Fatal Error: Your PC’s down. Now what?
Here are some first steps to pull yourself out of the blue-screen blues.
"The computer and I don’t like each other," Marcia C. Brier says, "and it makes me anxious when it doesn’t work." SirPopper: "I didn’t know what a B.I.O.S. is I thought how can this be alive in the computer." Braintrain!
News link: here
86 Responses
12.10.2008
It took him 3 hours to fix a simple ***** problem!!! Yeah, sure!
12.10.2008
Most people see PCs in the same way most of us see the motor car.They require, and indeed, expect, it to “just work”.When it doesn’t, it’s an inconvenience, at best, and they arrange for the appropriate mechanic to fix it.Beyond normal operation, they’re simply not interested in the maintenance aspect, be that changing oil, or flushing Temp folders.That’s what us “computer guys” are for.
12.10.2008
Yup. as I said in an earlier post, we are glorified janitors. If your boss backs up the toilet, he doesn’t go looking for a plunger or try to learn how to snake out the pipes. He tells someone to go fix it.And for the same reasons you say, we are never going to see a widespread change from the typical Windows PC we see today. The business world will never go to widespread use of Macs or Linux for the same reason that someone who has never driven anything but a Model T can get into a modern automobile and – generally – know how to operate it. Most people don’t want or care to learn something new or learn about what they are doing, they want it to work and be familiar.It’s taken ten to twenty years of widespread PC use for people to get to this point. A major change, even to a new OS, takes a massive amount of time and capital. If it’s not broke, don’t fix it.But as for people not wanting to learn about computers, If you work in IT, be glad of that. It’s job security.
12.10.2008
@vertigo RE: ” we are never going to see a widespread change from the typical Windows PC we see today. The business world will never go to widespread use of Macs or Linux for the same reason that someone who has never driven anything but a Model T can get into a modern automobile and – generally – know how to operate it. …But as for people not wanting to learn about computers, If you work in IT, be glad of that. It’s job security. “Well said, and damn if that cranky old Model T Windows ain’t got a lick of new paint over that rusty old body…
12.10.2008
I build my own PC. No blue screens and if I do get them, which is rare, it’s up and running the next day
12.10.2008
“…No blue screens and if I do get them, which is rare…”Huh?
12.10.2008
I build my own PCs as well. I rarely get blue screens, but when I do, it’s almost always related to a screwed up driver update or something. But they’re easily fixable.
12.10.2008
Actual call from someone very high up in my company’s accounting department.”I am in this excel sheet made by my predecessor and when I click on this one cell the number goes away and is replaced by a long sentence. Did she do something I should tell HR about?”Hand to Heart the women had been an accountant for 15 years and had never used an Excel Formula.
12.10.2008
This is why I laugh when Mac fanboys talk about how the Mac is going to go mainstream.It’s hard enough to get people to learn the basics of using a PC. Anyone who thinks businesses are going to invest the time and money to train their employees to use an entirely different interface is crazy. Even if Macs / Linux were both a better technical and economical IT solution, PCs that look and work like Windows 95 will be mainstream until everyone born prior to 1980 has retired.And of course, the next comment is about how a Mac is a ‘better’ IT solution for a business.
12.10.2008
A Mac is a better IT solution for a business.
12.10.2008
Until the people writing the checks notice the price tag.
12.10.2008
@thenativeraverOr notice that most of your software won’t install…or that most of your staff is only familiar with Windows.
12.10.2008
TCO
12.10.2008
I’ll tell you what to do:Turn it off and pay the $50/hr or whatever for a professional who knows what they’re doing (as in, not Geek Squad) to fix it for you. Meanwhile, step away from the computer, go outside and enjoy the real world for a while.What? You don’t have the hundred or two to fix it? Too bad… should’ve thought about that earlier before you bought into the gimmick that Windows PCs are cheaper than Macs. “cost” = TCO, not what you pay to take it home from the store.
12.10.2008
I was with ya right till ya went off the Apple Fanboy deep end… here’s one of the more frequent situations I’ve encountered:Customer – “Yeah, my daughter convinced me to get a Mac for my business laptop, but now my files won’t load anymore.”Tech – “Most likely, you will need to install the software on the computer first.”Customer – “Oh, well, they don’t have a version for Apple”Tech – “Well, you can pickup Parallels or Bootcamp, but you will still have to have a legitimate Windows key to install XP, and that’s ~$130″Cust – “I’m not sure what you mean, I thought the idea was to get away from Windows?”Tech – “Generally that is the idea, but the software you use does not support Apple, so you will have to use this work around”Cust – “So, it will cost me $130 plus your hourly labor rate to set it up, then I still could issues with the label-printer it uses?”Tech – “Yep”Cust – “So, instead of spending $800 on the PC you recommended, I paid $1,800 for this Apple and I now have to spend another several hundred dollars just to be able to do my work?!”Tech – “Yep”Cust – “Ok, well then what about my Adobe CS3 Suite that I paid $1k+ for?”Tech – “You’ll have to purchase a side-grade for it, but that’s only if you’re getting the same version and they just released CS4 so you’ll just have to purchase at the upgrade price and specify you want the Mac version”Cust – “But that’s $600 and it was working fine, I wasn’t even going to upgrade it!”Tech – “Yeah, it sucks.”
12.10.2008
Idiot customer should not be allowed to own either!
12.10.2008
“Doing it yourself is not a bad strategy. The vast majority of small-business IT needs are similar to those of individual PC users, says Derek Meister, a service agent at Geek Squad”FAIL FAIL FAIL FAIL FAIL
12.10.2008
Apparently a Geek Squad employee aware of his own organization’s incompetence, telling everyone that even if you don’t know what you’re doing, it’s still better than Geek Squad.
12.10.2008
Do what I did. Buy a Mac.And the bury button is the red one—->
12.10.2008
I hate Geek Squad!They won’t hire me, which probably colors my perception of them as an enemy, because even though I meet all their qualifications, etc…and their service clearly needs improvement…They won’t hire me. That said if the economy wasn’t in such a bad state, I wouldn’t even stoop to Geek Squad, but alas, it is a job. (A job that apparently doesn’t like good, old fashioned, honest work, and thus will not hire me.)One time we caught them stealing porn off of a computer, was funny. The other time, they told us we needed to buy a new “geek squad certified” hard disk drive, or the computer wouldn’t work again. I then requested they hand it back to me, I inserted the boot CD I had with me, repaired the windows boot loader/mbr thing (which had intentionally been destroyed by my friend), and booted the computer normally. The guy almost lost it, and started desperately trying to make some excuse about it failing later, etc etc… it was endlessly sad and funny to watch. I only wish we had brought a video camera.
12.10.2008
If you know so much about fixing computers, why would you have them over in the first place!?!
12.10.2008
Zing!also : @pyromaster114 RE: ” I hate Geek Squad!They won’t hire me, which probably colors my perception of them as an enemy, because even though I meet all their qualifications, etc.. ” You need to be over the age of 14.
12.10.2008
tl;dr
12.10.2008
So you have all day to jack Geek Squad around.
12.10.2008
First let’s start with the fact that no self-respecting techie would even consider working at/for Geek Squad… hell I’d sooner deliver pizzas.Second, if you’re handy with computers, there’s no reason you should even have your machines being worked on BY those schmucks. I could *maybe* understand a warranty issue, but once again a TRUE geek builds their own machine and handles his/her own tech support.Third – “Stealing Pr0n” – hate to tell you this but if you’re dumb enough to leave pr0n on a computer that you take in to be worked on, odds are it’s going to be copied off. Triple the chance if it’s embarrasing webcam footage of you and/or a g/f. Mutliply that by 10 if you’re dumb enough to leave it in My Pictures. Call it wrong, call it ‘theft’ but at the end of the you should be a little smarter than that.Fourth – Using a Boot CD does *NOT* mean they were wrong about the Hard Drive, if anything it only reinforces the fact that the Hard Drive was the problem.Fifth – It helps your point if you actually KNOW what you’re talking about, and even moreso when you’re trying to get help because we techs don’t tolerate stupid.
12.10.2008
A lady came into my workplace once, telling me the little red light on her dash had been on all day. She had been driving around with the OIL PRESSURE light on. If you didn’t know, this is potentially fatal for a car, low oil pressure will destroy engine (bearings) in no time.My point: Very few people care or know how the equipment and machinery they use everyday actually works. That’s why we have specialists – mechanics for cars, IT guys for computers. Articles like this are ultimately pointless, except in that experts can point and laugh.
12.10.2008
I would suggest getting a Mac but in the current economic climate I am recommending a pen and paper.
12.10.2008
From page 2:Vacuuming out the dust — with a household vacuum. This corrupts the stored data. Use a can of compressed air instead. What?Household vacuum’s corrupt data! Nooooooo!
12.10.2008
Household vacuums generate a large amount of static electricity. Static electricity can cause all kinds of problems for delicate electronics – shorting them out or…corrupting data.Overly simplified – not incorrect.
12.10.2008
Install Linux
12.10.2008
Now what? That’s easy, buy a Mac. Let the flames begin.
12.10.2008
Waiting for the inevitable “switch to mac” comment
12.10.2008
I can’t remember the last time I got a blue screen….Running Vista on a ***** HP…
12.10.2008
One print page: computerworld.com/action/article.do?com …
12.10.2008
I really like all the Buy a Mac comments. I fix macs for a living, and the more they sell the more money I make. Because they break as much as any other computer.Except people get pissed off when they break, because they are supposed to Just Work.A customer was mad at how much it cost to replace a hard drive on his macbook pro, until i showed him it took over 30 screws to replace it versus 3 on a regular macbook, or 1 on his old Thinkpad