cowboys

[zak_swan]

you will have all seen tv program's about rouge builders doing bad jobs and charging too much.
what about rogue "pc engineers" or whatever they call themselves
i'm talkin about when someone that does'nt have a clue about pc's and it slows right down or won't start, so they phone up number in paper guy takes it away and "fixes it"
i'm not an expert on pc's by any stretch of the imagination but in the last few months ppl i kind of know eg girlfriends pal, have had trouble with there pc's they phone said number up guy takes it away and what do they do?
fix it? no they format the HDD and install window then charge £50!
they don't even ask if it's ok to do so.
i spent a few hours today updating windows, installing firewall anti virus etc on her pals pc today.
it just bugs me that these f*ckin idiots do'nt even try to fix problems on the pc's they probably could'nt anyway, they just get pc format hard drive stick windows back in and charge £50.
no doubt there is a lot of decent "pc engineers" out there who know what their doing and do a good job but how many cowboys are out there?
anyway had too much beer as usual and a rare treat of some grass so bye bye for now.

[808smokey]

a lot of times people don't know what's "wrong" with the computer when they bring it to me. Most of them have so much spyware and viruses that it would take way too much time to get it all off. Me personally, I take all the important stuff (MP3s, pics, docs, emails, etc.) save it to cd-rom then fromat the computer and give it a fresh install. Then copy the cd-rom back to the hard drive. It's more of a gaurantee on my end, that way I know it's in good working order when I give it back to the customer. Then they can't say I didn't fix it. If they get mad because the online casinos are gone or all the porn sites have been deleted then the will call me back in a few months to have me fix it again when they see how they caused the problem. I had one guy say It's been hijacked by the casino sites. When you booted it up it went straight to a VGA mode slot machine. Even CTRL-ALT-DEL wouldn't kill it.

[Jayhawk]

I'm afraid I'm in the middle on this one. I have my own little service company (mostly for tax reasons) and in the last couple of week have had 15 service calls on virus / spyware infested machines. In a couple of cases the customers have said "blow everything away" and start over but most of the time they call me because some "service company" has wanted to reformat and start over. Not opposed to that approach but RARELY do they actually backup EVERYTHING. Usually the mail files and address book, favorites, etc. get left out.

From a time perspective, backing up everything, installing XP and any updates, drivers, printer software, and reloading the data would take me far longer than just cleaning up the viruses and spyware along with a mini-tuneup. At least when I leave they AVG, Ad-Aware, and Spybot on their machines.

[thecoalman]

no they format the HDD and install window then charge £50!
they don't even ask if it's ok to do so.
.

Not sure is that pounds? Euro? 50 Eoros = about $60.00 U.S., sounds reasonable to me. If I was charging for that ,that's about what it would be. If they reinstall without telling you that all your data is going to be deleted that's another story. That's wrong in so many ways its not even funny. Maybe you should go in the computer reinstall business, just remember first you need to invest in a shop, electricity, printing, computers, gas, insurance, advertising, phone....... Running a business is not cheap, at least if you want to do it right.

[808smokey]

From a time perspective, backing up everything, installing XP and any updates, drivers, printer software, and reloading the data would take me far longer than just cleaning up the viruses and spyware along with a mini-tuneup. At least when I leave they AVG, Ad-Aware, and Spybot on their machines.

That's not always true. I've "cleaned" several computers but the registry is still all screwed up from the viruses/spyware and just creates more problems down the road. Start to finish takes about 2 hours (actual time using computer, 15 minutes) The rest is reloading/reformatting. Many computers I've seen never had defrag run on them or scandisk or anything really. I used to to install norton AV and adaware and let those run and it would take upwards of 6 hours to finish the scans.

[Jayhawk]

Agreed 808Smokey that a clean install is always the better way to avoid future problems. Normally I try to work "in the home" but if it's real bad and requires a reinstall, I usually won't unless they give me the machine so I can work in my lab. That way I can do other things while the "mindless" work goes on. Backing up over the LAN or to another hard drive is a lot faster and easier on my workbench than in the customers home. A few folks won't give the machine up, and it amazes me the number of people that don't have their OS discs, Office discs, etc.

[flaninacupboard]

you don't know the difference between € and £ ?

£50 is $94.5

[thecoalman]

you don't know the difference between € and £ ?

£50 is $94.5

Nope just the most important one $.

[offline]

you don't know the difference between € and £ ?

£50 is $94.5

Nope just the most important one $.

Hey thecoalman,

I have some important $ you can have in exchange for crappy £.
Give me £100,000 and I will happily give you U.S. $100,000

[thecoalman]

I was in Canada a few months back, everytime I'd look at the price on something I'd think "damn that's expensive". Kept forgetting it was in Canadian money.

[flaninacupboard]

you don't know the difference between € and £ ?

£50 is $94.5

Nope just the most important one $.

Hey thecoalman,

I have some important $ you can have in exchange for crappy £.
Give me £100,000 and I will happily give you U.S. $100,000

good deal. wonder how many americans it would work on?