What a palaver!

[Palustris]

On  Wednesday morning we had a beauty of a thunderstorm, right over us. My wife was on the phone at the time to a friend who has just returned from Sri Lanka. She rushed over and shut down the computer, but because she was on the phone she did not disconnect the Modem (external USB one). I never thought about it either, too busy watching the lightning and counting the seconds! Anyway there was an almighty crack which friend heard over the phone, but no lights went out or anything so we thought nothing of it. That is, until the phone call over I tried to go on the Internet. Nothing. "A device on your computer has malfunctioned" was the message. The strike had fried the Modem.
So, off into town to the Computer factory outlet I went, it is about a 10 mile round trip. They had not got one. They rang their Hight street shop who had. So I went into town. Now Wednesday is Market day so parking is hard. I walked, in the rain, to the shop, picked up a Modem and came home.
Well, try as I might it would not work. Back to the Factory. they tested it for me and discovered that it was a dud. Much apologies, ring up shop, yes they had another. Drove back into town, parked and walked. Sorry, we have not got one like that, but this one should work. Same price.
Took thisModem home. Connected it up, ran the set up disc, set up the Connection. Tried to connect. Windows shut down. Restarted Windows, tried to connect and Windows shut down. This time when I tried to start up Windows(Vista) it had to go into Repair Mode and remove the Modem setup program and do a System Restore to work again.
By this time the shop and Factory were closed. Thuresday morning, back to the shop to scream at them for selling me something which is not compatable with Vista. Shop does not open on Thursday. Down to the Factory shop which does.
Technician checks Modem for me and agrees that it is not suitable for Vista. Full of apologies as the shop people should have checked. They still have no USB modems in stock. However, he offered to fit an internal one free of charge. Internal one is also 14 quid cheaper than external. AND, since we had been mucked about he would do it there and then.
Well, we had to go to visit my mother, so I came home and collected the machine and took it there. Then home, lunch and off the visit mother.
We returned at about 4 o clock and sure enough he had put in the Modem and set it up. By the way he says we have a 20% of repairs and upgrades, do you want me to double your memory. We have been talking about this for a while, with the photographs being so big. "How long?" says I. "I'll do it now." So he did. Modem works too and he cleaned the inside of the machine for us while he was at it. But what a palaver to go through!

[NightHawk]

I can certainly sympathise with you there Eric.

It is more annoying when people are employed in these computer shops who don't have a better understanding of the equipment they are selling.     For the non-techie of us (and there are a lot) we rely on the 'experts' (or at the very least, more knowledgeable) to give guidance and sell us exactly what we need and that it is fully compatible with our existing set-up.

Anyway, having said all that I'm glad you got sorted out in the end. 

Laurie.

[ideasguy]

What a hairy a scary bad week Eric. I wondered why you were so quiet!
Its good you got it all sorted in the end. I admire you for your technical abilities in dealing with that nasty situation and the catalog of errors thereafter, particularly the System Restore.
Take a bow 

Have you noticed much improvement with the extra memory?

[Palustris]

Just been trying out some photo prinitng and the speed has iproved no end.

[roiphil]

I also had a right palaver when i bought the new vista pc kept on getting no connection to internet, phoned up shops helpline they said faulty return it to shop and exchange it so i did, now they did not have the same model in so got a slighlty better model for no extra charge took it home and it was a returned machine because when i switched it on it started up and asked for a users pasword  , phoned shop up told to take it back for replacement this time got an even better machine took it home and same problem as on first machine, so the shops helpline arranged for collection.

Got machine back a week later luckily one of their proper delivery drivers bought it we opened the box to see what the fault was on the reprt and it said no fault    now the driver is really good at pcs and he asked what connection told him dial up, he asked how many wires were in the cable that i am useing to plug into phone line told him 4 he said thats the problem the 2 outer wires were earthing the machine so it could not make  internet connection he found a cable in the back of his van but with 4 wires in, he simply cut throught the 2 outer wires and said there you go it will work now

and it does i actually found a cable with 2 wires in my drawer 

the outcome i have a machine priced at 895 euro and i only paid 595 also got 30 back in petrol, and a free mouse, its a good half our trip each way into limerick and i had to go back to the shop 3 times but it all got sorted out in the end, with the second pc felt sorry for the guy in the shop though having to put up with me phoneing up and saying errr karl this computer its been used before (silence his end) me, have you the password for it   

[Palustris]

Vista is designed for Broadband so Dialup is not its favourite. The trechnician gave us a cable to connect, but as he said the one which came in the box with the Modem would not work with the Modem in any case as it was wrong for either Dialup, Broadband or Fax!

[Eric Hardy]

Indeed, what a palaver, Eric. That was bad luck. Glad you got it sorted in the end. COMPUTERS !!!! GRRRRR !!!!
To cheers you up, my computer crashed last night, the second time in two months! 
I have McAfee and all the firewalls, antivirus, spyware and so on so what has caused it I don't know. When I start up it opens, then immediately a blue screen appears which I hardly have time to read then the computer closes down again. I am going to have to take it to the shop because I can't fix it 
I still have my laptop working though

Eric H

[ideasguy]

Aha!
I remember THAT computer 
Hope they sort it out so everything works properly, Eric!

[Eric Hardy]

Aha! I remember THAT computer  ;

Anthea and I went with a friend and his wife on a church crawl yesterday, photographing three Buckinghamshire churches. Over lunch I told him about my computer problems and he recommended getting an Apple-Mac. That is what he uses and he says that it is much more stable than a PC. What do you think? Having had these problems I am using my Bank Genie and Ideas Genie on my laptop with Vista anyway.

Eric H

[ideasguy]

Personally, I wouldnt advise that, unless you made the decision to switch completely to Mac.
Some software may run on both, but in the majority of cases you'll need two sets of software, one for laptop one for Mac.
The newer Macs can run Windows but that defeats the purpose, I guess.

Incidentally, my software items do not run on Mac (so I'm a little biased).

[Eric Hardy]

Thanks George. I was beginning to realise that myself. I have two external hard drives that I switch around and that would no longer be possible if I changed to Mac. I think I will stick with XP. Cheapest solution too  :

Eric H

[Eric Hardy]

Further developments. I took the computer into the computer shop I use. They did all sorts of tests and have come to the conclusion that the hard drive is at faullt so they are changing it for me. Fingers crossed, let's hope I have a stable system for a while after that.

Eric H

[ideasguy]

Have you all your data from that disc saved somewhere?

[Eric Hardy]

At long last my computer is back and I have spent 2 or 3 hours reloading my programmes this evening. The whole machine had gone haywire and even with a new hard drive the deadly blue screen was appearing. In the end we bit the bullet and really rebuilt the computer. It now has a new 2.5 Ghz Intel dual core processor, a new motherboard, a new 400 GB hard drive and 3 GB of RAM. Now I hope to get two or three weeks of trouble free computing 

Eric H

[ideasguy]

I'm real proud of you Eric!
Thats a very high spec machine and if it does as its supposed to, it should last for many years.
With that sort of ram, working with photos will be fun!
Now to get you up and running with IG pro on that baby!