Worst Explanation From Tech Support?

Disgruntled-with-Tech-Support asks: "Let's face it: At some point or another, we've had to deal with some form of tech support. Quite often, it's a hit-or-miss experience depending on the level of support required. Occasionally, strange, bizarre, or nonsensical explanations result from the problems reported, such as this one: I had just had DSL installed, only to find it much slower than the 56K line I was looking to get rid of. On calling the provider, I was told (by someone who likely reading off cue cards) to visit one of their internal websites for measuring bandwidth. While there, I observed that they had both bytes per second and bits per second listed, and that the number of bytes/sec != bits/sec * 8, rather a factor around 13 or 14. I pointed this out as a possible problem, and the guy's reasoning: 'Uh, it looks like the bytes are getting through to you ok, but the bits are getting stuck someplace.' What was your worst explanation from tech support?"

Comments

You said it...

[Raindance]

He *was* way off... it was the bytes getting stuck, not the bits!

Re:You said it...

[StanMarsh]

I had a cdrom going bad on a Dell that I had decided to put Linux on. I saw that the cdrom was totally gone when I couldn't boot from it. I swapped out with another machine and started installing RH9 and called Dell. I told him that I needed a new cdrom sent out because this one was bad. He asked in his Indian-accented english how I knew that it was the cdrom. I told him the computer wouldn't boot from that one but would from another cdrom. He asked me which version of Windows I had. I told him that the hard drive had been wiped for my Linux install. He told me to go to dell.com and download a utility to run on it. I said there is no OS, and even when an OS is on it, you're win32 app won't work. He said to right-click My Computer and go to Properties... I said, HEY there's no OS, no Windows, no nothing. He finally got some of the point and asked how could I possibly know that the cdrom didn't work if the computer didn't have an OS. I said that I know. He then said I probably need to update my drivers. I finally gave the phone to my boss (luckily a native of India) and had him cuss the tech support guy in Hindu. The cdrom arrived the next day.

Re:You said it...

[jpu8086]

"had him cuss the tech support guy in Hindu"

Thank god it wasn't me, I would have cussed him out in Christianity.

Hindi is the language. Hindu is the religion.

Re:You said it...

[LC Gundo]

From: ZED
To: ARMANDO
Date: Thursday - May 6, 2004 7:46 AM
Subject: Re: Request #90210 has been closed.

ARMANDO-

You acutally have 228MB available space you total space is 446MB ? Long live Google I'd be lost without it.

Zed

>>> ARMANDO 05/05/04 05:52PM >>>
Zed, is it true that 228MB is allocated to P:\Albumen and if we have about 210MB stored, there is about 18MB free space?

In other words,

What is the total capacity of P:\Albumen?

How much is stored on P:\Albumen? (that I think I know--currently about 213MB is stored on P:\Albumen)

How much free space do I have on P:\Albumen?

I apologize for being so dense. All this elite technical stuff is so baffling.

BTW: I've checked the Google calculator, and yes, I had my goggles on when I checked the Google calculator so I think I was able to see all the hidden thing is.

>>> HELP DESK 05/05/04 05:13PM >>>
220 799 167 bytes = 210.570495 megabytes
15 608 kilobytes = 15.2421875 megabytes

If you go to Goggle and enter in the search "xxx kb =" it will give you the answer. It's called Goggle Calculator, one of the many hidden thing is Goggle.

Right now you have 228 544 kilobits = 27.8984375 megabytes or almost 30MB's

>>> ARMANDO 05/05/04 03:16PM >>>
Currently, P:\Albumen properties shows 210MB (220,799,167 bytes), so I guess that means my current storage in Kilobytes is 215,624, right?

That means I have about 15,608 Kilobytes of free space, which is about 15.24MB, right?

I must not be figuring this right, because you just gave us 30MB more disk space and I just deleted a whole bunch of files, but by my reckoning we've ended up with only half as much free space as you just gave us.

Please tell me how much free space we have in Kilobytes.

Thank you.

>>> HELP DESK 05/05/04 02:19PM >>>
Right now it's at 231232KB's per Novell

>>> ARMANDO 05/05/04 10:16AM >>>
I've archived a bunch of old files and have gotten our file storage down to 209 MB in ...Share/Albumen.

Could you let me know how much disk space is currently allocated to this directory?

I'll try to keep the amount of files we have stored there under the allocated amount.

Thank you.

>>> <HELP DESK> 05/04/04 04:16PM >>>
Dear LOUISE,

Your request has been closed. The following is the resolution.
Added 30MB more space

For details or to reopen it, go to
http://helpdesk/hd/index.ssp?ticket_id=90210&u ser_id=LOUISE

IT - Acme Carnival Help Desk

Re:You said it...

[Anonymous Coward]

Only the "evil" bits get stuck.

--There are only 10 types of people in the world; those who can read binary and those who can't.

Re:You said it...

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe he accidentally pressed 'u' instead of 'i', they are right next to each other. (On Big American Keyboard.)

Re:You said it...

[Graspee_Leemoor]

"He told me to go to dell"

You should have told him to sco fuck himself.

graspee

Re:You said it...

[tarunthegreat2]

He couldn't fuck anything if he tried - He was Micro$oft.

Re:You said it...

[The Evil Couch]

what are you talking about? microsoft fucks people on a daily basis.

Re:You said it...

[macthulhu]

Canadians have real problems with pronunciation... When they say "ham", it comes out sounding like "bacon". C'mon, get with the program!

Re:You said it...

[egreB]

Maybe he accidentally pressed 'u' instead of 'i', they are right next to each other. (On Big American Keyboard.)
..though on the smaller american keyboards, the 'u' and 'i' button are far off one another. The medium-sized swedish ones don't even have and 'i' key.

Re:You said it...

[cosmo7]

Or it may have been the other way around.

It was, at least according to beardy weirdy Bryson. Aluminum was the original spelling and the British chose to make it sound more like other elements and call it Aluminium. In order to make their spelling stick, the British then colonised one quarter of the world.

Re:You said it...

[StanMarsh]

After having 20 responses tell me I'm an idiot, I decided that I may have said something incorrect. I asked my boss what language Indians speak, and he said Cherokee. So there, all of you were wrong, too! nah nah nah nah nah (My sincerest and most humble apologies to Indians, Hindus, and Cherokees everywhere.)

Re:You said it...

[ArsonSmith]

I see us like a keyboard baby, you and i are pressed next to each other. Ohh yea.

I work in tech support....

[Stir]

...and we have an error code we give our unfortunate *special* callers. We tell them they are experiencing an i-d-10-t issue but they should give it time and it might clear itself up.

Re:I work in tech support....

[i8a4re]

Hey, how about that, that's the same printer model number i give all those telemarketers that want to sell me toner.

Re:I work in tech support....

[briandk]

Mine was sometimes the DFU drive or line was down...but that it would be back up soon, it always worked, I tried the I-d-10-t but someone caught it..that was fun explaining that to my boss.

Re:I work in tech support....

[Anonymous Coward]

I went to buy an ethernet hub and was asked if I wanted a 1 or 2 port hub. Still wondering what I would talk to with a 1 port hub.

Re:I work in tech support....

[Brandybuck]

I would have asked for the one port hub just to see what they would have sold you...

Re:I work in tech support....

[Nate Eldredge]

And what will a 2 port hub do for you that a wire won't?

Re:I work in tech support....

[Sycraft-fu]

They are more commmonly called repeaters, but they do exist. They regenerate the signal to allow a longer run. Much like you can find a two port switch. Usually they are called a bridge and are used for media conversion or monitoring (and are quire rare these days) but they are really 2-port switches.

A 1-port on the other hand...

Re:I work in tech support....

[Anonymous Coward]

My personal favorite was informing a customer that his problem was due to a negative value between interfaces E.A.R. 0 and E.A.R. 1.

Re:I work in tech support....

[jrockway]

I like PICNIC better myself. Problem in chair, not in computer :)

Re:I work in tech support....

[byolinux]

We had Customers Using NTs.

Very amusing when we came to print out the end of year support logs, and it shows "532 calls from CUNTs"

Worst Explanation?

[Rupert]

The one they won't give you unless you cough up $25.95+tax.

Re:Worst Explanation?

[nukey56]

How is that in any way bad? Mechanics charge upwards of $50 just to take a look at your car to see what's wrong, and this has been standard industry practice for a long period of time.

If companies didn't charge you for technical support, you'd wind up paying more up front for a support contract (or more for a product with free technical support) and the cost would even out in the end. I deal with this argument all day long, and it simply does not hold up.

Re:Worst Explanation?

[bogie]

"Mechanics charge upwards of $50 just to take a look at your car to see what's wrong, and this has been standard industry practice for a long period of time."

No they don't. Any Mechanic I've even seen will look at a car for Free and try to tell you what's wrong. If its something which requires hours of diagnosing then yes they will usually charge a fee but its by no means automatic. I've been taking cars to dealers and private mechanics for estimates and second estimateas for years and I've only been charged a few times.

If tech support worked that way they would at least listen to your problem for Free and notify you if a quick fix is available. I'm not against charging for tech support if a problem involved lots of trouble shooting and hand holding on the Software makers part, but they should be making a determination if that's really necessary before they start charging you money or taking your credit card number. Asking for the card up front is just a scare tatic to try to get consumers to not call in. Personally I don't care for the pratice.

Re:Worst Explanation?

[DustinB]

Is that something like my cable internet company saying they wouldn't be able to fix my internet that they ACCIDENTLY unhooked until six days from now unless I purchased their cable TV package to expedite my support?

Re:Worst Explanation?

[nukey56]

Any Mechanic I've even seen will look at a car for Free and try to tell you what's wrong. ... I've been taking cars to dealers and private mechanics for estimates and second estimateas for years and I've only been charged a few times.

There's a self-defeating statment if I've ever seen one. Regardless, a quick search reveals that many mechanic services do indeed bill for diagnostics. Those who don't either pay their technicians less or charge you a higher hourly rate. The general reason why diagnositc fees are either all or nothing is because it is common to spend differing amounts of time diagnosing the same symptoms. Even a doctor will tell you that (who do, in fact, charge for s/office visits/diagnostic fees/).

Asking for the card up front is just a scare tatic to try to get consumers to not call in.

Seeing that technical support (the type in question) is fee-based, call centers are paid by customers. So, it's only logical that if a customer is unwilling to pay, they will be deterred from speaking to a CSR. Additionally, more supervisor-escalations are generated by asking for billing information at the beginning of a call when compared to in the middle of the call. The customer has already invested x amount of time into an issue, and then finding out they need to pay for a fix is not what they want to hear.

The system might not be perfect, but it is set up for a reason. Most companies strive to break-even in their customer service departments, so cost-cutting through tactics like this is merely a way of life. Otherwise, you'd get more outsourcing, crappier customer service, and a buttload of other problems associated with under-funded agencies. Just look at the PTO.

Re:Worst Explanation?

[Anonymous Coward]

Not exactly on tech support... but flying out of La Guardia, after sitting on the tarmac for 45 minutes without moving we were told over the loud speakers that we were being delayed because the plane was too big. I don't know what they did to make the plane smaller, but we took off 25 minutes later.

Re:Worst Explanation?

[Lord_Dweomer]

No kidding. I have a HP digital camera (it was a gift). I lost the software CD for it, and when I went to the website, I saw that they had it available to purchase on CD only. Even the fucking drivers! I called and complained to tech support (in india) and she just kept reading the script on loop. When I asked to file a formal complaint, she said that there was no way to do this at all from her office. Fucking wonderful. They outsource to india, and then prevent you from filing a complaint when the service sucks.

Re:Worst Explanation?

[DunbarTheInept]

The difference is that the mechanic that's charging you to look at your car isn't the company that made your car. I see a large difference in ethics between these two practices:
1- Charge someone money to diagnose what is faulty with someone ELSE's product.
2- Charge someone money to diagnose what it faulty with your OWN product.

Re:Worst Explanation?

[vxvxvxvx]

I used to work as a grunt in a transmission shop and through that I've been to a good deal of different shops on business.

Standard at the shop I worked at was to only charge the fee when it was a bitchy customer or involved removing the transmission from the vehicle. Otherwise, a lot of diagnostic work was done free (You could argue it was made up for in what we charge for other services, but that's true for everything "free")

In my experience dealing with other shops, that's generally true of nearly the whole auto service industry. Take a look at their car, check for the obvious things, and if more extensive testing is needed you start charging the customer for it (letting them know before hand of course.)

Re:Worst Explanation?

[chimpo13]

My sister manages a large retail store. When someone calls to complain, the employee CANNOT hang up on them.

She uses that to her advantage when she calls other companies. Help lines, just like support lines, are motivated to get off the line as fast as possible. If you don't hang up, just keep repeating your question letting them answer it over and over. It makes the person answering the phone look bad because their call time increases. Usually, but not always, they'll go out of their way to get you off the phone.

Re:Worst Explanation?

[fucksl4shd0t]

There's a self-defeating statment if I've ever seen one. Regardless, a quick search reveals that many mechanic services do indeed bill for diagnostics. Those who don't either pay their technicians less or charge you a higher hourly rate. The general reason why diagnositc fees are either all or nothing is because it is common to spend differing amounts of time diagnosing the same symptoms. Even a doctor will tell you that (who do, in fact, charge for s/office visits/diagnostic fees/).

Well, a former professional mechanic (me) says different. 99% of problems people have with cars can be diagnosed in 5 minutes or less, usually less. Building a relationship with a customer is worth spending those 5 minutes working for *free* to diagnose their car. I can't even think of how many stupid GM AC pressure sensors I sold just because they always looked the same on the gauges, and it literally took 2 seconds to hook up the gauges.

IN some specific areas, like exhaust and brakes, the free-looky is standard practice.

Besides the dealer (you know, the greediest little fuck on the block), most mechanics will only charge for diagnostics when they can't tell within 3-5 minutes what's wrong. That's the rule of thumb generally applied, actually. In the meantime, though, *every* mechanic shop posts something somewhere that says "We charge *this whole ton of money* for diagnostics", knowing that 99% of their diagnostics will be done for free.

Think about it. You're a customer, and you see a sign that says "Pay us $60 to tell us why your car is fucked up" and the mechanic just walks out and does it without billing you. Now how do you feel? How much does it increase the likelihood that you'll buy from these people who are obviously dedicated to serving the customer rather than bleeding him?

Re:Worst Explanation?

[eliasen]

The one they won't give you unless you cough up $25.95+tax.

In a former consulting gig, the client had bought a component to connect to their LDAP server. I eventually discovered that it was corrupting memory badly, and called support. The head of their support department told me that although they gave free support for 30 days to anyone who downloaded the same software off the internet, we had to buy a support contract because we'd actually paid for the software. She even refused to tell me if there had been a newer release, or if this was a known problem unless we bought a service contract.

Call me petty and vindictive and small, but I'd post the name of the company... if only I remembered it! Nixon was smart to actually write down his enemies list.

Re:Worst Explanation?

[edremy]

Serious answer: they probably had a number of small planes in the queue and your plane would have caused too much wake turbulence for them. They could hold you and let a bunch of small guys take off, or let you go and hold up a half dozen planes.

Re:Worst Explanation?

[Geoff-with-a-G]

I have a similar experience:
We pulled out onto the tarmac and sat there for ten minutes. Then the Captain tells us that they found a piece of the plane is broken, but nobody knows what it does, so they're calling the manufacturer to find out if it's important. Half an hour later, they get the answer that it's not. We took off and landed fine.

Re:Worst Explanation?

[SirRuka]

That's the most likely answer, but another is taxiway restrictions. Not all taxiways are made to take every size and weight aircraft. They may be older or run next to buildings (You don't exactly want part of the wing sheared off by a wall.). Thus the plane would have needed to wait until a suitable taxi path was available before heading to the runway.

Re:Worst Explanation?

[MemoryAid]

I was on a flight that was carrying both cargo and personnel, and ended up having more cargo weight than planned, due to people bringing more than the pre-arranged weight limit of luggage. I got to hear the discussion about how the flight would be cancelled due to being overweight, or some of the cargo would be Fed-Exed to the destination. Eventually, we did board the plane with all the luggage.

Then, for about 10 minutes just prior to takeoff, the pilot informed us that he would be "checking something on the engines" for a few minutes. We then heard the engines spool up as he brought the plane to high power until he had burned enough fuel to take off safely. We used the whole runway on that takeoff....

Re:Worst Explanation?

[Dalcius]

I actually recommend Tight VNC as it's a bit faster than standard VNC and an extension (fork) of the original source IIRC. I use it here at work.

That said, if you're ISP tech support, getting a user to install a VNC client is not only painfully difficult, but a security risk as well. In the case of VNC coming with the ISP software, I'd actually be extremely ticked off (e.g. cancel my service) if a VNC client was installed with any ISP software I installed.

Cheers

Worst reply i've GIVEN....

[NeoSkandranon]

As a former tech i've had to make up some pretty lame ones for people who were too dim or uninterested enough to comprehend the real explanation.

Re:Worst reply i've GIVEN....

[DrEldarion]

Ah, the infamous PEBCAK and ID-10-T errors.

Re:Worst reply i've GIVEN....

[NeoSkandranon]

Yes I can say i've actually told a customer they had an ID10T problem
=D

While my boss was in the office.

She laughed.

Re:Worst reply i've GIVEN....

[MikeDawg]

I completely agree with this. I've worked tech support, and even POS (point-of-sale) support before. Often times, if some layman asks you what you did to fix the problem, I give them a non-sensical (to the layman) answer, just so they stop bothering me. I have also developed new words for cashiers, as taught to me from other techs to get people to comply to what you're doing.

For instance, you don't say: "We are going to reset/restart your unix server" you say: "We are going to bump your server" You don't say: "A backhoe dug up your local T-1 line, and now you're on dialup, credit authorizations are going to take longer" You say: "Please don't call me, call the credit authorization company" There are so many more, but I just can't think of any handy right now.

Key is, you have to dumb things down a bit so the average lay person doesn't take 45 minutes chatting about what could be the technicial difficulty.

Re:Worst reply i've GIVEN....

[Elwood P Dowd]

Woah.

I've worked tech support, and even POS (point-of-sale) support before.

and

"We are going to reset/restart your unix server"

You worked for SCO back when they sold a product, didn't you.

Re:Worst reply i've GIVEN....

[aquasheep]

Can I ask who was the one that perpetuated all of those hardware misconceptions?

Whoever decided to tell the uninformed masses that the hard drive is that large rectangular box on the ground should be shot.

Re:Worst reply i've GIVEN....

[MikeDawg]

Ouch. . .

Well, in defense, our Unix servers were (trying to remember) System 5, I think. . . Which SCO owns. . . But there were several contributing factors to having to reboot the servers. a) crappy server cases, not enough cooling b) crappy SCSI HDs, prone to fail in their RAID configuration c) We had shitty programmers, and there were so many programs running concurrently that our programmers wrote, its not easy to kill each one individually. d) Making the registers useless for about 5 minutes, because we hate the cashiers.

Re:Worst reply i've GIVEN....

[CRCulver]

Hate to be a grammer nazi, but I seem to recall that the CPU is actually the computer, and the white/black box surrounding it with little fan noises and drive bays coming out of it is the computer system. Amyone wanna confirm or deny this?

You have a point. In any event, the OP might not realise that in many European languages the box is called the "CPU" because it contains the basic necessities for the computer's functioning, even if the CPU strictly speaking is a barely-visible piece of silicon deep within.

Re:Worst reply i've GIVEN....

[irokitt]

"So click on the thang-a-ma-jig and that will open the dealy and then you can start the jobby".

Re:Worst reply i've GIVEN....

[red floyd]

System 5, I think. . . Which SCO owns.

Claims to own. Novell has other opinions.

Re:Worst reply i've GIVEN....

[s0l0m0n]

I once used an excuse straight out out the bastard operator from hell's excuse generator..

"Electromagnetic interference from solar flares, sir."

The best part?

It was true. They had a 100"+ UTP arial cable.. Dude asked me why he was having packet loss. That summer, the sun was kicking out lots of solar flares..

Re:Worst reply i've GIVEN....

[prockcore]

For instance, you don't say: "We are going to reset/restart your unix server" you say: "We are going to bump your server"

Back when my company was an ISP our mac tech support would do that. "My mac is acting funny" "hmm.. give it two bongs... no, make it three.. three bongs"

Suprisingly, most mac users understood what it was to give your machine a bong. (NVRAM fun)

Re:Worst reply i've GIVEN....

[Anonymous Coward]

....Me: Uh, yeah. That's why it's called "USB". It stands for "Unbelievable Speed Bus".

You @#$%^. I trusted you.

-The customer

Re:Worst reply i've GIVEN....

[petabyte]

Yeah, I had one of those from when I did tech support at the university. Working a 8 hour shift from 4pm to midnight on a thursday night. About 11 o'clock someone calls down and wanted to register their new computer for a connection before the weekend. This should be no problem, I just need to get her MAC address. Now mind though that I'd been up since 6 and had 2 exams that day. The conversation goes something like this:

Me: "Ok, you're going to want to right click on My Computer and click on where it says Properties at the bottom"
Her: " ... Right Click the Mouse where?"
Me: "Oh on the My Computer Icon on your desktop"
Her: "... Well where on my desktop - My mouse is on my desktop"

Now, I think she means her mouse cursor but she actually means the top of her desk. After I realize that I try to explain "No no, the computer's desktop ... like where the wallpaper is" which she thinks is the monitor as her wall is behind the monitor. It had been a really long day and I couldn't think of how to explain what the computer desktop was. It wasn't her fault, she had just never heard it put like that before. Anyway by this point the two of us are laughing at one another because we both sound completely clueless. Eventually her roommate pointed to the screen and we were all good. It was a nice laugh on a very long day.

She sounded cute too but you know ... I'd always just be the "Tech Support Dude" anyway ...

Re:Worst reply i've GIVEN....

[wvitXpert]

I worked help desk in one of my university's computer labs and had an old lady come up to the desk for help. So I go back to the computer with her and she explains what she is trying to do (access some class work online). I wasn't sure what problem she was having with this exactly until she started asking how I was moving "that thing" (curser) around on the screen to go to the different pages... That was a long day.

Re:Worst reply i've GIVEN....

[Anonymous Coward]

that's when you tell him that he has to keep scanning, because if the unbelievable speed bus goes under 50mph koonoo reeves gets killed.

Re:Worst reply i've GIVEN....

[Macgrrl]

I got into trouble a few years back for returning an item to a vendor with the fault description "fucked" written on it. The vendor stated that without a proper fault description they could not accept the item for refund or exchange.

Item was relabelled and sent back to them with the following fault description: Faulty Unit, Continuously Kills Electronic Devices.

Item was subsequently accepted for full refund

Re:Worst reply i've GIVEN....

[netsharc]

You have me intrigued, how do you get the MAC address through the System Properties? The only way I know how to do it involves typing "netstat" on the command prompt (which would have been easier to explain, I think)..

Re:Worst reply i've GIVEN....

[demi]

Wow, a hundred inches really is a long run. Was it also in danger of being crushed by a dwarf?

Re:Worst reply i've GIVEN....

[SlimFastForYou]

For the sake of answering your question...

(And for the sake of simplicity, let's just assume a Windows XP machine... maybe with the My Computer icon turned on because thats what he asked the user to do..)

Although start>run>cmd>ipconfig /all is probably the easiest way to go you could technically get the MAC address starting his way. However for such a clueless user, the steps to take are way too many.

For example, on an XP machine:
Start
Right-click My Computer
Properties
Hardware Tab
Device Manager
Expand Network Adapters
Right-click your network adapter
Properties
Advanced Tab
Select Network Address from the list

My wireless card has a hardware address in the value field when you click on Network Address when looking at it's property sheet. My ethernet card doesn't, however I am not hooked through ethernet at this moment. Your milage may vary. Seems much easier to do an ipconfig /all.

Re:Worst reply i've GIVEN....

[erikdotla]

Hey man, the whole concept of a desktop is stupid anyway. The screen of any OS doesn't really resemble a real desk, just because it's contents loosely resemble little folded papers and manila folders.

You just learn to say things like "In the upper left corner of your screen, which is also known as the desktop, is a picture with the words "My Computer" under it. By the way, that picture is called an icon. (Now you just taught them something.) Right-click the icon and you'll see a box with choices appear. That's called a context menu, by the way, in case you didn't know. If you did I apologize, I just like to help people out. Click the Properties option on that context menu."

If people get confused on the technical terms like desktop, icon, or context menu after that point, it's their fault and they deserve to be placed on hold until the world ends.

Best support story: I did support for an Encyclopedia program, and other software for other companies. The Encyclopedia software line was closed for a holiday, but not other lines so we were working. Encyclopedia line rang cuz someone forgot to put it to voicemail. Guy gets put on hold. We figure he'll hang up eventually. 9 hours later someone finally decided to pick up the phone. The guy was chipper and happy as could be, had a simple question solved in 2 minutes, thanked us and hung up.

Re:Worst reply i've GIVEN....

[rcs1000]

STOLEN!

That anecdote was on http://www.rinkworks.com/stupid/cs_stuptech.shtml

Bah. Stealing anecdotes to get Slashdot "karma". It doesn't get much lamer than that.

Re:Worst reply i've GIVEN....

[Dok Fenderson]

I used to work the phones for Maxtor's HDD tech line, and later the NAS support line. Boring ass job, and amusement had to b self provided. Some of my better ones were:

"How do I turn on my hard drive?"
"Have you tried blowing in it's ear, rubbing it's thigh? Works for me."
"Huh?"
"Nevermind"

"OK, put the phone down, rub your nipples and sing songs by the Scorpians for good luck when you reboot." About 10% of the time I used this line, they would actually do it. Customers with a sense of humor rock!

The best one I had was a NAS 6000 call. 1.4 TB of storage in a hot swapable RAID 5. The customer had filled it with data and deleted the original source. No backup (you can see where this is going). Luser decides to demonstrate hot swap drives by removing two drives and swapping them.
"Is there anything I can do?"
"remember that it's lengthwise, not across when you slash your wrists. Across is just a cry for help."
"OK."

Dok

Re:Worst reply i've GIVEN....

[lizardb0y]

Yes I can say i've actually told a customer they had an ID10T problem/p>

We call them Layer 8 problems where I work.

Re:Worst reply i've GIVEN....

[prisoner]

I've never heard of an arial cable. Is it more expensive than the garamond cable?

Re:Worst reply i've GIVEN....

[rcs1000]

You are absolutely right. I fscked up beyond all belief.

Now, I know it seems hard to believe but I'm sure saw it somewhere. My apologies to the person I've accused of lying/stealing/karmic whoring.

Engineer said "She canna hold together."

[sandbagger]

And amazingly enought, it always did. Lazy bugger that Scotty.

Worst excuse I've heard..

[evel aka matt]

That my website was down because a link was posted on some news website, causing millions of geeks to load the page and overload the server. What a crock of shit!

Re:Worst excuse I've heard..

[Anonymous Coward]

Worst excuse I've heard from a client.. "I can't tolerate ANY downtime for my website.. I'm losing thousands of dollars a minute!! I have multimillion dollar clients!!" Right.. And you have a $7/mo shared hosting account that gets a hit or two a day.

Rinkworks.com brings you...

[Mr.Radar]

Computer Stupidities Their stupid tech support section probably fits this article best.

Re:Rinkworks.com brings you...

[pavon]

This one was hilarious. That tech is a genius.

Customer: "When my computer boots up, all I get is a black screen that says, 'boot2/'."
Tech Support: "What operating system are you using?"
Customer: "I'm using Windows 98 and NT 4.0."
Tech Support: "Ok, I'm the Mac tech. The Windows tech is gone, but I can try to help you."
Customer: "Ok, what should I do? I've reformatted the hard drive and have fresh installs of both operating systems."
Tech Support: "Sir, have you put any cheese or mustard in your a drive?"
Customer: "What? Did you just ask me if I put cheese or mustard in my floppy drive?"
Tech Support: "Yeah, we've had that happen a lot lately."
Customer: (staring blankly at roommate, who was laughing uncontrollably on the floor) "I think I'll wait for the PC tech to get back. Thanks for the help." (click)

Dude, your hard drive is blown!

[OdinHuntr]

I had a shipment of bad IDE hard drives. I was instructed by the Dell support dude that Dell recommends SCSI for "servers". Upon asking why, I was informed that it "had something to do with data harmonics".

Re:Dude, your hard drive is blown!

[nursedave]

No, that's data harmonicAs. You got da bad block blues.

Re:Dude, your hard drive is blown!

[AaronD12]

I'm so sick of having to deal with Dell. I work at a college with several labs full of the pieces of shit.

Recently, I spent 96 minutes on the phone "troubleshooting" an integrated NIC that would not illuminate it's link lights.

After escalating twice, the supervisor wanted to check the Windows drivers again, even though the PXE boot in BIOS reported that it wasn't seeing a network connection.

I angrily asked what the connection between Windows drivers and BIOS was. He said it does affect the BIOS if your drivers aren't set properly in Windows! WTF?

I asked him, what about Linux? He said, "We don't support Linux."

It frustrates me to no end to deal with a technician who wasn't even born when I took my first computer class, and have him (or her) treat me like I don't know the first thing about computers or troubleshooting.

My Macintosh can beat up your Windows PC!

Re:Dude, your hard drive is blown!

[cgenman]

I had been getting bad parts from MicroCenter for several weeks, had been dutifully diagnosing them and returning things that didn't work as I was desperately trying to complete a system that did. As I had bought the processor and motherboard as a pair, and the motherboard wasn't working, they wanted to refund only the total deal cost minus the non-sale cost of processor, leaving me with a processor costing about 20 dollars more than the identical ones they had on sale.

"We can take back the motherboard, but not the processor"
"Why can't you take back the processor?"
"Because you've opened it. We only take returns if it is unopened, or we can exchange it if it is defective."
"Can I at least get the sale price for the processor?"
"No, because you bought the 'bundle' processor, not the 'sale' processor."
"That doesn't make sense. They're the same processor, in the same box, with the same SKU..."
"Sorry."
"If I tell you it's defective, are you going to take my word for it like the other half-dozen parts I've returned."
"Yes."
"And if I get that exchange processor, the exchange processor is in a returnable, unopened state, correct?"
"...Yes..."
"Can you see where I'm going with this?"

"...Sales price it is."

Re:Dude, your hard drive is blown!

[PktLoss]

I had to pull something similar with the cable company a while back.

I was moving out of a shared student house, and needed to change the bill into someone elses name. So I dutifully phoned the company to make the change a full billing cycle before I moved out.
Sales: Hi, thank you for calling cogeco...yada yada yada... can i have your account number
Me: 12380918232
Sales: Sure, now what can I help you with
Me: I need to change the name on my account, I am moving out
Sales: Okay, sure I can help you with that, just to let you know there will be a $19.95 service charge for the name change
Me: Ummm Are you still running the free install promotion
Sales: Yes
Me: Is there a disconnection fee associated with ending my account
Sales: No, as long as you call at least a week in advance
Me: Can you see where I am going with this?
Sales: Okay, I can do that name change for you free of charge..

Re:Dude, your hard drive is blown!

[ruiner13]

True story, an ex-girlfriend of mine was having problems with her Dell. The first support guy we talked to told her to: "take a shotgun, point it at your monitor, and fire." That was her last Dell. She was a geek too, she didn't appreciate that.

My ISP is retarted

[SnprBoB86]

I call to complain that my service was flaky. Several times an hour the cable modem would just go out for 30 seconds then return. I call them and the guy says "well the problem isn't on our end it must be your network". I respond "Why do you say that?". He says "Well because your cable modem has been online and operational for the past 3 days with no disconnections". I say "Oh really? That's interesting... because its power has been unplugged for the past 20 minutes..."

Re:My ISP is retarted

[Tekoneiric]

Sounds like your modem got swapped with someone else by the installer monkey. I've seen that happen quite a few times. When I was working support, I don't know how many times I'd pulled up a customer's account up and see a different MAC, then pull up by MAC and see a different customer. The really funny thing is, all the other phone tech's missed it. I guess that is why I made it to mentor status so quick.

You'd be suprised how many times I had this one tech call me and go into a long story about some email issue. My response was "Have you done a modem check to see if their online?", having already pulled up the customer and checked the modem while the tech was yapping. That guy never learned to see if their online first. lol

Re:My ISP is retarted

[IncohereD]

My idiot roommate tried splitting the line to the modem without telling anybody first, then when we hooked it back up it wouldn't hold a connection for more than about 3 minutes.

When we got the Rogers guy to come he couldn't figure out why it was hooked to that outlet, and couldn't even figure out how the cable got to that point in the wall (it had been that way since I moved in about 3 years before). He put in a new wire, closer to where it came in the house, and we were fine from then on.

Re:My ISP is retarted

[Bill_Royle]

I had that a while back - after a significant amount of time, a technician came out to the house. It turned out that a line filter was a bit corroded on the outside of the house, and a quick replacement fixed it.

After reading several cable installer manuals, I found that a lot of cable installers will staple the coax too close to the rain gutters, and the ensuing rain tends to saturate the filter. Asking the cable installer to staple (or place hook-snaps) near-flush against the eaves usually reduces the likelihood.

Re:My ISP is retarted

[ergo98]

I had the exact same situation as the grandparent post: I was calling about my cable modem being out, and after being directed through all of the idiotic OS configuration steps (despite the little "link" light being out on the cable modem coincidentally occurring in concert with being unable to see the outside world), which I played along with, I could see where the conversation was going (headed towards "there's nothing on our end...we'll schedule a tech for a week but hope it clears up before then") so I disconnected the cable from the cable modem, and then listened as the telephone support narrated as they supposedly connected to my cable modem, and then supposedly pulled diagnostic codes and evaluated its health, etc.

I listened for about two minutes, and then said "Well that's odd as I disconnected the cable modem two minutes ago" she became flustered and was clearly caught in a lie -- it was a pretty awkward situation. In other words it's just as probable that they were just bullshitting to make you feel like they've done what they can do, when really they just want you to suck it for a while, or to call back for some other sucker to deal with.

Re:My ISP is retarted

[wo1verin3]

I had 1kbps upstream for about a week... (although download was fine...) and when I called they insisted they didn't guarantee any upstream speed and had me go to a speedtest site which said everything was fine.

Great, that site DOESN'T test upstream.

Went to DSL reports and wow seems to be a problem.

Lone story short, I had a cable modem for 7 years, i know when something is flaky like most people who read /.

Took me an hour to convince them to send someone out, replaced the modem with same model and problem fixed.

Re:My ISP is retarted

[taernim]

We have Speakeasy DSL, which is the best service I've ever had. Unfortunately for some people in our building, they opted for the cheaper solution: Cable. Our friends moved in next door, so we decided to share our DSL with them -- totally within Speakeasy's TOS. My neighbor came over to tell my roommate, who had hardwired the two apartments' networks together in the phone room, that their network was down. He checks everything in our apartment and everything looks good. Then he remembers the cable guy was in the building... he goes and finds the guy had disconnected the two apartments and told my roommate "Sharing your connection is illegal." He kept saying this, even after my roommate explained that we had DSL, not cable, so even if it WERE true we weren't allowed to share, it wasn't their problem. Ten minutes later, the internet isn't working again. Turns out the cable guy took the power cord to the hub, since he felt that my roommate "didn't understand stealing was wrong." Words... escape me.

Re:My ISP is retarted

[komseh]

Yes, the lines the run to your modem need to be taken care of much more carefully than your tv lines. The most important thing is to have your modem connected to the original splitter. Two splitters will work sometimes, three will almost never work. Perfect signal for a modem is 0dB. Anything under -5dB wont work; and anything over +10dB is bad for the modem. The second most common problem with modems are bad fittings. All of the fittings in the line from the tap to the modem need to be perfect. Otherwise your modem is going to drop packets and possibly lose sync with the head end. Other problems can be caused by nicks, cuts, kinks, or twists in the line. Significant amounts of signal can be lost even if the line is stapled or screw-clipped in equal segments. You can avoid these things by having your installer run your cable in the walls. It might cost you a little extra, but it looks nicer and your cable will last longer. The best tip I can give you is make sure your installer knows what the fuck is going on. If you see him wandering back and forth countless times, ask him whats wrong. Don't get in his hair though, because then he WILL do a shitty job on your install. Check his work after he leaves though. Good day all.

Re:My ISP is retarted

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd sue him, and his employer in small claims. I'd make a mini-vacation of it if it went to court. Get my ducks in a row in my free time while watching the tube. File a police report on the theft. Write a letter detailing the situation to the Better Bussiness Bureau. Maybe write a letter to newspaper or TV stations, see if I could get anything about it covered. Reckless Cable Companies Steals From Honest DSL Customers.

Now this all seems like a pain in the ass. And it is. But in the end, you'll have a badass story about how you battled a multi billion dollar telecommunications giant, and made them kiss your ass. That's right, I'd file for a new hub and to have them write formal letters of apology. Now *that's* being a dick. I would bet at least a memo would go out to not touch other people's things. :)

Re:My ISP is retarted

[unixbugs]

If your cable installer is using staples I suggest you go with another ISP.

I worked in the field forever and I saw so many funny things that the thing to do after work was sit around and crack up about the days events, the stupid customers, and the morons in the dispatching office.

"...ok then I think the problem is between the keyboard and the chair."

Working for the cable company and having service with their competitor was a laugh. They sent out a tech to troubleshoot the aerial line because my cable modem was losing synch more and more every day since the install, which I was unavailable for. Tech support continued to try to get me to clear my browser cache and reboot my computer and right click on my computer and all that crap. After a few rounds of supressed laughter I finally admitted that I wasnt using windows, I wasnt on a Mac... anyway

I could have replaced the line myself, but why do that when I'm paying for the service? Besides, theres a few beers left over from last night, and I could sure use some entertainment...

Now its clear that the person who originally installed this line had no idea what he was doing. Its going through trees, crossing power, and is zip-tied to a telephone pole hook, rather than properly secured. Near a large tree branch the line is worn down through the shielding to the stinger, and is very visible as the bare spot is next to the house.

They have a rule about testing the lines imepedance first. He gets out the little Ohm-meter and terminates one end, goes to the pole and tests it, and returns with a puzzled look on his face. He has to explain that he can't replace the line because its impedence is within bounds and the line must be fine.

Channel 3, also a local station, is coming in loud and clear with the local news due to the exposed wire, and this guy is arguing with me about policy?

We had the policy too, but it was because our techs, as contractors, were lighting up every corner of the house with a cable jack for the money. When this policy hit us, our re-wiring hit rock bottom and we lost alot of good technicians. It didnt take much more than a few phone calls to scratch this obviously moronic policy from their books. If picture=crappy then replace(wires);

Re:My ISP is retarted

[Nurgled]

A few months ago my housemates and I moved to a new house, taking our cable service with us. We just took the cable modem we had from before to the new house, where cable was already installed, and advised the cable company that we had done this.

This was apparently all fine and we should have service within an hour. A few hours later, I became frustrated and called back and got transferred to the tech support people. The first wall of support folks seems to have the function of asking what OS you use and transferring you to a "real" tech. We have a box running linux doing routing/NAT for our network, but I figured saying that would just cause me grief so I said "Windows 2000".

This turned out to be a big mistake. It turns out that the previous tennents of the house had been disconnected for having some stupid worm, so they wanted me to prove I'd patched my Windows 2000 box with Windows Update before they'd help me further. I just insisted I had, thinking it'd be easy, but they wanted the patch identification numbers from the Windows Update installation!

With no way to find these out, I just decided to be honest with the man. I explained that there was not a Windows machine connected to the cable modem and that I had just said that thinking they'd balk at the idea of a linux system. He seemed to ignore what I was saying and demanded I read out five numbers starting with Q from some dialog box in Windows 2000.

Becoming more than a little frustrated, I said that I had no way to do that and that there was no way the worms could be on my system. He was having none of it, so remembering that the worm he was trying to patch me for was Windows 2000 only I asked him what would happen if I phoned back and told them I was using Windows 98. He offered to transfer me to the "Windows 98" tech, and I agreed figuring that I wouldn't get any further here.

After waiting in the queue for 20 minutes, I got a connection to the Windows 98 tech who was the same guy I was talking to before! Both he and I knew he'd just put me back in the pool to try to get rid of me but by chance I'd ended up back on his line again. I very politely explained that my Windows 98 system would not connect to the Internet and he, with an appropriate amount of smarm, started going through the Windows 98 procedure he had laid out, which did not include patch installations.

I just played along with the little game, answering the questions correctly and pretending I was going through the motions. He knew I wasn't as well as I wasn't even trying to make it sound like I was.

Once we got through all that, he finally helped me. Apparently they have a special version of their online signup page which you must go through before Internet service is enabled at a new address. I wish they could have just told me that in the first place, as the first thing I said was "I have moved to a new address and transferred my cable service".

Re:My ISP is retarted

[chrisabailey]

AT&T Cable came out to bury my cable which ran to about 5 drops in my house, they simply cut the cable and ran it to a single room (to avoid digging under my driveway). Calling support to get it fixed went something like:

Me: My cable was cut by your installers, I need someone to come out and fix it.

ATT: Are your modem lights flashing?

Me: No - The cable was cut, I can see the end.

ATT: Can you power off the modem an start it back up?

Me: Yes I can but it doesn't matter the cable was cut!

ATT: Are you getting any channels on your TV?

Me: No, I'm holding the end of the cable now!!

ATT: I need to send you to a second level of support, please hold....(20 min later)...

Me: My cable was cut by your installers, I need someone to come out and fix it.

ATT_2: Are your modem lights flashing?

Me: No - The cable was cut, I can see the end.

ATT_2: Can you power off the modem an start it back up?

Me: Yes I can but it doesnt matter the cable was cut?

ATT_2: Are you getting any channels on your TV?

Me: No, I'm holding the end of the cable now!!

ATT_2: Do you have anything else between the cable and your TV?

Me: No, Everything was working until the guy cut the cable!!!

ATT_2: I need to send a technition out, please hold to set up an appointment....

CompUSA

[agent dero]

I've had some doozies of experiences at a couple CompUSA.

One time the guy tried to explain to me that I would need about $50+ more hardware than necessary to fix what I suspected to be a buggy RAM problem.

On another occasion, I was with a friend, checking out a couple hot-swap IDE cages for a development server I was building and a CompUSA dorkus walks buy and says "They're really overrated, and you probably don't need them, unless you're building a server (guy leaves)"

I didn't know what to say, he didn't help, he just offered a stupid opinion and left. So I left too.

Re:CompUSA

[nursedave]

Not really tech support, but ripped from the same page in the book of stupidity.

I was recently at Fry's, looking at their server racks. Pretty good prices. now, I don't really need (or know shit about) server stuff. But I noticed they didn't have server cases in their case department, and none near the racks, so I asked a guy about server cases. He directed me to the desktop and tower cases.

"No, I mean, the special ones for server racks, they've got holes in them that you use to mount in the racks."

"Oh, ok, well, you can just drill some holes in one of these cases and use that."

Riiiiiiiiiight.

Re:CompUSA

[localhost00]

On another occasion, I was with a friend, checking out a couple hot-swap IDE cages for a development server I was building and a CompUSA dorkus walks buy and says "They're really overrated, and you probably don't need them, unless you're building a server (guy leaves)"

Wow. One of the advantages of my mom working in administration at CompUSA is knowing that such an employee would be under fire really quickly.

Re:CompUSA

[tempest303]

The store rep said that a 10/100 hub will find the slowest connecting device on the network and then put everything at that speed, while a 10/100 switch will let everyone talk at the maximum speed they support.

but, uhm... isn't that the case? On a hub, every device must "dumb down" to the slowest link, whereas on a switch, every port can have its own speed settings (duplex, 10 vs 100mbps, etc)

How is this not so?

Re:CompUSA

[strider_starslayer]

I'm glad that someone else noticed that the store reps explanation was fundamentally correct. Now it's not 100% correct, and it's not the answer that anyone who has taken a course in networking would answer, but it's correct enough that a customer would not have been misinformed by the rep's answer.

Re:CompUSA

[netsharc]

Actually, it's usually the native speakers of english who have terrible spelling, non-natives have to formally learn the language and learn how to spell the words -- most learning is done through reading/writing anyway, whereas natives hear and speak a lot, but never really consider how to write the words they use.

Re:CompUSA

[jerdenn]

This is correct for current hubs, but it is also correct that older hubs would in fact slow down to the lowest available link speed.

Re:CompUSA

[ron_ivi]

indeed they do

"Create your own Microtel SYSSRBB102 1U ATA Rackmount Server With Xeon Processor"

Re:CompUSA

[rodac]

that is not true for a hub. a hub will make all devices run at the slowest speed. what you are thinking of is a s.c. dual-speed hub / switched hub 10/100 hub . these devices are not hubs. they consist of : one 10mbit/s hub one 100mbit/s hub inside the same enclosure connected together internally by a 2 port switch. a hub is a layer-1 device it creates a broadcast domain and a collission domain that is the set of all physical ports on the device. a switch is a layer-2 device it creates/emulates the same broadcast domain as a hub would but creates one independent collisison domain (physical link) on each port. Since only one nic is attached to one port/one physical domain collissions can not happen and thus the collission detection circuitry is disabled hence full duplex.

A bit of the why...

[Dozix007]

I have experience a fair share of Tech-Support mishaps. Most of the problems stem from the fact that the people who are diagnosing your problem are reading through a "cue-card" type program. They ask you questions, and their little program is "supposed" to find the problem. That is probably why you get some idiotic responses. Just remember "reboot", the ultimate solution for tech-support.

Oh that's easy.

[The Tyro]

"The problem must be on your end... everything here is working."

Yeah... sure.

That ranks right up there with their classic first question "do you have a firewall?" Answer "yes," and that IMMEDIATELY becomes the problem (despite the fact that it's been running for months with no change in configuration).

Just FYI: I find that confronting them with a few ethereal packet dumps usually gets you to the second tier at least.

Re:Oh that's easy.

[Avenger546]

their classic first question "do you have a firewall?" Answer "yes," and that IMMEDIATELY becomes the problem

The best part is that if you say "no" then *that* can be the problem... "if you don't run a firewall, you leave your computer more open to attacks"

Fun stuff. "Damned if you do..."

Re:Oh that's easy.

[strider_starslayer]

As someone who has worked in tech support, I have to speak up and say that when I was doing it; 90% of problems, were user problems, and not problems on our side.

And the whole point of troubleshooting is to isolte points to failure- REset the modem, reset your computer, disconnect the router, still not working, next step, try a ping to the internet, try a ping to the server, try a ping to yourself, reset the modem again (just in case you ignored the tech the first time he sugested it, reset the computer again.

That above scenario will solve somewhere around 70% of all network problems, and if you take out the request to reset the modem and computer the second time the rate drops sharply, because peopel have a tendancy to assume that tech support people have no idea what there doing and can safely be ignored. We've been given a script to follow that says to do exactly that, and we get in trouble if we don't do that scenario first; so sit tight, let us establish that it is not your firewall, your computer, or your modem, and then we can get to some real tech support- or hell, do it yourself, first, before you call in, and be sure to say that you did it yourself, first, how you did it when you get connected and save time.

Re:Oh that's easy.

[Dan Guisinger]

True. But some tech's are just unwilling to cooperate.

I've got a cable modem through Comcast. There are two lights on it that show whether the modem has locked onto a signal from the Coax cable. One night (as often happens) the signal disappeared, the lights went out, and I called Comcast. Took me 45 minutes to get the guy to stop having me check through network settings on my computer and check the damn local circuits for a problem.

I'm sorry, but if those lights are out, its not a problem with my computer.... its narrowed down to the modem, my coax, or their local network. Some techs, not all, but many.....are absolutely clueless if they don't follow their pre-determined question line.

Earthlink...

[Sefi915]

I was having a major problem with my DSL connection last summer.
I had a connection. I had an IP. However, nothing would go through the modem.
I even tried 3 different PCS and a Mac running Jaguar, directly to the modem, and still couldn't get anything through. And yet, I had a working, connected (if not logged in) modem.
So I called their support. Three techs I went through. They kept saying it was my problem, because they could ping my modem.
So I got to a second level guy. Chatted with him a while, told him what I'd done, what the first level guys had me redo.
He tells me he'll have the network guys check into it.
A day passes. Two. I call back.
Oh, it'll be a week before the problem's resolved.

A week. And four days.
I call back. I give my case number.

Drumroll.

I wasn't using an Earthlink-supported modem.

*blink* WTF? Excuse me? You guys SENT me this damn thing in the first place, and it worked fine til 11 days ago, and now it works again after I turned it off for two days.

Never did find out the real reason for it...

Re:Earthlink...

[Brandybuck]

Earthlink/Mindfsck are real jokers. It wouldn't surprise me if they actually went out of their way to hire idiots.

I has having a problem with my connection once, and I called them up. During the process I had to disconnect my broadband router (we don't support that), reboot into Windows (we don't support linxit or whatever it's called), install their silly software (we don't support winsock), all to discover that *THEIR* gateway was down.

Re:Earthlink...

[Gunfighter]

Let me preface this by saying that I am the network administrator for a small ISP. Here goes...

My lovely chat with tech support at another ISP (idiots). The following is a transcript of my chat with Tom at Earthlink's tech support.

Welcome to Earthlink LiveChat. Your chat session will begin shortly.

Tired of Spam? With Earthlink's free spamBlocker you can customize your settings to eliminate all of your unwanted email!

Tom M says: Thank you for contacting EarthLink LiveChat, how may I help you today?

Gun: Yes, I need to check and see if my forwards to a [yourdomain] account are being blocked based on the server they're being forwarded from. Do you need the IP address, forward address??

Tom M: In order to resolve this issue I need to know what email program you are using. If you are unsure, please open your email as you normally would, click on the Help menu (at the top by File, Edit View, etc) and click on About. In there you will find the name of the program and the version. please let me know what they are.

Gun: they are SMTP and, I imagine, POP3. I'm the administrator, not the end user

Tom M: Could you please be more specific about the issue?

Gun: rfk@[ourdomain].com forwards to rkruse@[yourdomain].com, but mails are not getting through to [yourdomain].com... at least, not to rkruse@[yourdomain].com. Therefore we have a mutual, unhappy customer as I host the [ourdomain].com domain, and you host [yourdomain].com, do you not?

Tom M: Kindly hold on.

Note: ALERT!! ALERT!! I could practically _hear_ the Indian accent as soon as he said this. This means I've reached a level 1 moron at a call center in India. Granted, not all people in such call centers (or call centers in India) are morons, but in this case, I think I ended up with the lowest bidder. Shame on you Earthlink!.

Tom M: Kindly hold on while I verify your account.

Gun: It's not my account, but go right ahead

Tom M: Have you set the forwarding feature in this email address rfk@[ourdomain].com to forward emails to rkruse@[yourdomain].com?

Gun: yes

Tom M: I am working on this issue and please hold on.

Tom M: I suggest you contact to the [ourdomain].com technical support regarding this issue.

Gun: I am the [ourdomain].com tech support! I was contacted, now I'm contacting you

Tom M: Okay, it appears that there might be problem at [ourdomain].com email address.

Gun: such as?

Tom M: As you set the forwarding email feature in the rfk@[ourdomain].com, you need to contact to their technical support to resolve the issue.

Gun: one last time... I AM THE TECH SUPPORT

Note: You'd think he would get the point by now, right?

Tom M: Okay, the problem seems to be at their end.

Gun: How so? We're forwarding email all over the world, and it all works except for this guy's. Doesn't sound like a problem on our end. Would you like for me to cat his .qmail file and paste it here for you to confirm?

Tom M: As you set the forwarding feature at this email address rfk@[ourdomain].com, I suggest you contact to this domain [ourdomain] administrator.

Gun: I am this domain [ourdomain] administrator

Gun: please repeat that back to me so that I know you understand... say something along the lines of "Gun has complete and god-like control over the [ourdomain].com domain"

Note: AAAAAAAAUUUUUUGGGGGGGGHHHHHH

Tom M: Can I know where did you set the forwarding feature?

Gun: certainly! we use Qmail as our mta

Tom M: I am sorry to inform you that EarthLink does not given any technical support for Qmail.

Note: Please make the bad man stop.

Gun: hermes [ourdomain].com # pwd /var/vpopmail/domains/4/[ourdomain].com hermes [ourdomain].com #

Re:Earthlink...

[trg83]

My guess is that "LiveChat" is actually a robot. I tried to contact eBay's online tech support one time and got the same sort of stupid pre-scripted one-liners. Eventually, I finally asked "are you a robot?" He replied "No". Then I asked "Are you a real person?" and his response was "I am human" or some stupid shit like that. All his responses were very quick and completely without grammatical cues to indicate any emotion. If corporations think their customers should accept shit like that, SCREW 'EM ALL!

Re:Earthlink...

[starworks5]

well ill tell you what, i used to work for a company here in oregon called stream. basically its like this, the person who your talking to sits there hitting shortcuts with his keyboard, and beleive it or not, but there arent enough shortcuts so they sometimes have to use 2 shortcut combo's. and these guys will trouble shoot 6 people at one time, and all of them will get fustrated and call us eventually.

Re:Earthlink...

[Gunfighter]

Actually, they didn't have the IP blocked. It was the customer. He had some freaky filtering turned on in his Earthlink account settings.

No wonder...

[rasafras]

bytes/sec != bits/sec * 8

It should be bits/sec*(1/8), since you're getting one byte per every 8 bits. And you probably knew that, but I'm anal.
On the other hand, who knows what's happening when the bits are getting stuck someplace....

Re:No wonder...

[JensLH]

It is however still true that bytes/sec != bits/sec * 8 :-)

*runs for cover*

Pixel Modulation

[lupin_sansei]

When I was a teenager I had a Sinclair Spectrum computer that loaded games off casettes. One game I bought wouldn't load properly and I was told by the salesman "Probably the Pixels on your type of TV are modulating incorrectly with the computer causing the loading error".

Great Scott!

[Samah]

At a computer repair place I was working at a few years back, I recall one of the techs there explaining to a customer that the reason his power supply had stopped working was that the "flux capacitor" had blown.
Mind you this tech wasn't an idiot (or an ID ten T), he just wanted to get rid of the customer :)

"it's a feature, not a bug."

[RevRa]

One time I called Redhat for tech support in getting a RH to run on a laptop. I was told, "LCD's don't have scan rates and frequency settings like CRT's do."

I almost went through the phone to choke the bastard.

-k

Re:"it's a feature, not a bug."

[jdreed1024]

One time I called Redhat for tech support in getting a RH to run on a laptop. I was told, "LCD's don't have scan rates and frequency settings like CRT's do."

I almost went through the phone to choke the bastard.

Uh, only problem is, he was mostly right. While LCDs do in fact have scan rates and frequency settings, no one cares, since they're mostly fixed. Almost all LCDs (at least in the home user market) have a 60 Hz vertical refresh rate. And most LCDs have a fixed resolution, so the scan rate is fixed (it is derived from vertical refresh and resolution). So he mostly knew what he was talking about, assuming the question was "How do I configure XFree86".

Now, if the question was "Can I install Linux on a laptop?" and the answer was "No, because LCDs don't have scan rates", then that's pretty stupid. But that's not clear from the post. Also, how long ago was this? It wasn't that long ago that Linux on a laptop required a lot of kludging, especially to get X running.

Re:"it's a feature, not a bug."

[dgatwood]

Actually, LCDs don't have scan rates in the traditional sense. They act as basically one big memory chip, retaining the image until a new piece of data is pushed into a given pixel. That's why you can shoot the front of an LCD panel with a camcorder and get no flicker.

And I don't know about your flat panel, but all of my analog flat panels support several refresh rates, including 60 and... 72, if memory serves, and occasionally higher, depending on resolution. That has nothing to do with the way the image is displayed, and is strictly a factor of what clock speeds the VGA decoder hardware happens to support at a given resolution. However, you still have to feed it a sync rate that the decoder can handle.

If you really don't want to care about refresh, you'd better be using a digital flat panel (DVI or ADC-digital).

Kill the process!

[lemsip]

At one big corporation I worked at, they rolled out a security patch and it caused my Windows machine to start acting up, so I called the IT support (we were encouraged not to fix problems ourselves), and the guy on the phone took control of my desktop remotely from his end, so I could see what he was doing. He got the Task Manager up, paused a few seconds, and then said "That's really odd, there's a process taking up 99% of your processor time". He tried to kill the process, but it wouldn't go away, and he repeatedly tried to kill it about five times.

He didn't seem to realise that the "Idle" entry isn't actually a process...

Re:Kill the process!

[kfg]

What a dork. Everyone knows that to kill the idle process you just run emacs for Windows.

Poof! Idle all gone.

You get a better operating system out of the deal that way too.

KFG

Re:Kill the process!

[floki]

He didn't seem to realise that the "Idle" entry isn't actually a process...

What would you call it instead? It is kind of a process. It just doesn't take part in the normal scheduling process as it is running at DPC/dispatch level. It also doesn't have a normal priority but is ranked as lowest-prio process just below the zero page thread (has priority of 0). Articles and tools saying that the idle thread runs at priority 0 are wrong. For a tad more information look at this explanation of its functionality.

Can't have Windows 98 and DOS on the same machine

[sgb235]

My wife's (former) tech support person told her that her Windows 98 machine was crashing because it had DOS on it, and that the two were incompatible. He kindly reformatted the hard disk over lunch and reinstalled everything, supposedly without DOS, but didn't think it was necessary to back up her work. Then he yelled at her because he thought she should have noticed that he had been failing to back up her machine overnight, as required as part of his job description.

Bank Help Desk

[LostSinner]

A friend of mine works for a large bank in the area. After receiving new computers at their branch, they noticed that the connection to the central office was running incredibly slow. They let it go for a while, thinking that it might be a problem that would clear up on its own, but it never did. She finally broke down and called their help desk. After reporting the issue, the response she got back from the tech guy was:

"Oh, that's perfectly normal; the computer just has to get used to the software."

Re:Bank Help Desk

[Jeremy Erwin]

Perhaps they were running Gentoo, and the computer was busy compiling.

Data belt slippage

[PlazMan]

On an on-site call about fifteen years ago, I told a clueless yet very inquisitive (i.e. annoying) lady that the belt had been slipping on her data bus, causing her computer to crash. She was much relieved when I told her it was no problem for me to tighten it back up.

I have no recollection what the real problem was, but whenever her computer would crash after that, she would call and tell me her data belt was slipping again.

Server out of water

[Ffakr]

When I did phone support as a student worker, I had to tell someone that their email was unavailable because the server sprung a leak and it was out of water.
Unfortunately this was true as we were still running a water cooled IBM Mainframe.

The clients seemed to accept it without question but I'd have to image they though we were yanking them.

Dell...

[taernim]

Dell tech support has been going downhill for years. I think the best/worst story I got was when I got a machine from them about 4 years.
Came pre-installed with a bunch of crap, so I formatted and was reinstalling... then I noticed a grinding sound when the HD was reading... so I call them up to get a replacement.
What was the tech's opinion on the problem?


... a virus.

Yeah. Needless to say, I was rather speechless.

Bridge rectifier

[jgannon]

When I was first learning about electronics, I was trying to find a simple way to convert DC to AC. I asked the RadioShack guy if I could use a bridge rectifier in reverse. "Maybe." Argh. Now I know better... what a waste of a dollar.

They're not reading from que cards

[T.Hobbes]

At least, not in the place I work. The problem is lack of training, but the people I work with have a full knowledge of all materials in which they were trained. Admittidly, the level of training is subpar; but the workers are only expected - and allowed - to perform a limited number of fixes. Lack of knowledge about bits vs. bytes is embarassing, but knowledge of the 8:1 ratio is not required for the work that is performed.

At issue is the level of training provided.

All this is not to say that don't find the horror stories, from a tech's and customer's point of view, funny. Speaking for myself, half the people I speak to assume I can see their monitor and the other half think you can't open Outlook Express without connecting to the internet, despite the big 'work offline' button in front of them...

Satellite Internet

[thedillybar]

Not sure if I can blame the tech support guy for this one, but it was funny.

A friend of mine had satellite internet working for months, and one day it started cutting out on him. The signal strength would show EXCELLENT->BAD->ZERO->EXCELLENT. It'd keep repeating in this cycle so fast, it couldn't even initialize the connection. So it was basically worthless.

After installing all their updates, rebooting 10 times, rebooting the satellite modem 10 times, etc. the tech support guy told me 1) I must not've done what he'd been saying and 2) I have to uninstall everything and start over. If you don't have the CDs we'll have to mail them to you.

Enough of that crap, there was no way I was messing with that software anymore. I already fought with that thing for hours. Time to climb up on the hot roof and look at the dish.

The problem: About 500 bees nesting in the thing. Apparently it was cool...that or they were just getting high on the radiation, I'm not sure which.
The solution: 3 large cans of Raid.

I called the tech support guy back and he didn't believe me...

Re:Satellite Internet

[nounderscores]

Raid [killsbugsdead.com].

I love it. He said it was a software problem, and in the end you were forced to debug your satellite modem.

Re:Satellite Internet

[pen]

The solution: 3 large cans of Raid.

I don't understand... how did mirroring your hard drives solve the problem?

Re:Satellite Internet

[martingunnarsson]

"Yeah, I used raid to debug my satellite connection, that fixed the problem"
Completely true, but any geek will think you're full of shit. The whole sentence is basically just BUZZ-words :-)

Mod parent up

[Coneasfast]

this site is excellent, i couldn't stop cracking up after reading some of these

# Tech Support: "Type 'fix' with an 'f'."
# Customer: "Is that 'f' as in 'fix'?"

# Tech Support: "Tell me, is the cursor still there?"
# Customer: "No, I'm alone right now."

# Co-Worker #1: "A boolean variable has two possible values: true or false."
# Co-Worker #2: "Umm...true?"

Whatever you do

[LittleLebowskiUrbanA]

Don't mention 3rd party software. No matter what, it's ALWAYSthe 3rd party's software vendor's fault.

comcast is less than smart

[nelazul]

Once I was having problems with my cable modem; it was far slower than it would be expected. I called support. Approximately the following conversation occurred:

Me: My internet access is running at far slower speeds than it usually does.

Tech: Do you have a router?

Me: ...yes...

Tech: Well, you know, you might want to replace it. Routers can wear out, like lightbulbs.

Me: ...

Great support

[minotaurcomputing]

I've always had great experiences... just today a nice young man told me the best way to fix my computer was to type format c: ... well, I did it and things seem to be on track for

Please Press 6 If You Have a Clue

[thedillybar]

Everything else has 'advanced user' setup. Why can't we have advanced tech support?

"If you are an advanced user, i.e. you know more than our flunkie tech support people, please press 6. We will connect you to an intelligent person on this side of the ocean. Please hold."

I hate trying to boot a machine (or convincing the guy on the other end that I'm trying to boot a machine) 10 different times when I know the hard-drive has failed.
It's bad. It's under warranty. Come replace it.

Re:Please Press 6 If You Have a Clue

[John Starks]

I haven't worked tech support, but I've worked at companies that provide tech support. And let me tell you, the worst user is the "advanced" user. Sure, the user may think you know what he's talking about, but in the end it just makes him arrogant and unwilling to listen. Heck, I've been that guy, only to feel completely sheepish when I realized my mistake.

Yes, you know the hard drive has failed. But for each user like you, there are ten users that THINK the hard drive has failed, when it really turned out to be something else. It's much cheaper to make everyone go through basic troubleshooting than to replace everyone's hard drives.

Re:Please Press 6 If You Have a Clue

[Eccles]

Everything else has 'advanced user' setup. Why can't we have advanced tech support?

Because everyone will choose that. You may have to add a warning, "If you demonstrate that you aren't in fact at advanced user, you will be mocked mercilessly."

Re:Please Press 6 If You Have a Clue

[jonadab]

> > Why can't we have advanced tech support?
> Because everyone will choose that.

Quite so. There's a solution to this: make 'em pass a quiz. Use a bank of
100 questions and give them _three_; if they get all three right, you give
them tier-two support immediately. If not, you send them to Tier 1. Of
course, you should only make people spend time taking this quiz if they want
to get to Tier 2 without going through Tier 1. Normal people would just go
through Tier 1 instead, but in case they try the quiz, you want to word it
in such a way that they don't realize that they're failing and being sent
to Tier 1. I imagine it might go something like this...

Recording: "Thank you for calling BigCompany. If you know your party's
extension, press 1 now. For Sales, press 2. For End User Tech Support,
press 3. For Advanced User Tech Support, press 4..." [User presses 4]

Recording: "To help us diagnose your problem more quickly, please answer
these simple questions."
Recording: "What version of Internet Protocol are you using? If you are
using IP version 1, please press 1. If you are using IP version 2, press
2. If you are using IP version 3, press 3. For End User Tech Support,
press Star."

At this point if the user presses 1, 2, 3, or *, he gets thanked in a nice
recorded voice and put in the queue for End User Tech Support, otherwise
known as Tier 1. If he hits 4 or 6, he goes on to the next question...

Recording: "Which program do you normally use to edit your registry?
If you use Internet Explorer to edit your registry, press 1. If you
export the registry, use Notepad to edit the REG file, and then import
your changes, press 2. If you use Outlook Express to edit your registry,
press 3. If you use Microsoft Word or Excel to edit your registry,
press 4. For End User Tech Support, press Star."

Again, if they choose any of the wrong answers, a polite recorded voice
thanks them for this valuable information about their internet connection
and asks them to hold for the next representative, and they go into the
Tier 1 queue. If they get it right, they get a third random question
from the bank, and if they get the third one right they go into the Tier
2 queue.

The hard part is making a big bank of questions that clueless people will
mistake for regular diagnostic questions but the sufficiently cluefull will
always be able to get the right answer. There will be a *handful* of people
in the middle who will know what's going on but maybe not know all of the
answers, but they can call a second time and hope to get easier questions,
and in any case they'll be *way* in the minority, if the questions are
written properly. (You have to write them so the wrong answers are very
obviously wrong only if you understand the question and seem to make sense
otherwise.)

Unfortunately, I don't think it's possible to write 100 questions as good
as the IP version question. That one's impossible for a techie to get
wrong, so impossible for a techie to get wrong that the correct answers
don't even have to be listed as one of the options, meaning basically
nobody will get it right if they don't know. Most of the questions will
be more like the second one; end users might possibly be able to guess them
correctly, which is why I think there should be three questions, not just
one. If many clueless people get through to Tier 2 only to find out
the circuit the computer's on tripped a breaker, the system fails. The
reason for the bank of course is so people in the know can't easily tell
morons "the secret" to get Tier 2 support; each person has to prove for
*himself* that he knows more than the Tier 1 support reps.

The risk inherent in this system is a PR risk; some end users might notice
that the questions are different each time, and, if they're smart (yes,
there are smart people who aren't knowledgeable about

Bad Bad Support

[Fierythrasher]

I worked technical support at a start-up ISP in '96. We had 5 external USR 33.6 modems hooked up to a term server. One day my boss accidentally turned off the UPS powering all the modems, all 5 users were cut off. Worse, while the term server rebooted no one could log in for about 3 minutes. An angry user called up, and I had to given an explanation better than "my boss pulled the plug." So I said: "Reboot your system." He did. "Try now." He got on. "It seems your system experienced a modem feedback loop. It happens from time to time, rebooting usually fixes it." My boss gave me a C-note for manufacturing the term "modem feedback loop".

hmm...

[T.Hobbes]

...it could be their admin system hadn't yet updated your e-status, and the isp tsr said what he knew...

old school

[3ryon]

Once, while I was in Hell I couldn't remember a phone number. So, obviously, I called the operator. Man, that guy was a bastard.

Time Warner RoadRunner tech support

[WD]

I call up Time Warner RoadRunner support for the cable internet service. The cable connection is down. The conversation with Tech Support goes like this:

WD: Hi, my cable modem isn't working. The Link light on the modem is blinking rapidly.
(I can hear TS typing up a trouble ticket with one, maybe two fingers)
TS: Whoah whoah whoah... How do you spell that? B - L - I .... ?
WD: Yes M'am, B-L-I-N-K. Thank you.

This is no exaggeration. That is exactly how it went down.

Re:LOLLOLOLOLOLROFLLLlll!!!!!!11~~on3

[Inspector Lopez]

Attention Earthling: We have been studying your culture and We find it ... fascinating.

Your use of the expression "fucking comedian" leads Us to interpret this as a "profession" or line of work. Previous study has led Us to generate a rough understanding of "comedian." We have nothing really like "comedian" here on Betelgeuse IV; the nearest thing would be translated roughly as "dentist." We also have deduced a wealth of words referring to copulation (again no real equivalent exists here; the closest is "shovelling volcanic ash out of the commode")

However the confluence of the terms "fucking" and "comedian" has confounded even Our most famous dentists.

We would be most grateful for an explanation.

Not tech support, but an installation...

[CSharpMinor]

I ordered cable Internet from Charter a few years ago. The good thing was that they had someone out there in less than a week. The bad thing was everything else.

At the same time, we switched from satellite to cable TV. Just in case Charter had problems, I told them NOT to remove the satellite dish. At some point during the install, he decided to use the coax coming off the dish-- which he pulled out of the wall, leaving a hole in my garage's wall. Furthermore, he hit the dish-- hard-- and dented it, rendering it worthless.

I wasn't home at the time, and I knew he'd need to access my computer, so I set up an administrator account on Windows for him. (Hey, It was 2001, I hadn't switched to Linux yet.) I left this note for him, exactly these words: "username: Charterguy; no password." It's probably a good thing that he couldn't figure out what "no password" meant, seeing as he would have ruined my computer if he got onto it. (Of course, he left without running any cables or installing the modem, because he couldn't log on to my computer.)

And, just to add insult to injury, that night, when I went to sleep, I could swear that I was hearing voices! Turns out, he left his radio in my attic. (And those radios last for days on a charge if you only listen on them without transmitting.) I never did find it, so for the next three days, I slept to the sound of field calls.

Mod Interesting, I need karma.

Logitech's 'Black Hole Of Mousepaddery'

[beejay54]

I once had to call into the 'lovely' folks at Logitech to deal with issues regarding a wireless keyboard and mouse package. At the time the keyboard and mouse would randomly loose their connection to the base station. So after doing some standard troubleshooting myself and checking every concievable thing, I bit the bullet and called them. The guy on the line was not only rude but I questioned whether he had attended his science classes back in grade 10. Call it manufacturer denial, but he tried to insist that the colour of my mouse pad would somehow 'suck' the RF signals into its deep black hole of 'mousepaddery' before they got to the base station less then a foot away. The word 'wow' came to mind, but for all the wrong reasons. I know dark colours can attract certain waves better then others but come on!

Re:Logitech's 'Black Hole Of Mousepaddery'

[peacefinder]

This is closer to the wierdest solution ever, but what the hell.

I witnessed a housemate of mine who worked from home have an amazing issue with an early Logitech optical-tracking mouse. (The kind that still used a ball... this was back in '95 or so.)

It would stop working after six hours of use or so. Specifically, it would no longer track left. Up, down, right were all fine, but left failed. He was a tech himself, and tried all the usual stuff... installed latest drivers, checked the cabling, cleaned the ball and rollers, everything. Nothing worked. Being a patient guy, mostly he lived with it. When it happened, he'd walk away from his computer and go have a late lunch, and when it came back it would usually work.

But eventually, that last straw arrived and he couldn't stand it anymore. He called Logitech support. He went through the whole business on the phone, and the whole Logitech troubleshooting script. Eventually the tech basically gave up, and put him on hold while he found a mouse guru to ask.

So my friend is sitting there on hold, toying with this mouse that's not tracking left, shifting restlessly because his ass is sore from sitting there for hours, and suddenly it starts working again right before his eyes. He sits up straight in disbelief, and it stops working. He slumps in disappointment, and it works again. He resorts to handwaving.

From across the room, amidst the cussing, I practically hear the little *ding* as he finally figured it out.

He started work around noon, and in the late afternoon in that season the sunlight would come in under his arm, hit that part of his desk just right, bounce through the seams in the mouse buttons, and dazzle the "left" part of the optical sensor. If he kept it in shadow, it worked fine.

Sometimes it's the little things that get ya. :)

Re:Logitech's 'Black Hole Of Mousepaddery'

[Nasarius]

I know dark colours can attract certain waves better then others but come on!

Unless your mousepad is very, very heavy, it's unlikely that it's attracting light of any kind :-)
Absorbing, yes.

Re:Logitech's 'Black Hole Of Mousepaddery'

[Piquan]

My call with Logitech:

I worked for a mom-and-pop computer store. Got in a new design of joystick. We were going to put it on a display computer, so I open the box, and the unit is broken. The stick lolls over to the side. One of the springs that holds it upright had failed. (Insert juvenile jokes here.)

I call Logitech. The tech asked me, "Did you try it on another computer?" I patiently explained that the problem was mechanical, and was clearly not a computer issue.

"Well, try it on a different computer." I explained the problem again, careful to be clear and precise.

"Alright, then, try it on a different computer." I clarified that the joystick had never been plugged into any computer. Ever (at least not since it entered the shop). I was completely aware of the defect from the moment I removed the joystick from the box. It had never been attached to any computer.

"Are you refusing to try a different computer?"

Everything after that is a blur.

Not to mention the submitter has it backwards

[mlyle]

at the number of bytes/sec != bits/sec * 8, rather a factor around 13 or 14.

Shouldn't it be bits/sec = bytes/sec * 8? ;)

Re:Not to mention the submitter has it backwards

[cujo_1111]

You are correct that there is 8 bits to a byte, but the parent is correct in saying that it should have been 'bits/sec = bytes/sec * 8'

Think about it...

Re:Not to mention the submitter has it backwards

[innosent]

Actually, it depends on what you are measuring. If you are measuring bits/sec of traffic vs. bytes/sec of data, the factor is probably around what you stated for smaller packets. Since this is typically how bps/Bps is measured, the numbers on the page of the site are quite possibly correct. Of course, the tech guy is still a moron, but the explanation is almost correct. Those extra bits get "stuck" when the packets are decoded, since the ethernet and TCP/IP headers will all be stripped off.

Re:Not to mention the submitter has it backwards

[caspper69]

And yet you always have the option of hitting the back button in your browser instead of submit.

If only this choice was made more often....

Re:Not to mention the submitter has it backwards

[randyest]

>>>at the number of bytes/sec != bits/sec * 8, rather a factor around 13 or 14.

>>Shouldn't it be bits/sec = bytes/sec * 8? ;)

>no... it's eight bits to a byte.

Yes. Assuming he meant (bits/sec) = (bytes/(sec * 8)). I must assume he did. It's important to me.

1 byte / 1 sec => (8 * 1 bit) / 1 sec = (8 * 1 bit) / 1 sec => 1 byte / sec = 8 bits / sec

And I'd expect more like 9-11 bits to transmit a byte, on average, due to packet overhead and error correction. 8 is optimal, which doesn't happen much. 11-14 wouldn't be shocking if there's a lot of packet loss, as it sounds like there may be.

Re:Not to mention the submitter has it backwards

[Graff]

A byte is usually 8 bits but it has also been defined as 6, 7, 9 or even odder combinations. It all depends on the system architecture.

You can read a bit more about it here

Re:Not to mention the submitter has it backwards

[Stinky Cheese Man]

> Of course, the tech guy is still a moron...

Not necessarily. He may have just assumed the caller was a moron and was either having some fun or trying to get rid of him ASAP.

Re:Not to mention the submitter has it backwards

[Trepalium]

TCP bulk transfers? Maybe 8.1 bits per byte. You're talking about about 20 bytes per packet of 1500 bytes (an overhead of just over 1%). Even with an MTU of 576 (dial-up default), your overhead is still a little over 3%, or less than 8.3 bits per byte. If you want to factor in ACKs at maybe 60 bytes per packet, the overhead would be around 5% and 13%, or 8.4 and 9.0 bits per byte.

Now, if this person had set a tiny MTU (68 bytes is minimum, IIRC), then it would be possible to get a really high overhead. Most likely he 'tweaked' his TCP configuration and tuned it for peak modem performance, which limited him to modem performance when he connected to a higher speed connection.

Re:Not to mention the submitter has it backwards

[eric76]

More correctly, it should be bits/sec = bytes/sec * bits/byte since bits/byte is not canonically defined to be 8. In fact, there have been other computers that had other than 8 bits per byte.

For exmaple, the PDP-10 had 9 bits per byte and 4 bytes per word (36 bits).

I've also seen 7 bits per byte on some old 9-track tapes that came from, I think, a Honeywell computer.

Re:Not to mention the submitter has it backwards

[zemoo]

That's why you use "octet" when you want to be precise

Re:Not to mention the submitter has it backwards

[boots@work]

No. The reason to use "octet" is because you want to sound like an IETF RFC, because that makes you sound more authoritative or because it makes your boyfriend horny.

octet==byte.

Re:Not to mention the submitter has it backwards

[NilocRAM]

see? that's why measuring nybbles per half second is the industry standard... too confusing any other way...

Re:Not to mention the submitter has it backwards

[AKAImBatman]

* the term was more liquid in the past

Byte was *never* variable. You're thinking of "word" which represents a natural unit for a system. Thus a PC has a 32 bit word, a Unisys Mainframe has 48 bit words, and an embedded processor has a 16 bit word.

Re:Not to mention the submitter has it backwards

[FireballFreddy]

...an embedded processor has a 16 bit word.

*boggle* *boggle* *splat*

Did you hear that? It was my brain exploding. Congratulations, you've killed me. Now I'll have to set the building on fire.

Re:Not to mention the submitter has it backwards

[eblum]

Usually one byte = 8 bits but when you transmit them, you have to keep parity check or ciclic redundancy check (CRC) an this takes some bits. So, to transmit a byte (8 bits) you need to use some extra bits (about 3).

For example: a dial-up's best speed in Kb/s is 4.5. 4.5 Kb/s x 1024 = 4608 bytes/s. 4608 bytes/s* 8 = 36864 bits/s or 36.8 Kbps But if you use 11 you get: 4608 bytes/s * 11 = 50688 or 50.6 Kbps, the best speed you can get on a 56 kbps modem.

A 256 kbps broadband connection should be: 256000 / 11 = 23272 bytes/s. 23272 / 1024 = 22.72 KB/s. Does 22.72 KB/s sound familiar for a 256 connection?

Ernesto.

Re:Not to mention the submitter has it backwards

[tverbeek]

Umm... Ethernet frames don't get send over dialup lines.

Right. But parity and stop bits do. I usually pretend that a byte = 10 bits (and simplify my mental arithmetic) when looking at dial-up throughput rates.

Re:Not to mention the submitter has it backwards

[3Suns]

*Bzzt* sorry, try again. Although "word" has certainly seen more variation than "byte", both have referred to different numbers of bits through history. From the Jargon File:

byte: /bi:t/, n.

[techspeak] A unit of memory or data equal to the amount used to represent one character; on modern architectures this is invariably 8 bits. Some older architectures used byte for quantities of 6, 7, or (especially) 9 bits, and the PDP-10 supported bytes that were actually bitfields of 1 to 36 bits! These usages are now obsolete, killed off by universal adoption of power-of-2 word sizes.

Historical note: The term was coined by Werner Buchholz in 1956 during the early design phase for the IBM Stretch computer; originally it was described as 1 to 6 bits (typical I/O equipment of the period used 6-bit chunks of information). The move to an 8-bit byte happened in late 1956, and this size was later adopted and promulgated as a standard by the System/360. The word was coined by mutating the word 'bite' so it would not be accidentally misspelled as bit. See also nybble.

Re:Not to mention the submitter has it backwards

[rizzo420]

i had issues with my cable connection when i first got it (found out i couldn't just release and renew the ip address to get it reconnected, i had to actually restart the computer). i told the guy on the phone that i do tech support when he started treating me like the average dumb computer user and we got into a little conversation. basically it came down to him saying "so you actually fix real problems". thought that was funny. he admitted to me that he wasn't taht bright, just followed the book.

Re:Not to mention the submitter has it backwards

[operagost]

My DSL gets forty mebibytes to the fortnight, and that's the ways I likes it!

Re:Not to mention the submitter has it backwards

[drinkypoo]

I only read RFCs for the articles.

Re:Not to mention the submitter has it backwards

[Pharmboy]

Sorry, but I must digress...

I am forced to manage the network at the office, as we have no IT staff, so I am the part time IT staff. 25 clients, 6 servers. Fortunately, I am an old school nerd, so I have learned lots of helpful tips to reduce the workload.

1. If they complain about the speed of their system or internet connectivity, firewall their IP off the network for 2 to 3 days. When you release the lock out, they seem to think its a lot faster and don't complain anymore.

2. The easiest way to reduce errors and mistakes is to make a big deal out of every small problem. This way they are terrified to do anything except what they have to do in order to get the job done. No more wondering around the control panel, internet, etc.

3. If they ever install any program without your permission, then the computer probably needs to be pulled and bench tested. This should take 3 to 5 days. Complain about "spywear" and "viruses", and try to use lots of confusing terms with nano, giga and mega in them (then they will act like they understand, which is really funny). They will never install anything again.

Now, some may think I am being funny (it is, but I'm not). Some will think I am cruel. Some will think its a bad BOFH inpersonation. But if you get about 10 hours a week to keep with all this stuff, you would develop these methods as well.

Oh, and it is a fun way to relieve stess, too.

Re:Not to mention the submitter has it backwards

[tricorn]

Ever since modems went higher than 2400 bps, with various protocols for compression and reliability built in, the actual data transmission (over the phone line) has not included start/stop bits. The transmission between the modem and the computer does, of course, when using asynch transmission modes. Combined with compression, that's why you want the data speed on the serial line to be higher than the transmission rate over the phone line, combined with a flow control mechanism (x-on/off or rts/dts).

Things would have been so much simpler if Hayes hadn't been so successful and modem control lines had been used. In particular, if synchronous transmission (specifically, SDLC) along with a variable clock rate, had become standardized, all of the garbage of trying to packetize frames over SLIP/PPP, all of the headaches (including patents) of +++, all of the hassle of trying to figure out interface speeds by looking at the bit pattern of A and T, and not noticing that a connection had dropped because the "CARRIER DROPPED" came out in the middle of a packet, would have been eliminated. Transmit clock, receive clock, RTS, CTS, DCD, and use DTR to signal between data and sending configuration commands. Combine with RS-422 signalling for better noise resistance and Ethernet might never have needed to be invented. Just using SDLC with a self-clocking protocol would have been a major win, as frames are checksummed and start/stop bits don't need to be sent (the overhead of flags and beginning/end of frame is irrelevant as when the amount of data goes up, the overhead drops as low as necessary). It works fine as an "asynchronous" protocol, i.e. interactive typing.

Ah, this one bugged me quite a lot ...

[JMZorko]

Let me preface this by saying that I think Apple, generally, makes quality products, and I own 3 Macs and am happy with them. However, I had once purchased an iBook 900mhz G3, only to find that it often wouldn't wake from sleep when I opened the lid (yes, it was still on), leaving a cold restart as the only means of recovering. When talking to the Apple tech support person, I told him this; I also told them that I had an iBook 700mhz that never exhibited these symtpoms, even though it was running the same version of OSX, the same software, etc.

His responses were professional, until the point where he mentioned that the 900mhz model was 30% faster than the 700mhz model, and that could possibly justify the increase in the number of time I needed to restart. I then asked if, given two machines, one being twice as fast as the other, but crashing twice as often, these machines were equally usable. At that point he backed from his earlier statement :-)

Regards,

John

Re:tech no-support

[Ffakr]

Having worked on a tech support line, and managed tech support people, I can tell you that you should be really damn happy when your tech admits they don't know something. It's a lot easier for a newb to give an answer they *think* is correct than to admit they don't know everything off the top of their heads.
Honestly, what would you prefer?.. someone saying, I'm not sure, let me find out for sure.. or someone making shit up that can get you into more trouble?

Satellite speed

[rgarcia]

I have a 256Kb satellite connection (out in the sticks) and one time when my bandwidth dropped to below 28Kb speed or less, tech supp said "the cloud cover is slowing the speed of the beam down but once the skies clear you'll be back to full speed." //grumble// ...shouldn't have told him it was cloudy.
The problem eventually "fixed itself" but when I called again for the same problem about a month later, I made sure to say there wasn't a cloud in the sky. His response (almost sure it was the same guy)?
"There is invisible weather fenomenon slowing the beam down." ...worst part is I'm stuck with it 'cause it's the only company I can get out here with anything faster than dialup.

Dell and Telstra

[watsondk]

A new Dell inspiron laptop with its built in DVD/CDR combo drive would not read CDR media.

on calling Dell support, they told me that "No DVD ROM Drive will ever read CDR Media without a UDF reader driver"

--

then comes the real classic, also from Dell

Same laptop, started to overheat after about an hour of use, so thinking it was something to do with the Linux install, I restored it back to its windoze, which made no difference

calling Dell, they told me that it will run cooler with windoze than Linux, and just totally ignored the "Its Got WINDOZE" from me.

several calls later they sent a "tech" out to replace the CPU

----

The worse yet, and this time its not from a help desk in India (Yet!)

This time from my ISP (Telstra), who when called about yet more email pain, told me when I mentioned I could not even ping the server let alone connect to it.

At the time I was running pine on a UNIX box

the "tech" told me "If I was running outlook I would be able to ping the server"

----

same help (hell) desk also told me:-

to install windoze on my Powerbook, after I called them about drop outs.

to install the OSX version of IE6, when I could not use their web site from Safari

This happens all the time with internal support...

[Anonymous Coward]

Hardware problem with company laptop, call help desk.

Me: My laptop won't boot.
Support: You need to open a ticket on the help desk web page before we can help you.
Me: ...

It's the OTHER company

[br00tus]

I've found if two companies are involved with something, it's always the other company that is to blame. If there were dropped packets or slowness between machines we had at Level 3 and machines we had at Globalcenter, the fault would always be the other one from whoever's tech support I was asking. Same with carriers and network providers, Verizon blamed the ISP, the ISP always blamed Verizon.

One time I was working with an application server called NetDynamics running on a Solaris machine when NetDynamics tech support said "It's a problem with Solaris, it's a Sun problem". I yelled at him "Sun bought you last year, you ARE Sun!!!" He stammered and said "Yaa, that's true...but it is a problem with Solaris". Ugh.

Re:It's the OTHER company

[magefile]

I assume by subtitles you mean closed captions, in which case what Sky did is a violation of Federal law. It's illegal to strip captions from media that has it, or to sell A/V equipment without a caption decoder, except in a few very specific cases.

Unfortunately, there's no codified enforcement, and there's no quality requirements - in theory, they could send a "." every five minutes and be completely legal. Smacktards.

I'm hard of hearing, so I need captions in order to be able to follow a TV show without straining to hear. Still, though, the best part is probably when you're watching a cartoon, and the captions have one joke, and the audio has another.

time for Real Insurance Reports

[linuxbaby]

Maybe you've already seen these - but here are the hilarious Real Insurance Reports

The following was published by an insurance company for internal distribution. These reports were submitted when policy-holders were asked for a brief statement describing their particular accident.

• The other car collided with mine without giving warning of its intention.
• I thought my window was down but found it was up when I put my hand through it.
• A pedestrian hit me and went under my car.
• The guy was all over the place. I had to swerve a number of times before I hit him.
• I pulled away from the side of the road, glanced at my mother-in-law and headed over the embankment.
• The accident occured when I was attempting to bring my car out of a skid by steering it into the other vehicle.
• I was driving my car out of the driveway in the usual manner, when it was struck by the other car in the same place it had been struck several times before.
• I was on my way to the doctor's with rear-end trouble when my universal joint gave way, causing me to have an accident.
• As I approached the intersection, a stop sign suddenly appeared in a place where no stop sign had ever appeared before. I was unable to stop in time to avoid the accident.
• The telephone pole was approaching fast. I was attempting to swerve out of its path when it struck my front end.
• To avoid hitting the bumper of the car in front, I struck the pedestrian.
• My car was legally parked as it backed into the other vehicle.
• An invisible car came out of nowhere, struck my vehicle and vanished.
• When I saw I could not avoid a collision, I stepped on the gas and crashed into the other car.
• The pedestrian had no idea which direction to go, so I ran him over.
• I saw the slow-moving, sad-faced old gentleman as he bounced off the hood of my car.
• Coming home, I drove into the wrong house and collided with a tree I don't have.
• The indirect cause of this accident was a little guy in a small car with a big mouth.

Speakeasy/Covad

[psoriac]

I had this exact same problem when I had my Speakeasy service (through Covad) installed earlier this year. For me it lasted exactly 14 days before it magically started working one night with no explanation to this day.

Every time I called them to see if they had made any progress, I got the same "do you have a router, does it have a firewall, are you running Windows, did you try blah blah blah" run around. I eventually narrowed it down to an MTU problem by crafting custom response packets from my external webserver until I hit a packet size that got through, but even with this information they weren't able to fix it.

That the internet was the bottleneck

[galonso]

Had a 28.8 back in the day, and was coding web pages for NS2.x (tables -- woohoo) and was getting less than 1k per second throughput. Called the ISP, and they identified the modem as being a "problem part." So I went to the store where I bought the modem the previous week, and got a wonderful bit of nonsense:

sales tech-"It can't be your modem, it runs at 28.8 and the internet isn't even that fast."
me-"excuse me?"
sales tech-"Yessir, the internet only runs at 300 baud, which is a measurement of how fast the bits can go through the pins in the cable connector. You see, the wires are actually faster, they run at 9600 baud, but the pins can only go 300 because they are hollow and electrons, which is what electricity is made of, won't go through hollow pins, so they have to go around the edges. Since there are hundreds of these pins hooking up the internet the internet is limited to 300 baud, and I apologize for whoever sold you the 28.8 modem."
me-*looks dazed*
sales tech-"as an apology, let me give you $5 off on a soundcard upgrade, and I'll throw in a cable connector with solid pins for your modem so that you will know the speed issues are not at your end." (remember this was in the serial port days)

The guy had little kernels of almost truth in there, but I think it was luck:)

Re:Plenty of them...

[afxgrin]

If you've ever worked technical support for a consumer electronics manufacturer, you would realise that the person on the phone is required to follow certain guidelines in troubleshooting.

When I worked tech support I attempted to reduce the required number of steps by removing redundant troubleshooting. Upon hearing that the customer is relatively competent in what they're doing I would skip the bullshit. I always sat at the borderline of getting fired for just not following policy. It was fun knowing that within 1 year the job would not matter. :-)

Even if I tried to follow the guidelines I would change simple questions like:
"Do you have it plugged in?"
to a
"I assume you have it plugged in...." with the customer, when realizing their dumbassedness would reply "Well whatcha' know ... I did forget to plug it in!".

It makes them happy when they figure things out on their own without telling them to do anything. :-)

To make things clear, management came down on me even over happy customers. Customers who even had written letters of appreciation! :-) I didn't give them anything for free, I did't give out 'confidential' information, I just skipped 'Basic' troubleshooting steps.

The Computer's On Fire!!

[Anonymous Coward]

A coworker of mine (University) was working the helpdesk and was seconds from shutting his phone off when he got one last call.

User: OH MY GOD THE COMPUTER IS ON FIRE! Help! There's a computer on fire.
Tech Support: HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
User: My name is blah, I'm the assistant dean for the University.
Tech Support (to himself): OH FUCK

Boss the next day: Umm, yeah. You're outta here. Nothing I can do.

Turned out to be a disk that crashed the hard way. And the platter decided it was still going to spin...and get really hot...and...you know the story.

The Bits/Bytes Multiplier

[ewhac]

The canonical multiplier to go from bytes/sec to bits/sec is ten (10): One start bit, eight data bits, one stop bit. This is how things were over serial/modem connections not so very long ago.

I find it still remains a reasonable rule of thumb. DSL and Ethernet frame data packets differently, of course. There are no start or stop bits surrounding each byte, but there is a multi-byte packet header and trailer. IP framing, of course, adds more overhead, but I find the 10:1 rule is close enough for most purposes. Besides, it's really easy to calculate in your head.

Schwab

From an old NetZero tech

[NoWhere Man]

If you got one of the 3 week program "trained" type of techs I feel sorry for you guys...

Every so often you might have gotten one of us real Geeks.

But even we had to deal with internal stupid issues.
I remember a few times through out the 3 years I worked for Netzero when certain accounts would become unavailable for no apparent reason.
The only similarity between the accounts would be what letter they started with.
We'd come into work, and on the white board we'd see something like: "Accounts beginning with A, G and K are not able to connect".
Oh you could ask why, but you'd never get an answer.

The release of Windows XP was no picnic either. I had to wing more then a few calls. I never saw some many people spend time on break for those first few weeks.
Try explaining to people that thier old hardware doesn't work on thier brand new computer because of XP? That made people happy.

BOFH Excuse Server

[plankers]

This might be slightly OT, but you can't ignore the BOFH excuse server!

Salespeople

[Xaroth]

I once received a call from Qworst offering to sell me DSL. Since it had not been available in my area when I first moved in, I was interested to hear that it was available. To their credit, it was, in fact, newly available. To their discredit, the person I was speaking with wanted to bundle MSN with it.

I asked whether MSN would give me a static IP address (knowing full well where this conversation was going to lead). Her response: "It says here that you get 9 email addresses."

I explained, politely, that there was a difference between IP addresses and email addresses. She insisted that there was not, and that I would recieve 9 email addresses if I signed up with them.

I asked her if she knew what I was talking about, at which point she became indignant. She began to expound upon how *much* she knew about it all, and that I should trust her, she knows what she's talking about, and that I would receive 9 email addresses.

After a bit more back and forth, I decided to change tack - I said that this was all very fine and well, but that I would much rather use a 3rd party ISP. After explaining to her what an ISP was, and how this was different than MSN in this context, she said that such a thing was impossible to do. I was unable to suppress the cough of surprise.

"Excuse me? I had a different provider the last time that I had DSL at a previous address. I know for a fact that you can do this."

She was insistent that it was impossible, and became belligerent. At this point, it was all fun and games for me (I mean, more so than originally), so I played along and said that the real reason that I wanted a 3rd party ISP was so that I could be sure to get a static IP address, and that I was pretty sure that this was not a part of MSN's service.

She reminded me, again, of exactly how many email addresses I would receive. I told her she didn't know what she was talking about, and she said some very rude things and put me on hold while she talked to a supervisor.

I waited for a couple of minutes, and when she returned, she was very sheepish and apologetic. You see, it turns out that you *can* order DSL with a 3rd party ISP, but that she was only a part of the sales team doing this particular promotion, so if I wanted to order DSL that way, I'd need to call their DSL sales line. (The irony of this exchange was, of course, lost on her.)

I politely thanked her for her help, and recommended that she read the Qwest DSL website and learn about the difference between IP addresses and email addresses before talking to more customers. She thanked me, and I hung up.

Not an explanation, but...

[Eythian]

...I called a dialup ISP because I couldn't get a PPP connection. Authentication was fine, but PPP negotiation failed. I explained this to the tech support people, who naturally asked what version of windows I was running. I said that I found the information out in Linux, but it had the same problem in Windows. I explained the PPP negotiation issue, and was met with 'what's PPP?' as the response. I think I spent more time explaining basic networking to the support person than anything else. Turns out they just had a flakey server that was fixed 15 minutes later.

Our own tech support

[Feelgood]

Our 1st level tech support forwarded a call to me because the woman couldn't figure out her password. When I talked to the woman, she said, "The woman I was just talking to told me my password started with an 'X' as in 'Zebra'. What should I type?"

Virus problems and my ISP...

[soren42]

The stupidest tech support answer I've ever run into was during the height of the virus/worm scares in February.

My cable modem connection had stopped work. Given my ISPs track record, this was unremarkable, but after it continued for 2 days, I decided to call the tech support number. After supplying my ID number, the support person told me that my connection was intentionally shut off because I was broadcasting a widely-circulated Windows virus. I promptly informed the tech support person that I did not use the Windows operating system on any of my computers, and that I could not possibly have the virus I was accused of having.

The support rep immediately told me that I had the virus, and that they would not turn my connection back on until I jumped through their anti-virus hoops. I argued for almost 10 minutes with this neophyte that I could not use their Windows anti-virus on my Linux systems, and that even if I could, it would not do a damn bit of good. Did it matter? Of course not.

Finally, in order to get my connection back on, I agreed to perform their anti-virus tricks "to the best of my ability", and install Windows just so I could "remove the virus" from my system. The rep actually thought this was an excellent resolution to the problem, but for some reason didn't believe I would actually do it (could have been my vehement renouncements against the entirety of Microsoft's products). After another 5 minutes of cajoling, I convinced her to turn my connection back on so I could get the anti-virus tools, and access Windows Update.

I was, however, given a stern warning that if I was found to persist in operating with this virus, I would have my account revoked, and my services cancelled. I submissively agreed, and thanked the rep for her time and patience. I haven't heard anything since, and I never did actually install Windows or use the anti-virus crap.

What do you expect for minimum wage, a script, and a bunch of college kids majoring in business?

Some of my best lines :

[Glonoinha]

User : Why does it (something, various) .. ?
Me : Because it fucking does.

User : Why do I have to (do something, various) .. ?
Me : Because you fucking have to.

User : I can't (do something, various) ...
Me : Reboot your computer.
User : I just rebooted my computer.
Me : Rebooting the computer without knowing why you are rebooting it won't fix it. Reboot it again.
(waits...)
User : Wow, that fixed it. Thanks!
Me (under my breath) : D'oh.
(actually there was a esoteric bug in SPX connections on a Netware network where computers configured as remote print servers would not reconnect the SPX connection the first time it was attempted after that workstation locked up because the Netware server thought that the SPX connection was still connected. Attempting to reconnect from the same MAC address failed, but the server knew something was wrong at that point and released the SPX connection and the next time the 'print server' configured computer tried to tell the server that it was ready to be a 'print server' it would let it. As it did all this in the boot script (autoexec.bat) it really would fail on the first reboot and work on the second reboot. I could have walked them through typing in the commands by hand, but having them reboot it again was generally (much) faster.)

Re:Some of my best lines :

[Anonymous Coward]

Now, why does that sound familar to this:

A novice was trying to fix a broken Lisp machine by turning the power off and on.

Knight, seeing what the student was doing, spoke sternly: "You cannot fix a machine by just power-cycling it with no understanding of what is going wrong."

Knight turned the machine off and on.

The machine worked.

Re:Some of my best lines :

[techno-vampire]

Sometimes you have to do things like that because the caller wouldn't understand you if you tried to explain. Sometimes, it's not worth your while to try. If you really want to see what it's like "on the other side of the phone," check out this book of tech support horror stories. You'll have a little more sympathy for the techs once you've finished.

Re:Some of my best lines :

[kyletinsley]

A guy who did typewriter repair in the office next to us used to tell dim-witted customers who were unable to describe their problem well that "it sounds like there's a screw loose somewhere between keyboard and the chair".

Most of them never got it, and we'd die laughing under our breaths in the next room...

Re:Some of my best lines :

[AGMW]

there's a screw loose somewhere between keyboard and the chair

My favourites are Pilot Error and Fat Fingers.

Also, heard story about TV repair man turning up at some house and looking at the TV, before wandering over and hitting the TV, which fixes it. Hand a bill for 100 pounds to the homeowner who says it's too much and wants an itemised bill. TV Repair man writes note :-

Hitting Television - 5 Pounds
Knowning where
to Hit Television - 95 pounds

Re:Some of my best lines :

[TCaptain]

When this happens with me I usually just smile and say:

"You had cold hands"

Of course, now its funny to walk around the office and seeing people try and warm up their hands before booting up.

Re:Some of my best lines :

[6Yankee]

it sounds like there's a screw loose somewhere between keyboard and the chair

Also known as PICNIC - Problem In Chair, Not In Computer.

Once the diagnosis has got this far, trouble-shooting becomes a pleasure ;>

Re:Some of my best lines :

[Glonoinha]

Develop a strong ancillary relationship with the people you work with, bond with them out of the office (that's the multiplayer arena with the blue and white part on top, green part on the bottom, and has vehicles) and after you have known them for a while you would be surprised at how well they react to all of those statements.

Why do I have to hold my mouse button down and move it to highlight a block of text, and why do I have to hold down the CTRL key before I hit the C key to copy the text to the buffer, and why do I have to click the Start button when I want to shut down?

If you know a more effective answer than 'Because you fucking have to.' ... particularly when dealing with oilfield field hands, I am all ears.

Re:Some of my best lines :

[zaphod110676]

>>...(that's the multiplayer arena with the blue and white part on top, green part on the bottom, and has vehicles).....

You're talking about Unreal Tournament 2K4, right? The leviathan is my favorite.

Re:Some of my best lines :

[Glonoinha]

It's funny because that's how Americans really talk. Bet they didn't teach that line at the VPJ Acadamy of English.

Customer asks : Why do I have to hit the Start button when I want to turn off the computer?

Not how Americans talk : I am very happily to be helping you with your problems. You see it says right here that for you to be shutting down your computer you must be pressing the Start button and then verily nicely selecting the shut down option. It was my pleasure to be helpingly assisting you.

How an American that didn't personally know the caller would reply : Because you have to.

How an American that knows the caller on a personal basis would answer : Because you fucking have to.

Once someone has mastered a particular instrument in music, they then enhance and personalize the music, make it -their- music, through improvisation. The English language is the same way - develop a mastery of the language and then extend it to better express yourself. A first year English student making up words and pronouncing them wrong, using the wrong tense and timber ... that's just ugly. George W Bush making up words to better express his point - that's funny. The word 'fucking' is in the language for a reason, both as an adverb and an adjective - and when used correctly adds significant value towards expressing a particular sentiment. I wouldn't use it as a verb in an office setting however, that would be wrong.

To all the overseas Tier I tech support phone professionals : next time you get a call that is so blatantly obvious, something along the lines of 'Why do I have to (do something obvious)?' ... say 'Because you fucking have to.' The caller will relate, will understand the reply, and will probably respect you more for expressing yourself in a manner that doesn't try to hide behind technical jargon - you will be talking their language. No joke.

Re:Some of my best lines :

[Tiroth]

From the excerpt, that support guy just seems to be a whiner. Example:

Some people are very reluctant to let a call end. I don't know if they've found the experience so trying that they want to do everything they can to make sure they don't need to call back, are afraid to try things on their own or simply can't believe that their computer's fixed and will stay fixed.

Anyone who has dealt with tech support/customer service at a large company already knows why the "insecure user" doesn't want to hang up: they probably had to navigate through a 10-level automated system and wait on hold for 30 minutes to get support on the phone--and they know if they call back again, they'll have to repeat the explanation/troubleshooting of the problem from square 1.

Re:Some of my best lines :

[goatan]

Once someone has mastered a particular instrument in music, they then enhance and personalize the music, make it -their- music, through improvisation. The English language is the same way - develop a mastery of the language and then extend it to better express yourself.

not really Changing the spelling of a word is like changing one note in a chord it does look/sound wrong. music is made up of relations beetween notes that don't change, it's what notes are used in what order and rythm that makes your music just like it's what word's in what order make up your essay the notes and words should never change e is e c is c. this is true even for jazz. Improvisation doesn't meen hitting random notes you still have to play what has been composed to sound like the song your doing.

Re:Some of my best lines :

[Piquan]

"You had cold hands"

That's good, I like that.

I've gone in for a bit of mystical-appearing troubleshooting myself. A different time, the same company: there was a box showing erratic symptoms. I felt sure it was bad RAM. (The techs who were already on-site had been looking for software problems, and I felt sure they'd checked everything quite thoroughly.) I noticed while it was booting that HIMEM.SYS gave the message, "Bypassing memory test". (There's a flag in config.sys to make it do that. The default-- at least back then, I have no idea about today-- is to briefly test the RAM.)

Well, the error was pretty prominent. I felt that even HIMEM's simple memory test would find it. Me, I had just finished my lunch-- carry-out chicken from down the street. I even still had the carry-out box in my hand. It was too good of an opportunity to pass up.

I laid out some scratch paper on the user's desk. Then I took my box of chicken bones, and shook them over the computer, muttering "Foo mane padme hum". Then I dumped the chicken bones onto the paper, and studied them for a moment.

"Now the problem may be seen," I pronounced. I rebooted the computer, and subtly held down the left shift key. Some techs may remember, among other things, this would cause the on-disk config.sys to be ignored, and a default loaded-- one that lets himem.sys test the memory.

Sure enough, it reported the failure.

A different company. I was working the phone lines for tech support. The only other guy on support-- a buddy of mine from way back who happened to get hired there-- was green as can be; the company didn't even bother to train him on our product.

He comes to my desk in a hurry. He had a customer who couldn't install our product. He hurredly described the symptoms. I told him to instruct the customer thusly: take the disk, and hold it vertically. As if the disk were a knife, and you were trying to cut the desk, rap the disk against the desk three times. Then try the install again.

The poor fella looked like I had gone insane. "The customer's on the line right now," he said. "This is no time for jokes; I need a real answer!" I refused to tell him any more until he told the customer what I said. He went back to his desk. I could hear him start talking to the customer: "I'm real sorry, but..."

When he came back a few minutes later, his eyes were as wide as saucers. It had worked, the customer was happy. What was all that about?

I explained that there was a bit of dust on the disk surface.

A recent one. . .

[MikeDawg]

While checking to see if my ISP (cable i-net provider) provides IMAP for checking email, I decided to call. After calling, and explaining to the tech guy what IMAP was, he said: "Can't you just login through our web interface and use it." I said, "Yes, I can, but I'd rather not, because I'd like it to simply be checked by my MUA, rather than diddie dallying around typing in passwords on the web interface and such."

Silence for a couple of minutes, and then he said, I don't know.

No matter *what* the problem...

[schwaang]

me:"My cable modem is dead."
@home tier1: "Clear your browser cache."

me:"I can ping the gateway everything else is unreachable."
@home tier1: "Clear your browser cache."

me:"I just downloaded 200MB of pr0n in 30 seconds and I'm calling to say thank you!!"
@home tier1: "Clear your browser cache."
me:"Hmmm.. good idea."

Re:No matter *what* the problem...

[dubl-u]

From the jargon file entry for field circus:

Q: How can you recognize a field circus engineer with a flat tire?
A: He's changing one tire at a time to see which one is flat.

Q: How can you recognize a field circus engineer who is out of gas?
A: He's changing one tire at a time to see which one is flat.

Q: How can you tell it's your field circus engineer?
A: The spare is flat, too.

Overheard at Best Buy

[OneIsNotPrime]

I bet we could start a whole subthread of explanations heard from Best Buy employees. I hear something ridiculous almost every time I go in there (unfortunately, the line is usually delivered to someone who seems to buy every word)!

* "This [less expensive] camera can only hold 15 seconds of video because of the 'cache overflow'" - about a Sony Cybershot P7 whose video length is limited only by Memory Stick size

* "Well, the wireless internet is faster because it doesn't have to squeeze through the cable."

and the most egregious of all lies-

"This Lexmark printer is excellent."

Re:Overheard at Best Buy

[brer_rabbit]

Best Buy is fun-- I needed a crossover ethernet cable, went to Best Buy and asked the sales drone where they were. After finding them I gawked at the $30 price tag for a 10' cable. I said something about how I could get a crimper, cable and do it myself for that price.

His response, "if you know how to use a crimper you shouldn't even be in Best Buy!"

Re:Overheard at Best Buy

[Sardak]

I've got a great Best Buy story, the timing was just absolutely perfect.

I was there with a fellow co-worker looking at various things, and making fun of their absurd pricing (I work at a privately owned computer retail store), when I stumbled upon the "Ultimate Networking Kit." It included about 250 ft. of Cat5e cable, 20 RJ-45 connectors, and a set of crimpers, all for $99.98.

After doing some quick math in my head, I came to the conclusing that all the same materials could be bought, sans the huge box, for about $35 at our store. Right as I mentioned this to him, an employee walks around the corner and notices me looking at it, and replies with something along the lines of, "That's a GREAT deal. If you do a lot of networking, like me, you can't beat that price."

Re:Overheard at Best Buy

[Tore S B]

"This [less expensive] camera can only hold 15 seconds of video because of the 'cache overflow'" - about a Sony Cybershot P7 whose video length is limited only by Memory Stick size"

Erm, that's completely true. Cheap cameras can't encode video realtime, and also it can't write it to the flash chip fast enough, and therefore runs out of cache in 15 secs. Sony Cybershot, however (pretty damned good cameras, btw), can encode it realtime, and write to the fairly fast Memory Stick devices.

Heheh...

[Gary Yogurt]

I bought a new Philips TV several months ago and the component input wouldn't quite work with my PS2. (I'm far from inept, I've worked as a professional video editor.) So after some lazy attempts to fix it, I figured I'd call Philips and ask if there were any issues after various PS2 message boards failed to help. After several layers of phone-menus, I finally spoke to a real person, a nice Indian lady who probably was introduced to electricity earlier that day. I explained my simple situation and asked if my TV model had any issues with the PS2. Her response was that "the Playstation should not be used with any television." Regretfully, I hung up the phone instead of mining for comedy gold. I called again and spoke to an Indian gentleman who had only been briefed on television and was not aware that things could be hooked up to televisions. So before hanging up I explained to him what a Playstation was and used lots of fancy language to describe my problem. (I just didn't know how to fix it!) Philips rules! PS- I fixed the problem by updating the DVD drivers that come with the PS2's DVD remote.

Iomega support sucks ass!

[DigiShaman]

I can't recall the exact events. But back in 98, I had to RMA an Iomega ZIP drive for the IT department. When I gave them a call, I got an automated answer on how to trouble shoot the problem. But, if I wanted to speak with a "live technical support specialist" I had to provide a credit card account first.

WTF!!? The damn thing was under warranty. I'm sure they wouldn't have charged the card. But still, I didn't have access to a corporate card nor would I have used my personal one. After I told my boss (Admin of the department) he agreed with me. From that point one, we took the loss and vowed never to purchase another Iomega product. Fuck em, never again!

Re:Iomega support sucks ass!

[Gatton]

YES they would charge the card. I had a Zip drive and had to call for tech support because Windows 95 wouldn't recognize it. I had to pay $14.95 just to speak to a person. A few years later I received a letter in the mail saying that I was able to join a class action lawsuit against Iomega.

Details here:
http://news.com.com/2100-1023-208214.html?l egacy=c net

Re:Plenty of them...

[richdun]

I understand, I know plenty of people who have had to work in tech support and gotten some pretty crazy calls (like the "Internet doesn't work" when the customer doesn't have their modem or NIC plugged in, or even better, no modem or NIC in their computer). I just management then would let you find out if the customer was competent, then switch to a different set of troubleshooting. Like when a hard drive went bad in a Dell I had, and the email I sent sounded like I knew what I was talking about, they quickly just asked me to run this diagnostic software they have and then report the results, not the usual run around. Or for my HP TC1000, when I called about some speaker noises and that I had tried everything, they just took my address and had it picked up. Those are the tech support calls I like, the kind where they adapt to how well you know the product you're calling about. But I can understand if management doesn't like it, they don't have to actually deal with the customers, so of course they should know what they are talking about.

i've run help desks for almost 17 years

[HBI]

The problem is simple: you have a fixed budget which is universally too little to hire a lot of good people. You have a fixed (or increasing) call volume. So, what to do?

Well, in most places today they construct scripts and then hire peons to read them. They figure that most people will be deterred by this. They spend their nut on a theoretical third level person or people who are going to take care of the insurmountable issues. The rest of the people are there to obstruct the majority of people from the people who actually have a shot at fixing problems.

I've never worked that kind of desk. I actually know what i'm doing and if I don't, I find out fast. I hire people who are either tabula rasa, whom I can turn into something decent, or who have worked in service industries (I don't hire other people's help desk people, in other words). I prefer ex-military people. They are used to being treated like mushrooms and still solving problems. I also like to hire bright young women fresh out of college (or even those who didn't finish). Besides the obvious improvement in the surroundings, they tend to be pretty good at first level support if you give them a solid grounding. They're better at settling customers down in many cases. Then, garnish with one or two talented techs to sit in the middle and start spreading knowledge around. No scripts. Keep a team together for 6 months and everyone pretty much rises to the level of the 2nd level people.

The funny thing is that I can't keep employees very well (heh). They leave me and go make more money elsewhere with the skills they gain. Good money, too. I'm glad to see so many of them succeed. At my current job they have budget, and we've had the same team for 2.5 years. That's an all time record for me.

Even in 1994, imagine being told in NYC to hire 6 techs at salaries between $25k and $35k (preferred under 30). Even getting people to show up for that money in Manhattan is a pain in the ass.

As for problem solving skills, you tend to like those who worked in service industries. I personally worked at an appliance store for my parents from when I was 11 on. Me and my brother used to go out on a truck and fix refrigerators, washers, dryers, etc. It wasn't all that dissimilar to fixing up computers - there was a user interface, and a good portion of the time the problem was that the people were using the interface wrong. Say, not knowing how to use the washer timer or overloading the dryer or letting crap melt in the dishwasher and foul things up, or failing to clean the condenser coil at the bottom of the fridge (this is important). The rest of the time it was hardware issues. The hardware was modular and easily replaceable. Sound familiar?

Good support isn't unattainable. The sucky help desks have thrown in the towel though and basically don't care.

Re:i've run help desks for almost 17 years

[zbuffered]

Solution: if a customer wants a level 2 tech, they have to answer a question first. Something simple enough, but that demonstrates that they know more about computers than the peons at level 1. IE: get me your IP address without any help. Tell me how you can eject a CD-ROM and a paperclip. Simple.

Stay off the Internet today!!

[Dmala]

Several years ago I signed up with an ISP for dial-up service. I forget the name, it was a national service as I recall, but I got the impression that their local office was pretty small and possibly independently run. I called up to get the POP server address on what happened to be the day that one of the early e-mail viruses (Melissa, maybe?) was scheduled to deliver a payload. Keep in mind, that a fix for it had been widely available for over a month. The tech picked up the phone and went, "My God man, don't you know what day it is? The Melissa virus went off today! I can't help you today, we've already lost three machines in our back room. Call back tomorrow, and whatever you do, DON'T GO ON THE INTERNET!"

Of course, I'm the fool, because I didn't immediately run to find another ISP.

Bad sectors

[kabdib]

Overnight, my 1G drive (this was a while ago) developed about 10,000 bad sectors. Obviously bad news.

Gateway Tech Support: "How many sectors are there on the disk?"

Me: "Oh, about two million."

GTS: "That's really not very many then, is it?"

I never bought another computer from them.

Magical Self Powered Wireless Rogers Cable Modem

[Myrv]

I still remember the time the Rogers Cable tech insisted he could ping and connect to my friends modem while my friend and I were sitting there staring at the modem in the middle of his floor, unpowered, and disconnected from the cable. The tech wouldn't believe us when we said there was no way in hell he was pinging this modem....oh well.

Turns out somebody else had hard coded the IP number that the Rogers was trying to assign to my friends modem. Unfortunately it took 3 hours and several higher level techs later to figure this one out and fix it.

Re:Best BOFH answer.

[ErichTheWebGuy]

no, no, no, no, no! "The Earth's magnetic field is shifting. You will have to walk back to your dorm with your floppy disk wrapped in tin foil and hold it it least 6 feet above the ground."

Worst tech support explanation

[Zakabog]

"We don't support linux." I've heard that so many times from Road Runner. When I moved to AZ though the DSL guy saw my desktop (Afterstep) looked around a bit for the start menu, then I realized I should probably reset (the modem he gave me to start off with only worked in windows so I had to reset to install it) so I killed X and he saw the prompt "Wow linux, what distro is it?" I told him (debian) and he said "Wow, debian? We're converting all our servers over from Win 2000 to Debian real soon."

I've also had good experiences with tech support, especially on other peoples computers cause I'd be calling for warrenty work. I'd call up say "Hey this computer has a problem starting up, so I swapped out a few things like the PSU, RAM, CPU, and motherboard, the motherboard is probably fried since when I tried a different one it worked, so where could I get a new motherboard since the PC is still under warrenty?" The guy went from ultra depressed (thinking "Oh no, not another problem that will probably require 2 hours to finally get to the conclusion that someone has to look at the computer") to really happy and excited like "Wow thanks for testing out all that stuff, so it's deffinitely the motherboard? Just bring it to such and such store and they'll install a new one for you."

PC tech support seems so much easier to deal with since they seem to know more about how the computer works. I guess it's easier for them since the problem is always on the users end and they have to deal with a lot of different situations. With internet tech support all they know how to deal with is configuring e-mail and setting auto detect IP address in Windows 98 and above. They rarely have to deal with a customer calling up telling them there is a problem on their end and even if the customer described exactly what was wrong, they wouldn't be able to do anything.

neh, Fry's

[ajlitt]

You see, Fry's goes one step further than just having a horde of ill-trained customer service people roaming the store. They assign a person to each section, and go as far as to post a picture of them at the end of the aisles they're in charge of.

One day, upon needing some cable ends for some ethernet I was running, I decided to go to Fry's. They do have a good selection of networking hardware, so I figured I should have no problem getting the connectors. While I'm trying to find the RJ45s for rounded solid cable amongst the RJ11s, MMJs, and cable boots I get accosted by the salesdude, wanting to know if I need help. This is the same guy whose picture is pasted to the shelf. So I says to him, I says, "Could you help me find some RJ45s for plenum cable?" Reasonable request, right? I mean, there were routers to the left of me and telco racks to the right, and big spools of CAT5 behind me, so somewhere in that vicinity should be cable ends. His response: "I'm sorry, sir, I'm not sure what you are talking about."

I eventually found them on my own.

The moral of this story? Don't ask a customer if they need any help if you don't even know what products you sell!

Re:neh, Fry's

[n6mod]

The *only* time I've had anyone at Fry's tell me something intelligent was this:

I was looking for something that was on sale that week, probably an HD. Sunnyvale was out, but the guy I asked check the computer, and Palo Alto still had a dozen or so.

Me: "Can you call them and have them hold one for me?"

Him: "Sir, this is Fry's. You can get there before I can get someone on the phone with a clue."

Re:neh, Fry's

[robsteele]

Hmm, two posts about polite Fry's guys telling the truth. Maybe it's not such a bad place.

Re:There's data stuck in the cable

[tukkayoot]

Sometimes you have to pinch the cable tightly at one end and move your grip down the length of the cable to the other end to make sure you squeeze all of the data out of it.

Just FYI.

Widescreen idiocy

[Brian Kendig]

Back when Apple released its first widescreen (1600x1024) LCD "Cinema Display", I got one. But I was disappointed that Apple's DVD player software didn't handle it properly. When I played a widescreen DVD, it would have thick black borders around all four sides, as if it was first matted to fit inside a 4:3 area, then it was matted to fit inside a 16:9 area inside that. Not a big problem, just a silly bug, and an annoyance. So I called Apple tech support. "I just want to make sure you know of this problem, that you log it in the Apple bug database to be fixed in the next rev of the DVD software," I said.

"That's not a bug," said the tech support peon. "Here's a tech note which explains why you'll have bars above and below the picture when you play a widescreen movie on your monitor."

I told him, "That tech note only applies to 4:3 displays. I'm on a widescreen display. It should still give me thin black bars on the top and the bottom, but it shouldn't put bars on the sides as well. This is Apple's high-end monitor and I paid good money for it. I want to see this problem logged as a bug."

He gave up and had second-tier tech support call me back.

"First, I want you to reformat your hard drive and reinstall your operating system, then try it again," the second-tier guy told me. I figured, what the heck, I have backups, doing a reinstall will take less time than trying to convince him I don't need to reinstall. So I reinstalled. The problem remained, of course.

"The problem is that the Mac can only show a movie at up to twice its original size," the second-tier guy told me. "Your Cinema Display is bigger than that."

"Listen," I said. I have a sixteen-by-nine movie. I have a display that's 1600x1024 resolution. The movie is playing in a 1280x720 box in the middle of the screen. Now, what's the biggest resolution a 16x9 movie should be able to play on a 1600x1024 screen?"

There was silence on the line.

"I'll give you the answer. 1600x900. Right? That goes from edge to edge and leaves thin black bars at the top and bottom, each exactly sixty-two pixels tall. Not thick black bars around all four sides like I have now. Right?"

More silence, then: "I'll work on this and call you back."

He never called me back.

Re:Widescreen idiocy

[SkankhodBeeblebrox]

Guess what, he never called you back because you were a self-righteous caller...

The most annoying thing on the planet (for a helpdesk agent, obviously not for the customer) is a customer who thinks (or even DOES) he knows more than the people he is calling... You're calling them for support, and when they try to help you, you treat them like idiots... I really can't see why they didn't want to go that extra mile for you!

Oh, guess what... There are multiple aspect ratios for Widescreen DVD... But you already knew that, didn't you?

Re:Widescreen idiocy

[p3d0]

The aspect ratio doesn't matter. No aspect ratio would require bars on all four sides.

Re:Widescreen idiocy

[mpaque]

Want to know what really happened with the problem?

First, the DVD player back then didn't know much about wide aspect ratio or high-resolution displays. So...

First it switched your display to a lower resolution it could handle. The lower resolution modes have a 4:3 aspect ratio. Without 'stretching', or widening the pixels in the horizontal direction, which would look odd, this results in a display mode of operation in which the display produces black bands on the left and right of the display.

Next, now that it had a display resolution it knew about, the player looked at the aspect ratio of the movie, and determined that when it filled the active display width (which was matted, but it didn't know that), that there wouldn't be enough pixels of height to fill the display vertically. The program then generated a set of horizontal matte bars.

The vertical matte bars came from the display mode of operation. The horizontal bars came from the program's need to generate a matte.

Since then, the player has been substantially rewritten, and now knows much more about display hardware. I'd have been very surprised if the support tech understood details of display hardware and the DVD player internals.

heh

[GoNINzo]

That would 1997, when I was forced to call AOL and get support for a guy who needed to use it for work. (yeah don't get me started). The guy, Chauncy, eventually found out that the guy had an ethernet card and said 'Yeah, we don't support networks'. I was dumbfounded. 'Um, but isn't the Internet a network? Isn't AOL a Network?' 'Yeah, but we don't support networks.'

Just a little overstated... heh

Visual Studio 1.0 Collegiant Edition support

[Maigus]

A buddy and I had an assignment back in college to write "a windows app". That was pretty much the long and short of the constraints and this being circa 93 or so, we were working with VS 1.0 (installed from 27 3.5" floppies, no less). This was the collegiant version with no optimizing compiler.

We decided it would be terribly cool to create a electronic version of Star Fleet Battles. So, off we went creating our SDI application.

After some blood, sweat and tears we had something which should have worked. It was correct in every way we could figure out but the damned thing kept crashing on us. (imagine that) I finally decided to take one for the team and open a support incident.

After spending hours on the phone on hold while talking to different clueless support weasels I was finally connected with a person with actuall programming experience. I don't know if he was a developer or not but he did try to help. Finally, he asked me if I could send him our source code so he could attempt to debug it because there didn't appear to be anything wrong with it. I emailed him the source package and waited.

And waited.

Waited...

Finally, I called the guy back 3 days later.

Me: "So, have you had a chance to look at our code yet?"

TS: "Yeah, neat little game you've got here - is it SFB?"

Me: "Yes, it's supposed to be - I've never seen it work."

TS: "What? It works fine. We've been playing it here in the office for the last couple of days."

Me: "But, my version doesn't work - what did you change?"

TS: "Where's it breaking again?"

Me: Tells him line number and error message.

TS: "Oh that - you're dealing with a known bug in the debug compiler. Just compile your code in release mode and you're good to go."

I 'politely' explained at this time that I was running the collegiant edition. "oh" he said. "You're screwed."

Eventually, he assisted me with determining a work around. I never did receive the free upgrade I was promised to VS 1.5 which was available at the time (though, I'll admit he started backtracking just as soon as he offered it - somebody probably slapped him).

IIRC, we got a B on the assignment. All the time we spent debugging and on the phone with MS tech support ate seriously into our plan to develop features. We were supposed to have a certain number of menu items and other metrics of functionality which we completely fell short of. Fortunately, I had email evidence of some of my communication with the TS guy so our prof was merciful.

That said, it was an excellent course in how software actually gets developed - spend huge quantities of time on the latest MS bug and fail to meet your feature requirements in the course of debugging and trying to make the stupid thing work.

DSL and network overhead.

[CatNTHat]

While I can't speak to the obvious idiotic answer the poster received I can say that I used to support DSL. While the web page was obviously wrong you cannot assume that you will get what you pay for on the invoice. Because of the way that most telecommunications providers provision DSL there is a possibility that up to 20% of the bandwidth you pay for can be taken up by network overhead. Not necessarily your network overhead. It actually depends on the number of people on the local loop.

As for actually troubleshooting it, pings don't mean crap. A traceroute will give you much more information. A continuous trace using something like mtr (Matt's TraceRoute) or some other similar program will help you narrow down where the problem is occuring, additionally, if its a router and not a bridge then the CPE configs should be checked. If its a bridge then an ATM ping from the edge router (ERX) can tell you if its actually on the circuit as there should only be the one hop between the ERX and the CPE. The tech support reps should be able to do this last one for you.

Regards,
FreeBSD Knight

Re:Best BOFH answer.

[Disoculated]

The sad thing is that when I used to work at a large ISP, we really did have a lot more calls come in whenever there was a big solar flare. Modems are sensitive littls sons-a-bitches. Of course nobody would believe us if we told them "sunspots", but you had to try.

It is correct that 1 byte/sec = many bits/second.

[terminal.dk]

Download speed is measured in kByte/sec.
Line speed is measured in bits/second (and often real bits at that).

If ATM is used (often the case), then there is an overhead of 5 bytes per 48 bytes of ATM data.

Add to this a TCP/IP overhead of up to 42 bytes/packet, giving an efficiency of around 95%.

This gives you more than 15% overhead. So a factor 10 is a good bet.

Now, if it is cable, there are many other things actually in there, as many are sharing the same cable etc. So it might eat another 20% - just like 802.11 is only spending half the bandwidth in each direction - and have lots of overhead.

Re:When I was 13...

[Lord Kano]

When I was 13 years old I used to call Gateway and request help. Most of the time they didn't even give me an answer, they would just hang up. F U Gateway! :)

That was probably because you had Dell.

LK

Harmonic convergence?

[peacefinder]

Upon asking why, I was informed that it "had something to do with data harmonics".

My brother once explained a firewall's operation to a non-tech as "rotating the shield harmonics." The explainee (while obviously not believing it literally) considered this a good enough analogy for his purposes.

Bloody brilliant. Wish I'd thought of it.

moisture in the cable

[Fishstick]

I had an intermittent problem with my cable modem for weeks that kept getting worse. The connection would slow down at random times, often coming to a complete halt. I would go down to where my masq box is hooked up to the cm, check the lights, ping the nameservers, etc -- all would usually check out, though with lots of packet loss. I'd call and they say it sounded like moisture in the cable!

Eventually I started losing connection alltogether. I'd go down and the status lights on the cm weren't blinking. I'd unplug, plug back in, run pump -R and try it again. Sometimes it would work, usually not. Again I called Comcast and they would schedule a tech visit, only to have the connection start working again a couple hours later and I'd call to cancel.

Every time, Comcast could see my cm online and insisted it must be my computer -- if they came out and the problem was on my end, they would charge me.

Well shit, they're gonna come out, see the POS 386 machine connected to the CM, see that it's running Linux, walk out and charge me -- so I ran the cm upstairs to a machine on the first floor and hooked it up directly so the tech would see that everything on my end was supported and fine.

Guess what -- started working again... for an hour. Then stopped. Then started. Then stopped again. This was nuts.

I went ahead and called them again and once again scheduled the service call -- working or not. I figured the worse that would happen now is they would come out and find it was working and I'd have to keep calling them back until they either fixed it or I had an anurism.

I went to work the next day and my wife called mid-day to tell me that the problem was fixed: "something had chewed through the cable and they had to replace it".

Sounded like the biggest bullshit explanation I ever heard until I got home and saw for myself. Sure enough, they had pulled the coax out from under the deck and run a new line -- the old line laying in the yard so I could see. Some little cocksucker with an overbite had chewed through the insulation.

The explanation the tech left with my wife was that the flakyness with the modem was probably because of varying dampness depending on outside temperature, time of day, dewpoint, etc. I think the modem dropped out everytime that buck-toothed, plastic-munching, broadband-killing fuckwad was out there nibbling on my cable!

Re:moisture in the cable

[pyrrhonist]

I think the modem dropped out everytime that buck-toothed, plastic-munching, broadband-killing fuckwad was out there nibbling on my cable!

(\(\
(^.^)
(")")

Thanks. Now I finally understand your sig. :)

It works here

[gnp]

Back in 1994 or so I was working for a company integrating some technology from MicroStrategy into our product and we were having some trouble making parts of it work. One time when we called technical support and posed our question, the response was a quick "It works here, thanks for calling!" followed by an immediate hang-up!

Re:This happens all the time with internal support

[cybermace5]

I've been on the other end of it, and they have no choice. As soon as the company-mandated trouble ticket system was installed, the company began using it to track IT personnel to see if they were doing enough. Trouble tickets were the only existing measure of an employee's performance. If you got direct-called and ran out to fix a dozen hardware problems at a time, you still weren't doing anything. So, submit the help desk ticket. Use the extra few minutes to relax on company time, due to their own policies, or swab down your filthy keyboard to make it all nice for the poor tech who's coming to fix your machine.

Bits about Bytes

[Anonymous Coward]

actually in asynch serial comms (such as your 56K) a byte is data bits, plus start, stop, parity bits
so the old standard 8,n,1
is really 1 start bit, plus 8 data bits, no parity bit, and 1 stop bit
so 10 bits in this case
the largest commmon byte would be something like
8,e,2 (1 start+8+1(for even)+2 stop bits, thus
12 bits in that byte as transmitted.

Earthlink

[Bugmaster]

Earthlink is, by far, the worst tech support bunch I've ever had to deal with.

Tech Support Guy: Ok, now here's what I want you to do. Reach behind the modem, and...
Bugmaster: I've rebooted the modem about ten times already. The DSL light is still off.
TSG: Well, do it once more for me sir, please.
Bugmaster: Fine. Rebooted. DSL light still off.
TSG: Ok, next thing we want to check is if there are any filters on the line...
Bugmaster: *checks to see if any filters have magically sprouted overnight* No.
TSG: In this case, it might be a bad phone cord. What I want you to do is replace the cord. Here's how to do it...
Bugmaster: Fine, fine, it's replaced. DSL light is still off. Incidentally, last time I called you, I had the phone plugged into the cord that I have now replaced -- and I didn't hear any DSL carrier noise. So, now what ?
TSG: Hm. Is the modem connected directly to the computer ?
Bugmaster: Yes.
TSG: What else is connected to the computer ?
Bugmaster: Monitor, keyboard and printer.
TSG: Ok, now what I want you to do is disconnect the printer.
Bugmaster: *temporarily speechless*...What.
TSG: Just follow the printer cord that leads to your computer, and disconnect it.
Bugmaster: Is this step in your script designed specifically to waste my time ?
TSG: Well, sometimes we find that extra devices connected to the computer cause interference, so why don't you...
Bugmaster: No. Let's pretend this didn't work, and go on to the next step.
TSG: But the printer...
Bugmaster: NOW.
TSG: Ok, the next thing I want you to do is check if you have sync at the NID. The NID is a small box on the side of your house where all the phone wires are going to. You'll need a pair of wire strippers.
Bugmaster: You want me to rewire my phonebox.
TSG: Yes.
Bugmaster: *punches in adelphia.com on a dialup connection* Will that finally satisfy you ? To put it more succinctly, is there a point at which Earthlink will actually accept responsibility for their service ?
TSG: Well, you see, we need to check the sync at the NID so that the next step is for you to call the phone company, and arrange for the next step with them. If that doesn't help, we'll escalate your request.
Bugmaster: *clicks "order broadband"* I didn't think so. Tell you what. I am not going to rewire my phonebox at 3am. If there isn't a tech at my house tomorrow, I am cancelling my service. Thanks for your help.

Re:They all start here

[Phillup]

Secretary calls me up and says that there is a problem with the server and I need to fix it because she has some important document to work on.

I ask her what makes her think the server isn't working (she did not use a server).

She says that the little box on the screen is moving around like it always does before she logs in (Windows NT) but that it says "No Server Input".

I say: huh?

I've never seen Windows show that screen before...

So, I try to pull up the machine via PC Anywhere... no go.

I try to ping it... no go.

I ask her to describe it again. She says it looks like it always does, but it says "No Server Input".

Frustrated... I climb into the car and drive to her site.

When I look at the monitor, well... it looks nothinkg like a Windows dialog box (which is usually grey in color).

It is a nice colorful Red-Blue-Green "rainbow" colored box... that says "No Signal Input".

You guessed it (I hope)... the monitor is on, but the computer isn't.

So, I boot the computer and all is fine.

When she asks me what I did to fix it (she disapeared as soon as I got there, like most of them do... especially if you need their password)... I told her that I had to reboot the server.

Didn't have the heart to tell her...

Verizon DSL

[Wateshay]

When I moved into my house, the DSL wouldn't work, using the modem that I'd brought with me from my apartment. So, I took the modem out to the point where the phone line comes into the house and tested it there. Still didn't work. Neither did the other modem I had from a previous apartment. So, it seemed pretty obvious that the problem was outside my house.

Armed with this information, I called Verizon.

Call #1 I made the mistake of telling the guy that I had a Mac. So, I get transferred to their Macintosh help department, and get some guy in India who can barely speak English and assumes I have a bad modem. Of course, he can't solve the problem and has to give me a different number to call the next day (not that I'm going to, because I know it's not the modem -- I've tried it at my office and it worked fine).

Call #2 The first call didn't work, so I call back again. This time, though, I'm smart enough to forget to mention that I have a Mac. After a suitable period spent listening to soothing jazz (and the occasional assurance that my call is important), I get a nice enough women on the phone. I patiently explain to her what the problem is and what steps I've gone through to track the cause. After listening to me, she responds by asking which modem I have. I describe it, and she immediately tells me that I have the wrong modem. I need the other model of modem. Unlikely, but I'm no expert in DSL technologies, so I'm willing to give her the benefit of the doubt ... which means waiting half a week for a new modem to show up.

Call #3 The new modem shows up, and I try it. Much to my lack of surprise, it also fails to work. Back to the phones, I call Verizon for a third time. Finally, I get someone sounds like he has a clue. Still wary, though, I decide not to mention that I have a Mac. Only problem is that he wants me to run through some diagnostic steps, which means I have to pretend to follow what he's telling me, and then do the equivalent under OS X. Simple enough, until he asks me to read him some number with a weird title. I think he's talking about the MAC address, but I'm not positive. Busted? Thinking quickly, I acted like I'd been interrupted, and asked him to hold on for a second. Then, I sat there for a few seconds, and when I came back said something to the effect of, "ok, so you wanted the MAC address, right?" Bingo, got it right. I gave that to him, and within' a minute or two, he'd run his diagnostics and determined that the problem must in fact be outside my house (just as I'd suspected at first). He told me he'd send someone out to fix it, and bid me good day.

Epilogue Within a few days, someone apparently fixed the problem, and I got a call saying everything was good to go. I plugged the modem in, and SUCCESS it worked! Only took 2 1/2 weeks, and three phone calls to reach the solution that I'd already determined when I made the first call.

Re:Verizon DSL

[StaticEngine]

It wasn't exactly BAD tech support, but it was amusing. We've had DSL ever since we moved to WA (just outside Seattle), and in the beginning, it worked about 98% of the time. Then, after a year of just fine service, it suddenly stopped.

I called Verizon, and asked what happened, since nothing had changed at home. They ran through the regular tests over the phone, and when nothing odd turned up, they said they'd look into it and call me back.

The next day I get a phone call. "Yes, sir? Yeah, well, as you know, for DSL to work, you have to be within five miles of a phone switch." Yeah, I'm thinking, I haven't moved or anything... "Well, sir, the thing is, someone was doing some upgrading on the lines, and they patched in a GIANT COIL of cable about a block from you, effectively making the line distance between you and the switch about twenty miles. We'll send someone to remove that coil ASAP."

A day later some Verizon guy shows up at the door shaking his head. "You the guy with the DSL problem? Yeah, there's only one key for the hatch with the GIANT LOOP of coil behind it, and the guy who has it is out sick today. I'll fix it tomorrow." He shook his head like he was seriously embarassed to be telling me this. I just laughed.

It got fixed a day later, but that was easily the most amusing tech problem I've ever had.

my most recent..

[MikeFM]

I'm a major geek and am experienced in all forms of the art.. recently I let the ISP of the company I work for know that we were having major connection problems.. resulting in a total lack of usability. First they told me that I was wrong. Then they told me it was our companies fault because we were obviously infected with some horrible virus (they told me ICQ was to blame). They told me because we were swamping the broadband connection (running an ssh session and doing some minor web browsing). Then they told me it was because we were the target of someone trying a DoS attack. Finally they made some adjustments to the antenea (wireless is all we can get in our location) and instantly everything is fixed. I have to wonder if it's really good business to blame your customers for a problem especially when it's obvious that they know as much about the topic as you do. It really lowered my opinion of their company. Another example of such support and we'll be switching to a different ISP.

The LISA daemon could be your problem

[adrenaline_junky]

I had this EXACT same problem with my ISP. It turned out that the LISA daemon that comes standard with Mandrake (dunno about other distros...) burps out ICMP pings over your network. My ISP took his ICMP ping traffic to be port scanning and/or some MS-Blast virus, and disconnected my connection. The bastards finally turned it back on once I tracked down exactly what was generating this (very minor) ping traffic.

Re:Overheard at Canadian equivalent Future Shop

[Killswitch1968]

From bash.org:
@FirebirdGM> I just called my Futureshop and asked them how much a 20 GB Hard drive weighed when it was full with information, compared to when it was empty.
@FirebirdGM> The guy that was on the phone told me that it was only a few pounds difference.
@FirebirdGM> And that's why I don't shop at futureshop.

Oh hell, I forgot about this episode...

[Max Threshold]

I used to be a customer of Smyrna Cable in Smyrna, GA. Charter Cable bought them out a couple months before I moved out of the area. I expected them to shut down my account when I turned in my modem at the office, but apparently they forgot that part. Periodically, I checked my old email address to make sure nothing important was going there. After a few months, I tired of this and asked them to close my inbox and remove my old personal Web site, which I'd forgotten the password to.

They insisted that the smyrnacable.net mail servers did not belong to them, and told me to contact Smyrna Cable. I patiently explained that Smyrna Cable no longer existed because they had devoured it. Apparently it was escalated to somebody with a clue, because a few days later my account was closed.

Months passed and the matter was forgotten. Until one day, some company in Smyrna emailed me. They'd found my old resume on my old site and wanted to know if I was interested in a job. Sure enough, my old site was back! Maybe somebody restored a backup or something. I went through the whole process again, only this time Charter's tech support denied even more vehemently that smyrnacable.net does not belong to them (despite the fact that it's among the choices on their Webmail page!)

I finally gave up on the. I meditated until I remembered my old FTP password, and replaced my personal Web site with the above story (suitably embellished) and a challenge to Charter Cable to permanently remove it. I then emailed the URL to tech support. Needless to say, the page came down most ricky-tick.

Emachines

[bot24]

I used to have a 433Mhz Celeron computer up untill a about 5 months ago when I got an EMachine T2341. It started up so fast, and I got all of my stuff installed and put in a extra Gig of ram. So, I was playing Warcraft III, and then the thing just shut off. I pressed the power button and nothing happened. I unplugged it and started it back up. Well, the memory had never shown the full gig. *runs free* It only shows 641840. I installed MBM and relized that my computer has an automatic temperature shutoff switch somewhere over 150 degrees that I was hitting. I got some clock cycle limiting stuff and managed to keep it from crashing or powering down. I opened up a tech support request, and they said that my ram was being used for the integrated graphics that I wasn't using. I E-Mailed back, and then they said how to turn it off. That didn't work.

Hold shift at the EMachines logo to see the ram.

This is an AthlonXP 2400+, it goes to fast to read.

Your ram is defective.

I don't think it is. What about my heat problem? Is that red light supposed to be on?

Your ram is defective.

What about my heat issue?!

Your ram is defective.

I took it back to Best Buy:

This computer has heat problems.

You opened the case. The warrenty is void.

It says right here in this E-Mail(waves paper) that I can do that.

The warrenty is void. All we can do is exchange it for a new one.

Well, the ram still doesn't work, but the inside of this one looks different. It hasn't overheated yet. Same model, different motherboard and cpu-fan...

Re:Emachines

[Bogue]

The warrenty is void. All we can do is exchange it for a new one.

Thats an incredible warranty.

Re:Emachines

[robochan]

So...
you're buying an Emachine...and you're buying it from Best Buy?!?!

It must be true.
Slashdot is no longer just for nerds

Re:LOLLOLOLOLOLROFLLLlll!!!!!!11~~on3

[Anonymous Coward]

Dear Betelgeusian IV. You have entered the Slashdot domain. Please reply with one of the following to prevent a hostile interaction with this Earth Tribe.
Be sure to say Linux rulz
Windows, M$, Bill Gates, GUIs, Darl McBride teh Sux
And most important, have a racist anecdote ready about Indian tech support complete with some nonsense about "Indian accents". This is most amusing as most Slashdot people still think that India is some place "out of town", somewhere near Africa, is a place where people go to school on elephants...oh wait - "Indians go to SCHOOL? Them niggers really are progressing, huh Billy Ray? I gotta stop humping my sister in the haystacks and start reading that Almanac thing." Finally, if by chance anything positive emerges about India (i.e. a better voting system, qualified software engineers) it must always be suffixed/prefixed with one of the following sentences to lessen the blow to the Great American Ego - "<Positive news about Indian> but there are poor people in India, so it doesn't matter" OR "<Positive news about Indian> but there are hungry-starving people who can't afford to use both their nostrils in India, so it doesn't matter". Happy communications with these well-read, literate slash-dotters.

Lying makes my job HARDER

[Anonymous Coward]

I always give the correct answer to any question given. Yes, it takes longer, and yes, you pretty much have to explain everything involved, at a really basic level.

Why do I do this?

Because educated users make less work for me than ignorant ones. This is a long term strategy, and I am telling you now that it pays off. Of course, if you are a temp or something, don't bother. Just fix and go.

Even then though, it's kind of fun teaching people who are about as technical as celery about the history of peripheral connectivity, and then getting the impression that they actually picked up something that would be useful to them in the future.

Re:Excuses I used to give as a tech

[Mycroft_VIII]

Your laughing now, but that is not to far from what really happend to me once.
While they weren't shaking the line, squirls HAD managed to get into a local wiring box for the lines (last time a tech did anything they didn't close it up properly) and proceeded to strip alot of insulation off the wires and everytime it rained we'd get 60hz buzz and other noise on the phone and it just kept getting worse untill about the third time we called someone out.
It took them three tries because everytime we reported the problem a guy wouldn't show for a day or two, and of course by then the lines had dried and he didn't hear anything wrong and say we must have an issue with the phone itself.
Finally we called it in and since it rained on and off for the next four days someone showed up while it was drizzling ouside and the noise was REALLY bad.

Mycroft

Was asked to install a program...

[myov]

After I installed it, he asked how I did it... the previous IT person said his computer was too new. The best part was that the "program" was a shortcut to a web app!

@Home

[Maul]

Back in the days when @Home was just starting up, my cable company actually sent two people out in a van to hook it up for you. One of them was the "cable guy" and the other one was the "tech."

The cable guy did his thing as the tech hooked the cable modem and plugged it into my brand new NT box with a network cable.

Tech hooks it up, sets the network settings, and reboots. No connection.

Tech begins looking at the hardware profile, and I notice a big "X" over my NIC, indicating it is disabled.

I told the tech that it appeared the machine shipped with the NIC disabled (I hadn't used the NIC before) and to try enabling it.

Instead the tech ignores me, dicks around with the TCP/IP settings some more and then makes some incoherant rambling about Windows NT not being a "plug and play" operating system. He tells me that he thinks that my NIC is not compatible with the cable modem and offers to sell me one from @Home for $70.

I told the tech that I would pass on his offer for the time being, and that I would call my OEM to see if perhaps they had an updated driver. The tech agrees and gives me the number to call for support.

As soon as the tech leaves, I go into my hardware profile and enable my NIC. Not surprisingly, I'm now online.

I actually called the number the tech gave me to let them know that either the guy was an idiot (or at best too arrogant to listen to the suggestion of a high schooler).

Contrast this with my most recent setup with Comcast. The guy basically dropped the cable modem off, took one look at all the machines I had sitting at the side of the room, and said, "I'm not touching anything. Here is the setup information." I'm not quite fond of Comcast (I actually preferred the Road Runner connection I had when I lived in San Diego), but at least their cable guy was smart enough not to prentend to know what he was doing.

From Charter Comm.

[oiper]

In an annoyed email over an on and off cable modem connection, I sent, "Dear Charter Comm, I currently subscribe to your cable modem Internet service, I would be very interested in upgrading to an 'Always on' Internet connection. Please contact me if such a service is in or comes into existence." My reply was, nearly word for word, punctuation(or lack there of) and all, "i'm sorry i don't know what you mean, what is an always on connection"

Where do they get these people?

[billywiggins]

I had just moved into my current house, the guy that lived there before had some funky phone line schemes ran through the house and only half of the jacks worked correctly, so I had to rewire the house, but when I got done the outside phone line went dead, as the phone company was doing work down the street, but unfortunately they didnt report it at the time, here is my conversation with the support line on trying to get the phone line turned back on. Me: Yes Im calling about my phone line, its not on, its like it got disconnected. Support: Let me check, Im not showing any problems with your line. Me: Well, thats why Im calling, to let you know there is a problem. Support: Have you checked different phones in your house. Me: Well, Im at the box outside and Im not getting a signal, so none of the phones in the house will work right now. Support: You need to check all your phones in the house, one of them may be off the hook. Me: Hello, am I talking to myself? If the signal to the outside box is not on, then the lines inside the house will not work. I just need you to turn the line to my house back on. Support: Have you changed anything in your house? Me: I just rewired the house. Support: Im going to send out a tech. Me: I dont need a tech, I am a tech, I need you to turn my phone line on. Support: We cant support anything within your house without sending a tech out. Me: Dont worry about the house, just turn the line that runs from the pole to my house on! I called back about 30 minutes later to find out that the line techs were working down the street and accidentally disconnected the neighborhood. The phone lines were back on about an hour later and my rewiring worked fine.

Re:CD-R wouldn't play...

[alannon]

Actually, the DVD format has a weird rule that there is supposed to be at least 1 gig of data on it, minimum, even if it's just padding. Almost all readers will still be able to anyhow.
As far as I know, though, CDs don't have this restriction.

International weirdness

[Punk Walrus]

I did International Help Desk for about two years with a large ISP. While I couldn't honestly say all the people in Europe were better techs than the US, with a European tech, I never had to:

1. Explain the concept of time zones. Mail went down in the UK at 10am. EST was 4am, and I call UUNet. The guy goes, "What do these people in the YOOKAY want mail at 4am?" It's 10am there, sir. "But it's so early in the frickin' morning! We always do our maintenance between 4 and 6." Yes, and that's 10 to noon in England. "But it's still dark out there, right?" The supervisor I demanded to speak to later told me she had to explain the concept of time zones with a flashlight and an orange.
2. Confused Sweden and Switzerland. Austria and Australia. "I am am sorry, sir," said the snooty tech to the head of our Australian Division on a conference call, "I show no 'Sydney' in Australia, maybe you meant Salzberg?" His response, "What are you, kid, TWELVE???"
3. One tech said on the conference call, "My boss said to tell the frogs to sip their wine and just wait." On the call? Two techs from Transpac. Merde.

I also got boldfaced lied to, like "Our routers don't keep logs," or "I'll call you right back." Of course, not all was rosy overseas.

1. We have test machines in a 3rd party data center in Frankfurt. The machine tests web cacheing, so the browser cache is measured preceisely. One day, tons of pr0n (which we were NOT testing for) started to show up in our cache, horribly skewing results. Frankfurt says, "Impossible, no one is allowed in that room! It is locked, and all entrances and exits are monitored!" But while using PCAnywhere, we watch some guy surfing pr0n. They still say that's impossible. We threaten to install a webcam. Problem ceases. Later, we find that "Locked and monitored" meant "everyone has a key, and are required to sign in and out on a clipboard hanging by the door if they access the room." Riiight!
2. We had a series of outages in Austria with French GlobalOne that were delayed for days because, and I quote, "The guy with the van is unavailable." You only have one van in the whole fleet? Their answer was a kind of shrug. The French tend to do this a lot. I loved them anyway.
3. Production servers that end up as MP3 server mirrors. Hard to do network testing metrics when half of Canberra and Brisbane are downloading pop music over supposedly restricted bandwidth.
4. The city: Hong Kong. The data center: leaky basement. The server racks: machines stacked atop one another, leaning against wet masonry wall. The servers: Machines that end up missing parts (RAM, hard drives, modems) after going through Chinese customs. The company branch: Out of business in less than two years.
5. Learning that when the Japanese say they understand, moral code forces them to say that whether they actually understand or not; apparently, it would be incredibly rude to say, "I am sorry, sir, I don't understand." This was averted by walking people though everything. This was not averted when things went down. It was like that office was terrified to reporting anything going wrong, even with normal, understandable issues.

But all in all, I loved working International.

cd burner == hot!!

[biddlej]

This conversation took place three years ago when I accompanied a friend on a trip to Best Buy to help her purchase a new computer. I kept my mouth shut to see what the guy had to say.

Salesman: This HP model is really popular. It even comes with a cd burner.

Friend: That's one of the things I really wanted for my new computer.

Salesman: Great...but if you decide to purchase a model with a cd burner, you should also pick up this surge protector.

Salesman hands her a $99 APC surge protector.

Salesman: This surge protector is even on sale, so you lucked out.

Friend: That's ok, I already have a regular surge protector from my old computer.

Salesman: Ohhhh...that's not going to work if you get a model with a cd burner. You know they don't call them "burners" for nothing. These things reach over 500 degrees. If you don't have a high quality surge protector, there's a high chance that your computer will catch on fire and burn your house down.

Friend: Are you serious? I don't want that to happen.

Salesman: Hey...I'm just trying to look out for you and your family's safety.

Me: I think it's time to go.

Later that day.

Friend: That guy wasn't that bad.

Me: Too bad Best Buy doesn't sell fire extinguishers, he could have sold you one of those while he was at it.


Nothing against Best Buy or computer salesmen in general...I just thought it was a funny story.

no, not in this decade.

[SuperBanana]

A byte is usually 8 bits but it has also been defined as 6, 7, 9 or even odder combinations. It all depends on the system architecture.

In the 1960's, yes. Now, no, not really- and your linking to a dictionary doesn't prove it. That dictionary definition is decades old.

For over almost 30 years, a byte is 8 bits, a nibble (no, I'm not making that up) is four. A word contains four nibbles or two bytes. Insisting otherwise is anal retentive at best.

Re:no, not in this decade.

[LittleBigLui]

A word contains four nibbles or two bytes.

On a 16 bit machine, yes. Are you posting from a 286?

Re:no, not in this decade.

[Kaemaril]

In the 1960's, yes. Now, no, not really

Tell that to Unisys. Their mainframes (at least the ones I have to use) still have their 36 bit architecture, hence a 9 bit byte. Unusual? Yep.

Re:no, not in this decade.

[pommiekiwifruit]

Maybe if you are a hard-disk maker that's how big your byte is.

If you are a C or C++ programmer however, you will/should be using the definition in the ISO standard (1996 for C++, 1999 for C) in which a byte is the unit returned by sizeof and used by memcpy, memset etc.

On the hardware I am programming today, which sells millions of units, a byte is 16 bits. A char is 16 bits. A short is 16 bits. An int is 16 bits. A pointer is 16 bits but that ain't enough so we have to using segment registers from inline assembler (argh). If they could get away with it they would have probably have made a float 16 bits.

Believe it or not, there are processors that are not Intel 8086 compatible!

People who are not pedantic generate buggy code when arriving on wierdo systems, since computers tend to be pedantic themselves. But I admit that the association of byte with octet is very common, and in my opinion it was a mistake for the C and C++ committees to use the word byte for that unit of storage.

Re:no, not in this decade.

[entrox]

Have a look at the Wikipedia entry for Byte.

Re:no, not in this decade.

[Geoff-with-a-G]

Tell that to Unisys.

That would be awesome. You should post an email address for someone senior at Unisys. I'd love to see a flood of emails from slashdot users telling them their byte size is wrong.

Re:no, not in this decade.

[operagost]

Even on a 64-bit machine such as the Alpha, a WORD is DEFINEd as 16 bits, a LONGword is 32, and a QUADword is 64. Your way would force redefinitions when a 32-bit or 16-bit program is ported to a 64-bit platform, making the port even more tedious. Because DEC maintained the deinition of LONG and WORD, porting from VAX to Alpha was that much easier.

Plenum Rated vs Normal Cat5

[DonnarsHmr]

Plenums are defined to be any compartment or chamber which is connected to or a part of the air distribution system of a structure. Think things like ducts, flow shafts, and sometimes even the void above a dropped ceiling. The outer PVC jacket on normal Cat5 cable burns at a relatively low temperature and produces large quantities of highly toxic black smoke. Plenum rated Cat5 has a much higher combustion temperature and produces smaller quantites of smoke. The National Electric Code specifies that only Plenum Rated Cat5 can be run through any space connected to the air distribution system. Since air ducts are handy ways to run cable, a lot of Plenum Rated gets sold.

pfft. stupid TECH SUPPORT?

[MattyCobb]

as someone who had the unfortunate job of working tech support for a DSL ISP I can tell you first hand that most of the stupidity comes from the customer NOT the tech. and usually, if we give you a BS answer it is because we think you are a moron who we just want you off our phone/away from us and will probably belive whatever we say. its really not a personal thing. its after about the 1000th "my modem don't work." "sir, is it plugged in?" or something similar conversion you start to hate all of humanity who would dare ask your help.

Want some funny stories? Here you go!

[Parandor]

http://rinkworks.com/stupid/

Actual line from Microsoft...

[lxt]

I rang Microsoft up to activate some software (I know, I know). I had to go to a human operator, as the system didn't like my serial number. The conversation went like this: Tech Support: Hello, Microsoft Activation Services. I'm afraid I can't activate your product, please call back tomorrow. Me: Why not? I need the software as soon as possibly... Tech Support: Yeah, there's a bit of a problem at our side. Me: What? Tech Support: [embarrassed] All of our computers have crashed, we don't know what's gone wrong, and we can't boot them back up. ...well, at least for once Microsoft were refreshingly honest :)

Packard Bell zinger

[Zenmonkeycat]

I was trying to upgrade my current system (Pentium 75, 850MB HD, 24Mb RAM, 14.4 Modem) with a new modem, and had great difficulties with the serial ports recognizing the modem's connection.

Me: "I'm trying to upgrade my current system with an external 56k modem, and I'm having difficulties getting it to work."

Tech: "But why would you want to switch out your current one for one that's only got 56? I mean, you already have 75, right?"

Me: "No, you're thinking of the processor; I'm talking about a modem, and mine is only 14.4k."

Tech: "No, actually those are just different words for the same thing."

Me: [Silence.]

Tech: "Trust me, I know what I'm talking about."

Photocopy Floppy

[paulkoan]

I remember being the operator for an IBM 4361. The controllers (like massive coax hubs) booted from an 8inch floppy.

It wouldn't boot one day, so I called tech. We worked out that the boot floppy was currupt and we'd need a new one. They said they would need a copy of the floppy to do this.

That presented me with a problem, as the floppy was currupt of course, and I didn't have a spare anyway.

They tech guy said, no problem, just photocopy it and fax it to us.

Well. I was all prepared to explain exactly how stupid he was when it transpired that the floppy had a label on it with the codes required to gen a new copy!

koan

Dell tech support Germany

[PsyQ]

In Switzerland all your tech support calls to Dell get rerouted depending on the language you speak/choose. French goes to France, Italian to Italy, German to Germany. So far, so good.

Now I don't doubt that the Germans have quite a high level of quality when it comes to manufacturing machines, optical components, AMD processors and the like, but their customer service is definitely one of the worst I've ever had to experience.

We had a Dell laptop with what we supposed was a damaged wireless LAN card. It would report "Network cable unplugged" even when the card's MAC was clearly allowed to get on the wireless LAN and had the correct SSID set. I'm a UNIX tech and don't know much about Windows, so I felt it might be nice to call Dell to find out what's wrong and get someone to send a replacement card if it really is the card's fault.

After waiting patiently through 10 minutes of pop music three times (their system kicks you off after 10 minutes) I finally managed to get a real, flesh-coloured human on the other end of the line.

Them: "Hello, Dell Inspiron support, how can I help you?"
Me: "Ah, well, we have a Dell Truemobile blah blah card here that is acting odd. How can I verify that it really is defective?"

He asks for the service tag, the usual details and I tell him the precise nature of the problem.

Them: "Oh. Well, I see that you have Windows XP Home Edition preinstalled there. Home Edition does not support networks. I'm sorry, we can't take that card back, you need to upgrade to Pro and try again."

I really hope he was fired afterwards, since as they say, "your call may be recorded for quality control". Swapping in the same model Dell TrueMobile card from a different shipment of notebooks worked just fine, by the way.

Re:Dell tech support Germany

[jafuser]

In Switzerland all your tech support calls to Dell get rerouted depending on the language you speak/choose.

French goes to France, Italian to Italy, German to Germany.

Let me guess... English goes to India?

Why I hate Microsoft

[GrouchoMarx]

True story.

Back in 1995, my family had been using our first PC (whitebox 486 with Windows 3.1) for about a year. Our Microsoft mouse had been trouble from day 1. It kept sticking on screen as if the pointer hit something, even though the mouse itself was fine. I called MS, and over the course of the next few weeks they had us clean the mouse (several times), buy cleaning kits, change drivers, get a new mouse, nothing seemed to work. Finally, one tech (perfect English in those days) said, and I quote, "Well, I guess it's obviously your mouse pad. I guess you could always take your business elsewhere."

The next day we bought a Logitech mouse, and have used exclusively Logitech mice for the past decade without the slightest bit of trouble. I later went on to help found a Linux Users Group in college.

The moral: Dude, NEVER dare your customer to take their business elsewhere. Not even if you're Microsoft.

True story

[GrouchoMarx]

Earlier this year at work, I needed to run Visio 2003 to make some simple diagrams. (This is at work, not home, so I didn't have a choice of software.) Visio, installed on Win2k SP4, would not run. When I started it up, it would crash immediately, usually without even giving me a message.

Called Microsoft.

After a 45 minute call to setup an account, then a wait to get a callback, then another 45 minute conversation with a very nice Indian gentleman, we fixed the problem.

Microsoft Visio and Microsoft Windows are incompatible. This is a known issue. The fix is to drill down to some obscure registry key and add a 1 to it. Then everything works fine.

And somehow Linux is the OS with the reputation for obscure configuration and software conflicts. Go figure.

Re:True story

[dave420]

Just got to add this in here - that's not the normal operating procedure for windows. On linux, however, installing most software involves the command prompt at one stage, at least.

I'm not a pro-microsoft/anti-linux guy (heck, I'm using linux right now), but let's not ignore serious shortcomings in the OS we love... :)

A personal favourite of mine from this week...

[rbbs]

From: Manjeet
To: Robbie
Subject: MOUSE IS DEAD

HI ROBBIE

PLEASE CAN YOU HELP THE NEW SECRETARY ROSE WITH HER COMPUTER. HER MOUSE HAS
STOPPED WORKING AND SHE CANNOT DO HER WORK. HER EMAIL ADDRESS IS:
medsec@***.com but she cannot access her emails because
she's got no mouse.

MANY THANKS.

Manjeet.

--

i don't understand...was i supposed to email her a new mouse??

Re:A personal favourite of mine from this week...

[evil-osm]

i don't understand...was i supposed to email her a new mouse??

No you were supposed to e-mail her, to tell her to reboot her computer. Duh! Some support rep you are!

Re:A personal favourite of mine from this week...

[ChoyLeeFut]

A friend of mine used to do desktop support for a law firm in Toronto. He gave a really bizarre explanation to a user... and she bought it:

User: "Why is the network so slow?"

My Friend (pointing at the CN Tower): "Do you see the CN Tower over there?"

User: "Yes."

My Friend (said with a straight face): "Well all the network traffic has to bounce off the CN Tower and back again. That's why the network's slow."

User buys the explanation, and my friend has a story to tell, to this day. :)

I wouldda done worse.

[raehl]

I'd have cussed him out in Atheism. Which is pretty hard, because none of the words exist.

Re:I wouldda done worse.

[shadowcabbit]

I'd have cussed him out in Atheism. Which is pretty hard, because none of the words exist.

It's easier than cursing in Agnostic, where you can say stuff, but nobody's sure what you said.

Re:I wouldda done worse.

[Asterisk]

With all those hands, it sounds like we're back to Hinduism, not Judaism.

That depends....

[raehl]

Still wondering what I would talk to with a 1 port hub.

Was is warm and wet?

You handled that VERY poorly.

[raehl]

Correct explanation:

"Which room are you in, and should I bring any alcohol?"

Actually, I suppose the second half of that is unnecessary - you were working tech support at the university, you obviously needed to bring alcohol.

Another view of the problem

[hayden]

Q: How many user support people does it take to change a light bulb?

A: We have an exact copy of the light bulb here and it seems to be working fine. Can you tell me what kind of system you have?

I can laugh now

[jrb3]

I used to provide over night support for a batch processing system. Early one morning I got paged and dutifully stumbled half dressed to the pay phone around the corner and called the operations staff. Me (though yawns): What seems to be the problem. Support: The whole systems ground to a halt, the link to America has gone down, we think some trawler's dragged the line up. Me: I'll get my scuba gear and be right down. Support: Really? Me: Goodnight.

Re: Oh wait no I'm not.

[kyletinsley]

Damn it. I used to fully understand the relation between bits and bytes. But after reading your three helpful posts I somehow lost that knowledge and became confused again.

You should have stayed in bed today.

Gateway Sucks

[fahrvergnugen]

In early 2001, after building my mom a computer from scratch, I received her old Gateway 233Mhz system to do with as I pleased. The first thing I did was flash the BIOS. When the system failed to POST after that, the next thing I did was contact Gateway support.

Thus began an odyssey that I hope never to repeat with any company, and certainly will never repeat with Gateway. They're never getting another dime out of me or my family for as long as I'm alive.

Below is why. The first two logs detail a chat session between Gateway and myself, conducted using a particularly nasty piece of customer service software called eGain. You can see how it made the live person on the other end of the chat session sound like a robot.

After that follows a series of e-mail correspondence. This log has been edited both to cover my tracks a bit, and to get around the slashdot filters, as the characters per line ratio of the post is otherwise too low.

Chat Session 1

Question: I updated my BIOS and the system boots, displays gateway logo, but does not POST.

A Chat Agent will be with you shortly.

Wendell: Hello Fahr, welcome to the Gateway Chat Support Service. I am Wendell here to help you with your issue.

Fahr Vergnugen: Hi. Have a system here that's not terribly happy.

Wendell: Can you please tell me the exact problem you are facing with your Computer?

Fahr Vergnugen: Need S/N?

Wendell: Fahr, please provide me your Serial number.

Fahr Vergnugen: Okay, older PII-233Mhz / LX chipset board. tried to slap in a newer celeron, it didn't take, decided to update the bios.

Wendell: Okay , Fahr.

Fahr Vergnugen: sure 0009589521

Wendell: Thanks , Fahr.

Wendell: Can you please tell me the problem you are facing with your System?

Fahr Vergnugen: grabbed BIOS 4A4LL0X0.15A.0023.P18 from the gateway support site (was running P11) and flashed the board.

Wendell: When this issue happens is there an error message? If so, could you please tell me the exact error message?

Fahr Vergnugen: now, the system fires up, displays a gateway logo, and a small progress bar in the top left fills from grey to white, and the system acts like it's going to POST normally, but it never happens.

Fahr Vergnugen: the bar takes between 3 and 4 minutes to reach 100%.

Wendell: When this issue happens is there an error message? If so, could you please tell me the exact error message?

Fahr Vergnugen: and from there it just sits. If I hit TAB to view system messages, it acts normally, but again, no POST. Nothing happens.

Fahr Vergnugen: no error message. Just doesn't beep and post.

Fahr Vergnugen: I think it's probably pretty shafted, but I thought I'd check with you guys.

Wendell: Fahr, please hold on while I search for your resolution.

Fahr Vergnugen: np, holdin' on.

Wendell: Thank you for waiting. Please review the following information, which I think will help you.

Wendell: [Item sent - Astro and Profile 2 - Computer stops responding after power-on self-test (POST)] http://www.gateway.com/support/techdocs/astro/trsh oot/1106.shtml

Wendell: Did you get the page , Fahr?

Fahr Vergnugen: yep, but no help I can tell already, since it assumes I can get to Windows, which is not the case.

Wendell: I realize your time is valuable, please wait one minute while I research this further.

Fahr Vergnugen: np

Wendell: Fahr, I apologize for the delay

Re:Gateway Sucks

[arevos]

Open the pod bay doors, Wendell.
I'm sorry, Fahr, I'm afraid I can't do that.

layer 8

[CAIMLAS]

most technical problems I've experienced with users tends to be layer 8 of the OSI model...

Re:Sunspots

[GISGEOLOGYGEEK]

Damn, so many fools around.

The 11 year solar cycle peaked a couple years ago. Sunspot activity peaks with the cycle.

The activity can cause huge electromagnetic disturbances that can very much be picked up by phone lines, cable lines etc, any antenna like structure.

Go ask your local geo-physicist about the hastles he/she had trying to perform exploration surveys on mining properties through the period of the peak. Like the phone lines, their long cables laid out in the bush also act like antennae, picking up the solar activity and wrecking any data you are trying to collect.

Been there. Done that ... and had to throw out the data. .. and complain to my friends about it on staticy phone lines from the same effect.

Didn't happen to me but....

[BungoMan85]

I knew a guy who worked at one of the local Best Buy's. A lady, in her lat 30's came into the store with a computer that wouldn't boot. She asked the guy I knew to have a look at it. He took it back and realized the power supply wasn't working. One of his co-workers convinced him it would be rather funny if instead of telling her what the problem is and fixing it they tell her a BS story and see if she buys it. So they take the computer back to her and inform her that her computer is in need of a new flux capacitor. She apparently has no idea what they are talking about and they decide to run with it, the guy tells her that they do not have any flux capacitors in stock at the moment, but the Circuit City across the street usually does. Well the lady takes her computer over to the Circuit City and apparently tells them what she was told. About 20 to 30 minutes later the lady comes back into the Best Buy with her computer and tells the guy and his co-worker that Circuit City didn't know what she was talking about. They tell her they'll take another look at her computer and take it back and about 10 minutes later come out and say that they were right and she does in fact need a new flux capacitor. They suggest she take it to the Best Buy in the town just north of where their location and ask them, visibly frustrated at this point she leaves the store. About an hour later they get a call from the lady, who is furious and screams over the phone something to the effect of "YOU LITTLE ****ERS! A FLUX CAPACITOR ISN'T ****ING REAL!!! IT'S FROM A ****ING MICHAEL J FOX MOVIE!!!! I will NEVER shop at Best Buy again!!!!"

Haha - this reminds me...

[Niet3sche]

A few years ago, I was trying to get a part so that I could connect to a router.

The part I was looking for was an RJ45DB9 connector. I had one on me (my personal one), but needed to buy another one (for the business).

The fun started when I went into the store:

Me: Yeah, I'm looking for a DB9-to-RJ45 connector. I don't see them on your shelf, maybe--

SalesTroll: Sir, there's no such thing as that part.

Me: Uh ... no, I need to connect a rollover cable to it. There is such a part. I didn't see it here, but was wonderi--

SalesTroll: That does not exist! I don't know where you got the idea--

Me: *pulls out my hardware - lo and behold, the hardware that "doesn't exist"!

SalesTroll: *confused and shocked expression*

Me: Please grab a manager for me and ask; you may well have one in the back, as you do some networking here.

SalesTroll: *Goes to a manager and mutters something ... manager looks at me and loudly says, that doesn't exist. SalesTroll then pulls out my hardware. Manager looks confused, comes over.*

Manager: Wow, that's weird ... I've never seen anything like this. They must be really rare.

Me: Uh, no, they're used for Cisco devices all the time--

Manager: Oh, those're like Macs, right?

Me: *holding back laughter and murderous thoughts* Uh, no. *I take my hardware back* I'll order online, thanks.

Ah, such fun.

Sun Server

[MikeHunt69]

This one is from one of my coworkers..
Apparently, one of their production sun server reset itself suddenly one day (this is in the late 80's/early 90's). They got some people from Sun in to have a look at it and they spent days looking over the machine and checkig logs. In the end, the explaination given was "A gamma particle from space". I shit you not. According to them, one flew through space, straight though the processor and caused the machine to reboot.

Re:Overheard at Canadian equivalent Future Shop

[bro1]

You wouldn't believe me, some guy just phoned me and asked me how much a 20 GB Hard drive weighed when it was full with information, compared to when it was empty.

I told him that it was only a few pounds difference. :)

Re: Mebibytes and Megabytes

[n3k5]

A *kilo*byte is 1024 bytes. [...] A *mega*byte is (usually) 1024 kilobytes or 1,048,567 bytes. [...] What are they teaching Kids in schools these days?

They're teaching kids in schools exactly what you said -- because most teachers are old farts who spread outdated information. Actually calling 1024 'kilo' and 1024^2 'mega' has always been insider jargon that had little to do with the official definitions of these prefixes and never made much sense to outsiders, so the practice of using those prefixes for 1,000 and 1,000,000 (not really for 1,024,000 AFAIK) is spreading rapidly. What 1024 bytes are _really_ called now is a Kibibyte (abbr. KiB), while 1024^2 bytes are a Mebibyte (abbr. MiB).

Not exactly Tech Support, but...

[Ann Elk]

Soon after I bought my first digital camera (and before I bought a printer) I found a camera store with one of those Kodak "digital printing" kiosks. I played with it a bit, then I had a question. I could see a floppy drive on the system, but I coulnd't find a CD or CF reader.

• Me - Can this machine read Compact Flash cards, or do I need to copy my pictures to floppies first?
• Employee - It will read Compact Flash. In fact, that's preferred - you'll get much better pictures with Compact Flash than with floppies.
• Me - Uhh, no. CF and floppies are just storage media. You'll get the exact same data from both.
• Employee (annoyed) - Look, I know this is true. I'm not going to argue with you about this!
• Me - Good. That's the smartest thing you've said so far. Nevermind.

Elderly + Computers = Bad Combination

[intekra]

I was in Hawaii in September last year, and after a long day I decided it would be relaxing to sit in the hotel hot tub for a while.

It was fine for a while, then some elderly woman got in at the same time (which was a bad enough sight itself) and she decided to make conversation. Well, the topic came up of me being a 'computer guy' but nothing really came of it.

Then, some elderly old man joined the party (remind me not to stay in that hotel ever again) and made conversation with the elderly woman, and somehow got on the topic of computers again, so this man asked if I could help him with a problem. I figured, hey... I'll be nice.

He said to me, "Ok, I'm using Microsoft W-O-R-D (He spelt out Word :\) not Works and I'm in a document but I can't get it to be lowercase. I've called Dell and they can't fix it either."

I'm trying not to laugh, and think a bit... Automatically assumming its the CAPS LOCK key, he said he tried that so I then tried explaining Format and Paragraph settings changes which got me nowhere.

I guess it would be funnier if you'd been there. The man spelling out W-O-R-D was probably the highlight of it all.

Some vacation :\

He makes the rest of "us" techies look bad

[atlasm]

I've been doing support for close to 10 years, and this just makes all helpdesk techs look bad. It casts a stigma on us all who strive to fix problems as opposed to just "answering the phone". If you don't know the answer, find out from someone who does! Don't BS the user, if you do, the next time they may not call, and if that happens enough, no one calls and your out of a job.

Re:he's kind of right

[fuzzybunny]

No no, you're talking metric bits/bytes. He means imperial.

Sheesh, those Europeans, always trying to get everyone to change to their kooky system.

Re: Disconnect the printer please

[goldmeer]

Actually, I remember a case where disconnecting the printer actually helped find the problem.

A customer called up because his computer would lock up frequently. We troubleshot the hell out of the system. We found that when the printer was not connected, the system was stable. So, he returned the printer, thinking that he had a bad printer.
Next day, new printer, same model... Same problem.
So, we went into SERIOUS troubleshooting mode.

It turns out that he recently fixed the ongoing moisture problem in his basement, and the grounding rod (Yes, this was a very old house) was not grounded. He poured some water over the rod, and found that the system was stable. I strongly advised him to get the house re-grounded.

He figured that he'd just give his house a cup of coffee every morning until he could have someone come out.

I've talked to you before, haven't I?

[ivan256]

Call in to ISP tech support after they clearly messed up their router configuration when the reconfigured it. Fortunatly, the tech support staff there actually knows how to get things done, but they come up with the lamest excuses.

Me: My connection isn't working after your recent planned outage. It appears you have a routing loop.

Them: Um. Have you tried resetting your CSU/DSU.

Me: Yes.

Them: Um. Do it again. You have to leave it off for at least a minute to clear out the problem.

Me: What?

Them: Turn it off for 60 seconds.

/me truns off the equipment

Them: <frantic typing>.... Ok, turn it back on.

Them: Is it working now?

Me: Yes. It looks like you fixed it.

Them: If you ever have this problem again, you can call back and we'll walk you through it.

How lame is that?

Reformat and Reinstall Xenix

[CustomDesigned]

We used SCO for several years in the 1980's, and were very dissatisfied with their support in general. The answer to any problem was "Reformat the disk and reinstall Xenix to see if the problem persists." Naturally, this was never a viable option for a production system. A better solution was to replace the buggy SCO software with the fledgling GNU software. If it didn't work much better already, it could be fixed. I bought several cartridge tape distros from GNU to support them.

When ESDI disks came out, we thought it would be a good idea to try and get better support for the new technology. So we signed up for the $1200/yr premium support plan. That kind of money should at least get us past the "reformat your disk" nonsense.

We got our first ESDI system, and booted the latest Xenix install with ESDI support from diskette. Everything went smoothly until it got to the part where you format and partition the disk. Two thirds of the way through the formatting, it found a bad sector. No biggie, these were common and just added to the bad block map in those days. However, it kept finding the *same* bad sector over and over - ad infinitum.

So we called our premium tech support - confident that now we had a problem that they couldn't possibly blow off with "reformat the disk", since that was exactly what we were trying to do. Not to mention the big bucks we were paying. I explained the problem, and to my horror and consternation, the guy said, "Reformat your disk and reinstall Xenix." I completely lost it, and told him he was a complete idiot and needed a new career. He told me I needed to calm down and follow instructions if I wanted his help. I told him what he could do with his help. The boss gave me a long lecture on the relative number of flies caught with honey versus vinegar - however, that was the last SCO system we ever bought.

Through XP Interface...

[Animaether]

Try this (works on most every install, as it doesn't require 'My Computer' to be visible - which it isn't by default in XP :
1. Go to the Start menu
2. Choose "Help and Support"
3. Search for "Diagnostics"
4. In the results click on "Network Diagnostics"
5. Click "Scan your system"
Windows XP will now test various settings until the results are displayed.
6. Under "Modems and Network Adapters" expand (click on the + besides) "Network Adapters"
7. Expand the pertinent card (there may be more than one)
8. Read MACAddress line.

Much less daunting, a few less steps, and in the end the tech support person has a wealth of information available to them through the user. In addition, once things are setup, the scan can easily be performed again to make sure things work.

SBC Tech Support!

[enforcer007]

The conversation went like this:
Me: "Hi, what settings should I use for your DNS servers?"
SBC: "What DNS servers? Are you having trouble connecting to the internet?"
Me: "I'm installing Linux, and having issues with getting it to work over a PPPOE connection."
SBC: "I'm sorry, we don't support exotic operating systems"
Me: "I don't need support, I just need your DNS servers."
SBC: "Sir, you don't understand, unix based computers are incompatible with the internet."
I just sat there astonished for a few seconds, and then hung up. I'd figure it out on my own.

Re: Mebibytes and Megabytes

[WWWWolf]

Saying "What utter rubbish" is what causes the problem in first place. The definitions of kilo/mega/gigabytes are varying depending on who's speaking. And then there's the standard units, which are always the same. As long as people don't agree on something, and insist redefining the prefixes based on context, there will always be confusion.

I solved this problem this way: When I say "1 Gibibyte", it's 1073741824 bytes, and when I say "Gig", it's "About enough, but still too fucking much, to burn on a CD". =)

Eliza Support

[Nurgled]

Support Rep: Hi! I'm Eliza. What's your problem?
Gun: I need to check and see if my forwards to a [yourdomain] account are being blocked based on the server they're being forwarded from. Do you need the IP address, forward address?
Support Rep: What does that suggest to you?

DSL Line Distance

[Phaid]

As everyone knows, DSL speed is limited by wire distance from the local telco Central Office or Remote Terminal. A couple of summers ago, SNET (Connecticut independent phone company, now assimilated by SBC) was having a lot of trouble with bad DSL performance. They had wildly oversold their bandwidth and the service was almost unuseable between 5PM and 9PM, peak gaming hours. Faced with a barrage of calls from angry customers, telephone tech support people were telling callers that the reason for their DSL trouble was that the summer heat was stretching the telephone wires, which increased their effective distance to the CO/RT and therefore slowing down their traffic. As the lines cooled in the evening, they shrank again and performance returned.

Re: Mebibytes and Megabytes

[swv3752]

Kibibytes as word is a failure. Outside of a few pedagogues on the internet, noone even knows such a term exists. Those familiar with computers are resistant to using new terms. Those unfamiliar consider it all gibberish anyways. And the new term are even more nonsensical as at least kilo and mega are somewhat familiar terms.

Besides which, kilobyte and megabyte and gigabyte is not jargon. It is a computer term. Sorry but your attempt to revise history has failed.

Didn't happen to me, but...

[phillymjs]

...it did happen to a woman right in front of me at Micro Center in Radnor, PA, several years ago. She was in front of me in line at the service desk, where I was waiting to either drop off my PowerBook for repair, or pick it up. That I don't remember.

I overheard her exchange with the guy manning the service counter. Apparently her PC kept running out of RAM and someone else had suggested the presence of a "memory leak." The service counter guy assured her that the machine's RAM was solid and not liquid, therefore there was no chance that it could leak from the computer.

I don't know how I managed to keep a straight face.

~Philly

Dude, you're getting owned.

[GerbilSoft]

A friend of mine called Dell Tech Support because a new USB 2.0 card he installed was slowing down his computer. He called Dell Tech Support, and the tech person told him to run the Dell Diagnostics software. He got an error saying "Invalid System Clock." The tech person put him on hold for around 20 minutes, and then came back on and said "You couldn't have gotten that error. Do you have another disk to try it again?" He said "Yes", tried it, and got the same error. The tech person came back on, and said "There's no way you could get that error. It's a figment of your computer's imagination."

Mistaken Identity

[Renaissance 2K]

One of my most beloved systems ever was an old 386 that my uncle gave to me when I was 11. The thing was ancient. All it had was a 30 MB hard drive and a 5" floppy. I decided to add a CD-ROM to it, because CD-ROM's were the new fangled doodads of the day (it was rated 2x, just for the record). Of course, the thing didn't work when I hooked it up. I know today it was because my motherboard didn't have an IDE connector (just a generic "hard drive" port), but I tried desperately to hook it up. I referred to tech support numbers in the manual, and got to talk to somebody. He asked what kind of a computer I had, what OS I was running, and recommended I call somebody at IBM and ask them about the problem. So I called IBM, and told them I was trying to upgrade to a CD-ROM drive. The first question they asked was what computer I was using, and I told them it was a Datatech. The woman on the other end practically screamed at me: "The DATATECH is not an IBM machine!" And me, in my eleven-year-old glory screamed back: "Well, then, why'd he tell me to call you?" For about four years, I was afraid to call tech support because I thought people would take advantage of me since I was so young. Now, I just solve the problem myself.

My computer was afraid of the dark...

[Caduceus1]

I had an opposite issue in a sense...

We had a lot of Digital DECstation workstations. One of them stopped working, so I called Field Service, and our usual guy comes out. Although it is a straight-up motherboard swap, he needs to do some diagnosis to put on the tag to engineering.

As is, the system wouldn't POST. He took the cover off, tested it again, and it POSTed fine. Figuring something was loose, he tightened all the connections. Put the cover on, system wouldn't POST. Took the cover off, system would POST. Lather, rinse, repeat.

We decide NOT to put hte cover completely on, but just lay it down on top, upside down so the internals were covered, but nothing scresed in or possibly shorting. Won't work. Take it off, works fine.

New theory - took a piece of cardboard laying nearby, and covered the case. Wouldn't work. Took it off, and it worked. Took a piece of paper, covered parts of the motherboard at a time, and slowly narrowed down the location.

The DECstation 5000s had a pair of large EPROMS with labels on them. The labels covered small round windows which I assume was for "flashing" the EPROM to wipe it out and reprogram. Apparently, they had somehow developed a sensitivity to light. A single sheet of paper was enough to block the light to prevent them from working.

I'm no electrical engineer, but this was bizarre.

The field service engineer put "afraid of the dark" on the tag, and left it at that.

Try and debug that one on a help desk phone...

Re:My computer was afraid of the dark...

[Liquid-Gecka]

That is the difference between an EEPROM and an EPROM. EPROM's are erased by UV light, while EEPROMS are erased using electricity. =) Its not really that bizzare once you know that. We had a system go offline because the sticker faded. It was odd and took a little while to figure out.

the best lie we ever told.

[sammy baby]

I have a coworker who used to do phone support for people who really had no business doing router maintenance, but were stuck with the job anyway. Invariably, these people were highly defensive about their level of competence, and suggesting that they check the obvious - "Did you check to see that it's plugged in?" - met with an angry response. "Of course I did!"

So, coworker came up with a novel idea. Instead of asking them if the router was plugged in, he'd ask, "Can you unplug the power cord, and plug it back in upside down? Those cords are defective, sometimes you need to flip them."

Every once in a while, the guy at the other end would stutter nervously for a moment, then say, "Hey, that worked! Thanks!" Of course, the plugs in question were three-pronged, so there was no way they could have been plugged in "upside down," but they were grateful for the opportunity to save a little face.

Two people were flying in a helicopter...

[wyseguy]

over Washington state. It was incredibly foggy and the pilot and passenger quickly became lost. The decided to fly close to a building and ask for directions. The found a building and wrote a note to the people inside the building. The note read, "Where are we?". One of the office workers noticed the helicopter outside the window and quickly wrote a note back saying, "in a helicopter." The pilot immediately seemed to know where he was and flew directly back to the helicopter pad and landed. The passenger was astounded.

"How did you know where we were?"

"That was the Microsoft building. Where else would you get a technically correct, but completely useless answer," replied the pilot.

Worst Explanation? IE Nationwide Outage

[tmricha]

After a couple of days of a non-working cable modem and apparent lack of service from my cable provider (For reasons of anonymity, I will not mention the cable providers name, but we can call it "Cox").

Anywho...I proceeded to call the cable company and wait for Tech Support. After a few minutes holding, a lady came on the phone and I proceeded to explain my problem. She tried to walk me through the standard script (is it plugged in? do you have a head on your shoulders? are you sure its a computer?). Finally I asked if I could talk to someone in the Technical Dept (NOT Tech Support) and see if I could re-register my modem's MAC address. After flailing and obviously trying to prevent me from getting to the real help... she told me (drumroll please):

"Oh Sir, I just found out that Internet Explorer is experiencing a nationwide outage and you will need to call Micro$oft about the problem"

YOU GOTTA BE F$@#!ng Kidding Me!

I tried to be nice and tell her I didn't really think that was the problem and again ask for the Tech Dept. She would not budge. So we went back and forth on this a few times (all the while Im trying to remain calm).

Finally I lose it and try to explain as nicely as I can: Maaa'amm I don't think this is could be the problem because IE is a local application, merely a way to browse the web, its just tool. Since it runs local on a machine...it can't actually have a Nationwide Outage.

And before I could finish she was trying to interrupt again so I raised my voice and said: "AND IM NOT EVEN USING IE...IM USING MOZILLA! But Im sure there is a nationwide outage of that as well. Or maybe its my command prompt/ipconfig, maybe its having a nationwide outage as well. RIGHT?!?!"

Then she hung up on me....the nerve.

One of my dumbest users . . .

[SpeedyGonz]

I once told this user by the phone to "move the mouse across the screen and right click over My PC", well, a colleague of him told me later that the guy actually lifted the mouse from the table and waved it in front of the monitor while he was saying to me on the phone "But it doesn't move!"

Re: Oh wait I'm an idiot.

[harrkev]

Perhaps not.

A 9600 baud serial link is only 960 characters per second. There are ten bits per byte, because you have a start bit and a stop bit for each character. That makes 10 bits per byte.

Things get even stranger over ethernet... When measuring bandwidth in terms of bytes/sec, if you use FTP to measure it, then your measurment throws out the ethernet headers, which results in a lower number.

So it all depends on how you measure.

The cable guy

[technomom]

At Cablevision, they consider the digital upgrade to HDTV to be way to complicated for mere ordinary folk to handle. So they send "Super Cable Guy"! A special technician who is trained to install the HDTV converter box. It's a good thing they don't charge for this service.

Well, Super Cable Guy dorked around my Mitsubishi TV for about an hour before declaring that this particular TV did not support HD, despite the large "HD 1080i capable" printing on the front. He insisted HD 1080i had NOTHING TO DO WITH HDTV!! But he agreed to humor me and leave the converter around so I could try.

After he left, I walked downstairs and looked in the back of the TV. He had plugged the cables into the standard RGB input instead of the clearly marked 1080i DTV input. I swapped the cables, checked that I now could receive INHD and a bunch of other channels and then called the cable company and told them they need to explain to their techs just what HDTV is.

JoAnn

May make sense

[zoney_ie]

It probably makes sense to the people running the airport. Just like to the unknowledgeable, trains in Britain and Ireland being slowed / stopped due to "leaves on the line" sounds incredible!

(What happens is that in the Autumn, the leaves pile up on the line, getting ground onto the rails by passing trains. They form a slippery laquer, causing the trains to loose traction - on slopes this can result in inability to make the climb without a run at it or extra locomotion. It's like ice for railways!)

But it still sounds hilarious. "We apologise for the delay, this was due to leaves on the line".

Re:May make sense

[ryanwright]

This is why I don't tell users what the problem is. "The server will be down tomorrow from 8 to 10am for routine maintenance. I apologize for any inconvenience."

Or, for the train: "We apologize for the delay. We will be underway shortly."

Worst explanation I've heard

[saha]

My SGI 320 died one day with a puff of bluish smoke that reeked and subsequently had no more power. I called SGI's PC tech support, which I have to add is not their regular tech support for their Irix and Linux line of machines. Their IA-32 PCs manufacturing and their PC tech support was handled by another company.

The PC tech support "guru" insisted that it was a f@*#ing software problem. Smoke comes out of my computer and this imbecile comes up with the lamest excuse on Earth. Software !?!?!?!?!?! I was so pissed, I was fuming and talked to his immediate supervisor and bitched her out. I then threatened the regional sales manager not to buy any more machines, which is an effective threat when you end up buying Onyx 2000 and Origin 3000 from them.

In all fairness the workstation and server SGI tech support is really good. Its the best I've seen compared to Apple, Dell, HP ....you name it. You do pay a pretty price for their tech support, but when SGI entered the PC market they had to subcontract the manufacturing and support out to other American companies. Which resulted in a significant problem with the quality of their tech support (which I may add was all done in the U.S.) My experience with tech support from Bangalore has been pretty good so far. Which goes to show its not which country you subcontract or outsource to, but to whom.

The fog (FUD) technique, or howto change subject

[Walrusss]

We installed a new linux server for a portal server in an all-windows-environement.

First thing the tech support said when those win file server had a problem:

"It's Linux's fault".

Well, what a convincing explanation, a nice big cloudy fog, sorry, FUD.... :-)

Dell HD didn't work

[gmletzkojr]

I went on a service call to a home user. They proceeded to tell me that they bought a Dell 8 months ago, and hadn't opened it all that time. When they did open it and set it up, it wouldn't boot. They contacted Dell, and Dell tech support informed them that "hard drives need to be used frequently or they stop working."

Weather-controlled cable modem

[MadHobbit]

A couple months after I had my cable modem installed a few years ago, it was pretty slow. Lots of dropped packets at the gateway, that sort of thing. So I gave Shaw a call to let 'em know I wasn't happy with the service I was paying for.

The explanation I got: "It's been cold lately, that's probably what's causing it."

This was in -October-. In Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. The temperature was hovering around freezing...maybe a little colder. No snow yet. On the Prairies, before the winter's out it's going to drop down to -30C.

So I hung up on him and the problem went away in a couple days.

For the record, I've had the modem a few years, in a temperature range from about +35 to -35. It still cuts out sporadically, but temperature has no obvious correlation :)

Worst question asked of tech support

[buckeyeguy]

Back in the days when my work location ran programs on a Unix mini and green-screen dumb terminals on the desktop, one of the secretaries called our word-processing support lady and asked her why she couldn't get Windows Solitaire to run on her terminal.

Wish I could remember the snappy answer given to that one...

DSL Support Call

[Anonymous Coward]

My DSL line started dropping out at random after a thunderstorm, the tech support guy told me the problem was that my DSL modem was in the same room with the computer, and the EMI from my computer was the cause. He said I would need to relocate the modem to a room with no other electrical equipment, then wait one day for the "fields to dissipate". Where in the world am I going to find a room without so much as a lightbulb in it? I found a copy of the latest firmware for the modem, flashed it, and was back up without further issue. I wonder why I even bother with those guys.

Your MicroCenter rep was pretty quick.

[LiberalApplication]

...the one I had an experience with wasn't exactly bright.

I had bought a retail-packaged CPU there and the OEM fan/heatsink that it had come with seized a few days of use later. So I bring it back to the MicroCenter, flag down one of the fellers, and said to him:

Me: "Hi, I bought a CPU here the other day, and while the CPU is fine, the sink it came with looks a little buggy".

Employee: [stares at me blankly]

Me: "Is it possible to just get the sink replaced? I don't need a new processor."

Employee: [continues to stare at me blankly]

Me: "Hello?"

Employee: [very slowly and seriously] "This is a computer store, we don't sell sinks here. You want the Home Depot in the next plaza."

Me: [stares at employee blankly]

Re: Mebibytes and Megabytes

[AmericanInKiev]

This is an old argument first heard echoing around the halls of international translation.

A Table in English translates to "(a Table)" in German, but the germans have different cultural associations with the word, and thus the word Table in english in fact conjures up completely different connotations, emotions and sensibilities in the english speaker when compared to the word for the same objeect in germany.

(Not my argument - a paraphrase of classical translation pedogogy)

What we have here is a translation between base 10 for humans and base 2 for bounded arrays.

Most people use arabic notation, but in fact store and think of large numbers in base 10 scientific notation. We are essentially zero-counters when it comes to large numbers.

Computers on the other hand are first binary, and secondly store numbers in multidimentional arrays. They are not zero counters, and do not favor round numbers. Generally computers favor memory blocks which are bounded by n dimensions each of which is a exponent of 2.

All thiis to get back to the main point.

The limitations of translation ensures one will never be able to express computer number comfortable in english - and thus the attempt should be governed by the law of diminishing returns.

AIK

I've done tech support...

[Xhad]

And by far the most ridiculous are the ones I had to make up for people who wouldn't admit they did something wrong.

Me: Oh, looks like the battery was loose.

Customer: No, it wasn't, I'm sure.

Me: Oh...(grasping)...were you near a window when you put the battery in?

Customer: Maybe...

Me: That's it. Sometimes sunlight can corrupt the internal settings of the wireless mouse, which can be reset by removing and replacing the battery.

Customer: Oh, THANK YOU!

NASA reprogrammed my cell phone

[goatbar]

From the "I wish it wasn't true" files from 1999:

Back when I had a Sprint cell phone, I had a week where I could make outgoing calls, but couldn't receive calls. When I talked to tech support and the guy asked me where I had been for the last few days. When I said that I had mostly been at work which was at NASA Ames, he said:

"Oh. NASA reprogrammed your cell phone."

How do you respond to that? The next day, my cell phone started working again. I guess NASA must have reprogrammed it back!?!?!

Re:MCSE

[SuiteSisterMary]

Actually, the good analogy would be 'some guy plowed into me with his car; he had a license. Therefore, having a drivers license isn't an indication of actual driving skill.'

Well, having your MCSE isn't an indication of your actual skill; it's an indication of your ability to pass a standarized test.

I had something similar once

[Weaselmancer]

The cover thing reminded me of a tech support story of mine.

I was doing support for some lawyers. Built them some PCs. One guy calls me after a week or two and says he can't get on the net.

So I arrive and test the PC. Yup. No net.

I do a little fiddling, then eventually take the PC out of the little wooden cubby hole in his desk to fiddle with it. I take the cover off, and check to see if the net card has worked loose.

Reseat the card, and all's well. Put it all back together...and it goes offline again. Went through this loop 3 times.

Finally, one time I ran my hand down the far side of the case. (Since I was under a desk, I hadn't had the opportunity to really see the opposite side of it.)

He had lined his case with refrigerator strip magnets.

Weaselmancer

Good old CompUSA support

[jdfox]

You don't read a lot about that, nowadays.

I had the misfortune to buy an HP Vectra from them for my brother , and the Windows install was in one huge monolithic blob on a CD: you had to install all the crap at once, even if you only wanted Windows or a certain driver. That would have been fine if they had shipped a stable build that actually worked. But the config for the Zip drive was both wrong and out-of-date, and downloading latest Zip drivers from Iomega didn't seem to help the persistent crashes and freezes.

So I rang up their "Tech support", to ask about their recommended fix. She walked me through the script, starting with "is the computer switched on Mr. (my surname)?", and suffixing every single question in the script with "Mr. (my surname)". This was clearly their attempt at personalizing "Customer Care", and make me feel like a Valued Individual(tm), but all it did was make me want to smack the "Customer Care" out of her with a blunt axe.

Eventually we came to the end of the script, and no closer to a solution. She now advised me to re-install from the massive blob CD, which would fdisk all my data to oblivion. I explained that I'd done that already, and it hadn't worked.

"It looks like the installation CD as shipped has a problem."
"No that's not possible Mr. (my surname). They're thoroughly tested."

"Well sure it is. Maybe it worked before, but doesn't work on the latest hardware."
"No that's not possible Mr. (my surname)"

"Why not?
"What do you think could be wrong with it Mr. (my surname)?"

"How about the out-of-date drivers?"
"How would that crash the machine Mr. (my surname)?"

"If there's a bug that didn't show up before, but shows up under a new revision of BIOS, or a new ethernet card, or new firmware in the Zip drive, and so on."
"I don't see how that's possible Mr. (my surname)."

"Well it says on the Iomega site that there's a known memory leak issue with the version of drivers that you've shipped, for a start."
"I'm sorry, what was that you said Mr. (my surname)? A memory LEAK?"

"Memory leak, yes. I can give you the address of the bug report on the Iomega site."
(muffled laughter) "There's no thing as a 'memory LEAK', Mr. (my surname)." (more muffled laughter, now joined by her colleagues, phone covered up and uncovered as she talks)

At this point I was starting to get irritated. Paying for incompetence and ignorance is one thing, but getting laughed at for politely explaining to someone what I paid them to already know is quite another.

So I told her to put her supervisor on the phone, right now. She sighed, and said "OK, Mr. (my surname), I'll put him on right away!" (more muffled laughter).

The supervisor was no better informed than his idiot underlings, but at least he was willing to listen and learn when I explained to him how poor allocation and deallocation management can cause a failure to reclaim discarded memory, and he accepted that there really was something called a memory leak, and that the computing world outside of CompUSA had known about it for years, and that Iomega had reported the bug exactly as I'd described it.

But CompUSA never did fix my problem. So I backed up my brother's data, and rebuilt his PC from scratch with a borrowed Windows CD, figuring it was worth losing out on the "free" Norton AV etc. that came on HP's monolithic blob-CD, if that's what it took to get a PC that didn't freeze randomly a dozen times a day.

Now, whenever one of us runs into a "professional" who wouldn't know his own job if it jumped up and bit his dick off, we usually look at each other and say in unison "there's no such thing as a 'memory LEAK', Mr. (my surname)".

Re:Overheard at Canadian equivalent Future Shop

[FrivolousPig]

"From bash.org: @FirebirdGM> I just called my Futureshop and asked them how much a 20 GB Hard drive weighed when it was full with information, compared to when it was empty. @FirebirdGM> The guy that was on the phone told me that it was only a few pounds difference. @FirebirdGM> And that's why I don't shop at futureshop." After reading that I called where I work (as tech) and asked one of the girls the same question who was working at the time, she didn't know how to answer, she was fired by my boss a week later, oops

Re:My ISP is retarted - Must be Catching

[Paulrothrock]

Two stories about Comcast:

The cable guy came to hook up my future mother-in-law's computer. I had recommended an eMac, since I know I'll be the one maintaining it and I know Macs better.

He rings the doorbell. At 8:30 in the morning. My mother-in-law opened the door (in her bedclothes) and asked him to wait a minute while she woke me up. He sighed and tapped his foot. I dragged myself out of bed and threw a shirt on.

Immediately upon entering the house, he says he's having a bad morning. Oh great. Then he asks what operating system the computer's running. "Mac OS X 10.2," I say.

"It won't work," he says. At this point, I'm feeling two things. First, I feel like I screwed over my future mother-in-law for recommending a computer that wouldn't work, and second, I want to know why this guy thinks an eMac won't work. So I ask.

"Well, uh, our software, uh, hasn't been upgraded, so, uh, I can, uh, get your name and number and we can, uh, call you when it gets upgraded. It works in OS 9, though."

"This computer has OS 9, too. Will it work if I boot into OS 9?"

"Uh, no," he says, "it's something about being upgrade to OS 10. It doesn't work anymore. It also doesn't work in Windows 95, or on computers that were upgraded from Windows 95 to 98, and people have problems using the service on HPs that have Windows XP installed"

At this point I knew he was lying out of his ass, because there's no difference in booting into OS 9 from an eMac and running OS 9 on a computer where it's the default OS. At least to the applications. And my parents have an HP with Windows XP installed, and haven't had a problem. This got me angry. You wouldn't like me when I'm angry. So I tell him to install the line, and I will set it up myself.

He walks out in a huff because (I think) he was hoping to get out of this job and get a doughnut or something. At this point, he's woken everyone in the house up by talking too loudly, and he returns with a HUGE drill bit. (Like an inch in diameter. Way bigger than you'll ever need to run a cable wire. I know, I helped my dad run cable in my house and we did it with a 3/8" bit and a coat hanger.) My future mother-in-law asks him what he's going to do with it.

"I have to drill a hole in the floor."

"Wait a minute, I'm paying $89 to have in installed in an outlet on the wall."

"Well, that's a different team, you'll have to get someone else to come out, and that computer's not internet ready, so it might not work anyway."

At this point, she's starting to cry because she just bought this house and he wants to put a 1" hole in the floor, and she thinks she just wasted $800 on a computer that won't work.

"Why isn't it Internet ready?" I ask.

"It doesn't have ethernet" the idiot says.

"Yes it does"

"But it's not the same on a Macintosh." (Yes, he's that dumb.)

"My friend's got four Macs running OS X hooked up to Comcast hi-speed in the same township."

"Well, maybe he figured it out how to do it," he says. "I don't know how."

Not knowing how is a lot different than "it won't work."

Under my breath I say "Maybe I should call Comcast and get a friggin' job."

"FINE!" says he. "YOU DO MY F*%ING JOB." Then he grabs his stuff and slams the door as my future mother-in-law is holding me back from rushing the asshole.

So now we have my future mother-in-law and fiancée in hysterics, kids scared in the other room, and my future brother-in-law and myself ready to hunt this guy down. All in the space of fifteen minutes of this guy ringing the doorbell.

We all calm down, and my mother-in-law calls Comcast and asks what computers aren't supported. As it turns out, there shouldn't be any problems using Comcast broadband, and they "don't know why any of their repairmen would say that." Then she got transferred to this guy's supervisor.

"Well, I'm getting a different story from him," he says. No shite sherlock, he wants to keep his job.

So th

Re:Emachines - BEST BUY!

[Zambarra]

i think e-machines is not the culprit here. its most probably best buy.

we'd tell people to return dead on arrival products to best buy, and 4 weeks later that same product is sold to somebody else, as new, not working. since we track serial numbers and retailers - we KNOW best buy sometimes puts returned merchandise back on the shelf without testing it first.

i never buy anything there.

Don't let them confuse you...

[jamonterrell]

They have no idea what they are talking about. Bytes/sec and Bits/sec do not have any special meaning beyond the number of bits or bytes that can be passed in a given second.
First, it's totally and completely moronic to strip the TCP Header off for one measurement but not for the other, it's not some sort of standard practice.
Second, the story says that instead of Bytes = 8*Bits, it was mroe like Bytes=13 or 14*Bits. That means that by their logic the BYTES were getting stuck as it was taking more bits to make a single byte, not the BITS.
Third, the speed test is probably hosted on a simple webserver with a moderately sized file, whose download is timed, because this makes sense, it's how everyone does it. With that being said, why and how would they see the TCP headers from that layer?
Fourth, in order to code a working speed test, you couldn't use packets small enough for a TCP header to matter it to matter, and I've never seen a speed test that tried. A standard TCP header is 120bits (15 Bytes) IIRC. Let's figure out how small it would have to be: (x*13)-(x*8)=15, solve for X and find that the packet would have to be 3, do the same for 14 and you'll find that it's between 2.5Bytes and 3Bytes of data in order for the difference to be the size of the TCP header. What kind of a speed tests measures accurately to anywhere near modern DSL line abilities (let's say 100,000Bytes/sec to 400,000Bytes/sec) with just 2.5Bytes? Even for just 100K/sec DSL that's a 400,000th of one second of bandwidth. That's like checking someone's hearbeat by touching their wrist for .00015 seconds!
Parent posts with this theory are merely flamebait and should be ignored.
Jamon

Am I calling for what?!?!

[agent_stretch]

I've spent 3 years of my life doing tech support, seen plenty of good and bad tech's but this takes the cake. My team was providing tech support for internal employees of a F500 company, we we're required to go through a script at the start of each call to determine whom we were talking to and if they were calling on behalf of themself or someone else. Our caller id system worked on users' employee id's but sometimes people would fat finger their eid and we would be made to look stupid. My cube neighbor gets a call from some lady who had typed in the wrong number. Apparently they had a bad connection because he keeped speaking louder trying to find out why she was calling. Suddenly he nearly screams out, "Are you calling for Dick?!". He realized his mistake, apologized profusely and then put her on hold for five minutes till everyone had stopped laughing.

wakarimashita

[nazokoneko]

in japan, they say "i understand" (wakarimashita) constantly during conversation; the meaning is pretty much synonymous with "i am listening." this is called aizuchi and is required to show you are paying attention. it is why japanese people might make "hmm" and "ah" noises and nod a lot while you are speaking. it's just a custom of politeness.

unfortunately, i think it causes the expression to lose meaning to them when translated to english. they use it much more loosely.

Re:wakarimashita

[ThinkingGuy]

In Japanese you'd probably phrase it in terms of "Is what I'm saying clear and understandable?" In Japanese politeness is very important, and asking someone directly if they "understand" can sound as if you are questioning their intelligence.
A Japanese speaker might say something like:
"Imi|setsumei ga tsuujiteiru deshou ka?" ("Is my meaning|explanation coming across clearly?")
Or more politely, especially when dealing with a customer:
("Go fumei na tokoro ga gozaimasu ka?" - "Are there any points (in what I've said) that are unclear?")

Disclaimer: I'm not a native Japanese speaker, but have studied it for 15 years.

Laptop + Lap = "You voided your warranty."

[Morgion]

My Titanium PowerBook's screen bumpers (little plastic/rubber nubs, prevent screen from touching keyboard) deteriorated and smeared away; I first noticed it when the gunk got on my hands. By that point, however, my screen had already scraped against the trackpad bezel and left a mark.

Not only was it within Apple's one year warranty, I had also forked over $350 for the AppleCare extension, so I could have the privilege of calling and telling them about the defect. The Phone Technician I spoke with was slightly infuriating. It eventually got fixed, but I had to deal with a local tech instead of direclty through Apple.

Tech: Under what conditions do you use your PowerBook?
Me: Mostly, it's on my desk at work. At home, I sit down with it for a few hours.
Tech: Do you use it on your lap at home?
Me: *blink* Um, yes...
Tech: Using it on your lap probably caused overheating, and that won't be covered under Apple's warranty.
Me: *fuming* But it's a laptop...
Tech: Actually, sir, it's a portable...

Apple never calls it a "laptop" on the site; I guess most computer manufacturers have moved away from that term because the systems just keep getting faster and hotter.

There are, however, many promotional pictures of people using iBooks and PowerBooks on their lap. *shakes fist*

Re: Mebibytes and Megabytes

[Glonoinha]

I can see it now. New guy shows up at the office, first day on the job. Starts talking and in the same breath utters the words 'kibibyte' and 'gibibyte'. Two of the guys on the team hold him down and start beating him senseless, two others start picking apart his resume and application paperwork to get him fired that same day on a technicality.

Anybody that actually says either of those words in my presence is getting bitchslapped, no doubt, and probably sent packing during the next set of layoffs.

Re: Oh wait I'm an idiot.

[harrkev]

Aparently nits are in season again. Pick them while you can!

Re: Mebibytes and Megabytes

[fitten]

Nah, I'm saying if they want to change it, they have to change away from our terminology. KiloByte remains 1024 bytes. If they don't like our "kilo" being 1024 and want something to mean 1000, then they should use the Kibi to mean 1000, then they should also not use the term "byte" either, as it is a technical reference, so they should replace that with something else, thus, KiloByte = 1024 bytes, KibiFloople = 1000 Flooples.

As to the other comment, the tech language we use was derived in the context of our field. It'd be like a bunch of novices coming in and completely changing the jargon of the plumbing field or medicine based on their uninformed preconceptions. "That's not a crescent wrench! It looks nothing like a crescent. Let's call it a Variable Gap Bolt Loosener and require everyone else in the world to do the same."

Also... Kibi and Mebi are just very unprofessional sounding, like they belong in some Pokemon cartoon. I wonder how many person-hours in committee were required to come up with those terms. I know they preserve the K and the M but this is rediculous. As for me, I will refuse to use "Kibi" and "Mebi".

You MUST be a competitor!

[Mouse42]

Unbeknownst to me, my printer port had broken from the mother board. I got my printer about 6 months after I got the computer, so I imagine, the printer port was just always broken.

I spent an entire day on the phone calling back and forth between the computer company and printer company. Finally, the printer company swore that their printer was fine, and told me to force the computer company to accept the blame.

I stuck to my guns and told the computer company the printer was absolutely fine, and that something had to be wrong with the computer itself. I was then told to go through a whole bunch of steps, a few of which included DOS prompts. Since my very first computer was run completely through DOS, I had no problem with these steps. This mystified the tech support guy.

The mysticism then turned into cynicism. He asks me:

"Are you a competitor?"
*laugh* "No."
"I don't believe you. I think you are a competitor testing our tech support."
"What? No, I'm not a competitor!"
"By law you are required to tell me if you are a competitor if I ask you. So I'm asking you, are you a competitor?"
"No! I am not a competitor!"
"Then how do you know DOS?"
"My first computer ran off of DOS!"
"Right.."
"Look, I just want my friggen printer to work, ok?"

After many more tests, his superior came to the conclusion that my printer port just must be broken. A few days later, a repairman showed up and swapped in a new motherboard, and voila! It worked.

PEBCAK and the Jedi Mindtrick

[process]

Working as a system administrator/support person I get alot of PEBCAK (problem exists between chair and keyboard). After a while experiencing these problems I've started doing the Jedi Mind Trick hand movement in front of the screen and chanting some gibberish before I sit down to fix the problem.

It's really hillarious when I then do exactly what they've been trying to do (so they claim) and it works. This leaves the employee with their mouth wide open, staring at me stuttering "b-b-but.."

Then I leave.

Try it, it's tons of fun ;)

Re: Mebibytes and Megabytes

[docholid]

...Breaking News...

This just in: Standard computing term "byte" has been redefined to refer to a group of 10 bits, rather than the previous 8. "The old standard was simply too confusing," say laypeople. The new term for referring to a group of 8 bits will henceforth be a "bibibyte." Industry insiders quoted as saying "WTF?!"

Re:Try a phone conference

[stephenbooth]

I love doing that. A lot of the projects I work on involve getting 2 or more (usually 3-5) external comapanies together and usually an internal service section or two, they're mostly integration type projects. Conference calls are fun, even more so is when you get them to come for an onsite meeting. Firstly they always insist that the meeting be on their site so they'll have their techies on hand. We refuse and say if you want you can bring a techie with you. When they show up there's always a 2-1 ratio of PHBs to techies (and each company sends multiple techies). So you sit them around the table and get them drinks. The first 30-50 minutes are taken up by a silent game of "Who's got the most 733T toys?" as everyone puts their laptops, PDAs &c on the table infront of them. The competition is usually fiercest between the PHBs, techies tend to have a mixture of self bought Palms, iPAQs and (if they're really badly paid) old Psions coupled with a 2 year old laptop that was a cast off from a manager. Occaisionally you see a techie with an iPod or a newish laptop infront of them. I think the former is probably a sign that they don't have a PDA and the latter usually means they work for Microsoft.

Once the winner has made himself known (it's always a male) the meeting begins in earnst, that is the blame storming begins. The PHBs sling accusations at them interspersed with occasional huddles with their techies after which they emerge to say something outrageous (e.g. "Windows 2003 server has a much lower TCO than Linux!") and the techies visably flinch. Then time comes for lunch where the PHBs all head for different top rated resteurants (trying to get us to go with them and not the other companies) whilst I join all the techies down in the nearest pub. Over the first beer we discuss the problems, over the second we rough out the solution and over the third we sketch out the details of the solution and devise a rough project plan for implementation.

Whilst the techies head off to retrieve their repective PHBs from which ever lap dancing club or department store they've found themselves in, I head back to the office and put the designs into Impress, lug my laptop down to the meeting room and hook up to the projector. The PHBs all wander back, sit down and try to kick off their blame storming again. I present the solution that was designed over lunch, usually to the howls of the Microsoft PHBs becuase I'm running Impress on SuSE Linux. Six months to 2 years later all suppliers involved announce how they designed and implemented this wonderful system. All by them selves. With no help from any one. Honest! Really! They're really telling the truth now! For sure! It's all those other companies that are liars!

Stephen

C'mon, man.

[StarKruzr]

Let's be honest. You can usually tell within the first four sentences spoken - including the greetings and introductions - whether the caller is going to be capable of following instructions and perhaps even useful toward resolving the issue, or will be completely, utterly fucking worthless.

It's amazing how much you can learn just from hearing someone's voice. And I haven't been wrong yet.

Re:C'mon, man.

[carlos_benj]

And I haven't been wrong yet.

If that's true it speaks to a limited body of experience because, as everyone knows, all blanket declarations are false.

From the Magic 8-Ball Department

[Rob Wilco]

Looks to me like that DSL rep would have offered a better response with one of these Tech Support Spheres instead.

Lessee (shakes sphere, reads answer): "Network Error" - see? It works!

Re:Not as good as this one...

[ryanwright]

I don't know why, but this reminds me of an experience I had at a Home Depot once. I'm walking through the store minding my own business and this guy comes up to me and asks me where some part is located. I'm dressed in my khaki slacks, nice belt, polo shirt - it never occured to me that he could possibly have mistook me for a Home Depot employee. I just figured he was lost and was asking a stranger for help.

Unfortunately I had no idea where his widget was located and so I responded, "I have no idea." He actually flinched. Then he made a horrible looking face and began to berate me, telling me I should know this stuff. It finally occured to me that he thought I was a store employee. How, I have no damn idea. I said, "You know, I don't actually work here." He rolled his eyes and said, "Yeah, right." I just walked away. What a moron. I can imagine the conversation he had with the store manager about the terrible attitude of "his employees."

Network Support

[Geoff-with-a-G]

I work network support for the Deptartment of Education in a major metropolitan area, and we got a trouble-ticket sent over to our group with the following Problem Description:
"how do I set up a teacher's iBook so that teacher can access DOE email at home without the need for an internet service provider"

Responses we came up with:
1. A REALLY long ethernet cable.
2. Terrestrial microwave.
3. Print the emails as they arrive, pay couriers to deliver the printouts.
4. Our datacenter is moving to a new building at the end of next year, suggest moving it into her apartment.

Re: Mebibytes and Megabytes

[jonadab]

> Actually calling 1024 'kilo' and 1024^2 'mega' has always been insider jargon

All of the terms in question, "bit", "byte", "nybble", "word", "double word",
"quadword", "kilobyte", "megabyte", "gigabyte", "terabyte", and so on and
so forth, are *all* inherently jargon. End users don't have any clue what
any of them mean (and shouldn't have to, in this era of hard drives large
enough to store more documents than you have time to create before the sizes
have inflated so much that your drive is so hopelessly tiny it belongs in a
museum). Just because they're jargon terms is no reason to change their
meaning.

> What 1024 bytes are _really_ called now is a Kibibyte

*WAY* fewer people use that terminology than the traditional terminology.

The 1000-byte "kilobyte" and the million-byte "megabyte" were devised by hard
drive manufacturers who want to inflate their size numbers. No operating
system by *any* vendor uses this type of "kilobyte" or "megabyte", nor does
any bandwidth provider of which I'm aware, nor any common throughput-measuring
software or device, nor any popular application software I'm aware of. Pretty
much just the hard-drive manufacturers.

My GTE story...

[rice_burners_suck]

When we had DSL installed at my work a few years ago (when Verison was called GTE), I had spent the better part of a week getting a Linux NAT server (a.k.a., masquerading) set up so we could all use it. It was at this time that I learned how to use Linux and the related programs, networking protocols, etc.

About a month later, we were experiencing a problem that prevented us from having a connection.

I called GTE and spoke to someone about the problem. They kept giving me a bunch of BS. When they asked which operating system I was using, I said Linux, and they said that wasn't supported. So on the third or fourth phone call, I said Windows, and when they told me which networking window to go into, I typed the commands into the CLI that would yield the same result. But all of this was to no avail.

Finally, after spending some time checking my settings and the network, I came to the conclusion that our side of the connection was fine and that GTE's DHCP server was down or otherwise not responding to us. We weren't being assigned an IP address, and therefore our connection appeared to be down. I called their number again and told their tech support people that they need to check the status of their server. Of course, they were all some minimum wage folks reading off some screen, so I begged and pleaded to be put through to someone technical, which was finally, after countless arguments, granted. I told their tech guy what I thought about their DHCP server. He checked, and sure enough, I was right. He punched something in, and we were back in business. Oh, and I got their direct phone number, in case of future bullshit.

The clueless tech support people are just there to help equally clueless users set up simple stuff in Windows. From that moment forth, I always figured out and solved my own problems. (Increasingly, it's this way with my cars and other equipment... Most people just don't know what they're doing.)

APC

[jonadab]

My horror story of tech support is from APC, from whom I solemnly vow *never*
to buy or recommend *anything*. We had an ongoing issue for *months* with the
software for one of their UPS units. I'm home ATM and don't recall the exact
model number. The issue was an annoying intermittent one, wherein from time
to time the software would decide for no particular reason that the UPS was
operating on battery power (when in fact it was not) and activate five-minute
automatic shutdown sequence. This was happening at night, causing many of
our overnight backups to fail, and it was happening first thing in the morning
when I (the only IT person on staff) am not normally there, causing a lot of
panic among the staff (this system is *the* computer, the *one* that matters,
the single mission-critical point of failure that CANNOT be down during the
day), and I was told in no uncertain terms this had to be fixed *NOW*, but
APC was totally unhelpful. I must have spent a hundred hours on the phone
with them. Every *single* time I called, I had to wait while the tech
support rep did a web search to find out what VMS was. On more than one
occasion I was told that the product we were using (PowerChute for OpenVMS)
did not exist, and that VMS was not supported. Also, despite that the
trouble ticket CLEARLY stated the problem was with PowerChute for OpenVMS,
were were told that we would have to purchase PowerChute for OpenVMS, since
the problem we were having was due to having the Windows version of
PowerChute installed on VMS, which was not supported. I was given Windows
instructions and on one occasion Unix commands to follow. I was told that
the problem was with the city's power grid. I was told that the problem
was with our application software. Various people told me that they would
research the issue and get back to me, but the only one who ever did told
me that the problem must be the PC's serial port, despite that I had already
explained numerous times to numerous people that the cable from the UPS plugs
into LTA16, an RJ45 port on a DECServer terminal server. I called and I
called and I called and I got *nowhere* every single time. I asked on one
occasion to please speak to someone who knows VMS, but it never happened.
We ran for weeks at a time on several occasions with the PowerChute software
disabled, meaning that if the power went out at night we'd have an unclean
shutdown -- unacceptable, but far less likely than the problems we were
having with PowerChute enabled. The problem was never properly resolved.

Needless to say, I will never buy an APC product again, and neither will
the library as long as I work there.