anyway to do their job :icon8:

[bitWISE]

My latest computer guy inquiries are:

"I just got back from vacation and my computer doesn't work"
-Most likely a blown Gateway PSU after inspection.

"My computer goes into sleep mode all the time"
-PC was going over 65C and shutting down. Compressed air and an 80mm case fan brought temps back to 44C.

"I need to make a program that stores competitors in my martial arts tournaments and prints assignments based on a wide variety of criteria"
-Use Access
"I don't know how. What else?"
-PHP front-end with a MySQL back-end
"I have no idea what you're talking about"
-Buy a book on Access or pay me to write a custom program. Those are your options...
"This is much harder than I expected..."

[Mat Linnett]

my old boss: "where's my # key?"

what bugs me is being asked how to do the same fucking thing over and over, usually by people who consider such skills beneath them, yet find they need them anyway to do their job :icon8:

Oh Christ, you don't work as support for a creative industry too do you?
The bane of my life are people like this; primadonna movie editors working on Holywood blockbusters, yet phone up asking why they can't see their media, only for you to point out they haven't turned their hard disks on.
Or why can't they see the output of their computer on their client video monitor?
Tried pressing a different source button?
I actually got called out on a site visit for that one a couple of weeks back. Some guy who owns his own broadcast company, is renowned as a hot shit offline editor, yet can't figure out that his deck and edit suite are on different channels on his broadcast monitor :E

The ones that REALLY crack me up are the idiots who are working on high def projects using multiple terabytes of storage who ring up complaining about crashes and poor performance only for you to discover that they've only got 124MB left on their storage

[GONNAFISTYA]

"Where's the any key?"

[^misantropia^]

The best way I've found to stop people from thinking you're the ultimate free resource is to say "$85 per hour, 2 hr minimum"

A tad too steep of an hourly rate perhaps, but it does indeed scare away the people that see you as free tech support. Though things might get nasty when said people are your in-laws and your girlfriend overhears you...

[^misantropia^]

On a side note: I'm a Linux developer and I've noticed that telling people you don't use Windows makes the number of support calls drop dramatically.

[plained]

i never ever bother, yea i can fix stuff super fast abolute.

ive found lamas would rather listen to some know-it-all pontifacate how superior they are then and an anticlimatic 2 sec fix from me

[FragaGeddon]

http://www.rinkworks.com/stupid/

[Kills On Site]

And does anyone else notice that when you do stop by someone's house to help them out, something that should take 15 minutes invariably ends up taking 3 or more hours?

Yes, yes I have. Mainly because the problem is that the computer is slow and you need to fix that, that takes a long time. I've run into a hardware problem that required quite a few reboots and long installs. Basically the amount of work I do compared to how long it takes the computer to do it is the main multiplier I've found. I do love the under 5 minute fixes, switch something on, change the input on the projector, remove the "extend desktop onto second monitor" on a single monitor system.

The one thing that truly gets on my nerves is when people want answers over the phone, I hate it when people want that.

[andyman]

"I need to make a program that stores competitors in my martial arts tournaments and prints assignments based on a wide variety of criteria"
-Use Access
"I don't know how. What else?"
-PHP front-end with a MySQL back-end
"I have no idea what you're talking about"
-Buy a book on Access or pay me to write a custom program. Those are your options...
"This is much harder than I expected..."

"what question do i have to ask that will make you do this for me?"

that's when you say bow to your sensei... BOW TO YOUR SENSEI

[Berserker]

And does anyone else notice that when you do stop by someone's house to help them out, something that should take 15 minutes invariably ends up taking 3 or more hours?

Every Damn Time

[andyman]

i hate when people ask how i download all my movies and music and what not. It's like... if you have to ask then you'll never know.


bt and newsservers btw mostly the newsservers, they are so fast

[ajerara]

"what bugs me is being asked how to do the same fucking thing over and over, usually by people who consider such skills beneath them, yet find they need them anyway to do their job"

never were truer words said.

[Giraffe }{unter]

I used to do it all the time for anyone who asked, untill it happened...

I spent about 10 hour working on my Boss's friend's computer. I then emailed him what was wrong and ways to prevent said wrongs from happening again.

10 hours and about an hour writing about the inner workings of his PC.

He had someone pick it up. never emailed back... never called

After that I started telling people I charge $75 an hour 2 hour minimum for house calls.

Now no one bugs me. I still help family and close friends with no problem.

2 years later my boss's friend emailed me. I never replied...

[Dean McLean]

I installed ubuntu on my friend's computer.

[brisk]

Yes. The problem with being computer literate is everyone thinks you're a free resource to solve 101 of their problems. My uncle is the worst... it started off with some simple help regarding folder structure or something daft and now hes literally ringing every week with some sort of PC problem he wants me to fix. Even worse, when you (sucessfully) help one person, they insist on letting everyone else know that you are capable of fixing their problems.

Jesus, I really hate computers. And family. Especially family.

[FragaGeddon]

Just start charging him. Maybe it'll be $50 an hour for family and friends. $85 for any other moron. With the standard 2 hour minimum.

[tnf]

once I helped a lady who had a virus (can't remember which one) on her work laptop. Removing it was a bitch as I remember (this was about 8 years ago). i also had to recover some really important electronic rolodex type of a deal for her off of a drive that had gone tits up. She was going to pay me through her work, once I got it done she called her boss and told him how screwed they would have been had it not gotten fixed and he told her to cut me a check for $500. So that was nice for a couple hours work.

But those ones are few and far between (about 8 years far between).

[eepberries]

My dad asked me a few nights ago if I could rip a tape or two onto the computer and burn it onto CDs for a friend of his. I agreed, since one or two tapes didn't sound too bad. So just yesterday I get 7 fucking tapes to rip in their entirety and it needs to be done by wednesday . I would have outright refused to do it if it wasn't for the fact that I'd already said I would do it and that it was for somebody's funeral.