Experiences with non-techies

[FezBoy]

2 hours ago, Pascal... said:

Kids in school still using USB sticks (and losing them all the time, also they don't work half the time)  even though everyone has OneDrive. 

 

Also whenever I tell them what my hobby is, they always have to ask the same stupid Question: ArE yUo a hAcKeR ? 

 

#JustREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

 

They probably don't have reliable internet at home, a lot of kids at my school don't.

[Gegger]

1 hour ago, Schnoz said:

This is what happens to me when I bring an ergonomic mouse to school. Not /s

only 1 of my friends knows what a trackball is

 

me: you know those arcade games with that ball thing?

 

THAT'S WHAT ATRACKBALLIS

 

fuck it my spcaebar isbroken

[GilmourD]

On 9/9/2019 at 4:34 PM, Pascal... said:

Kids in school still using USB sticks (and losing them all the time, also they don't work half the time)  even though everyone has OneDrive. 

 

Also whenever I tell them what my hobby is, they always have to ask the same stupid Question: ArE yUo a hAcKeR ? 

 

#JustREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

 

OneDrive sucks. I say that from a professional standpoint.

[Krauzer_]

 I work in technical service at a home electronics store and this thread is more or less my jobb every day. 

Don't get me wrong, I love my job but after showing anyone over 60 how to use an smartphone or laptop (or anything) I want to cry a little bit. 

I know that not anyone know about tech like we here in the forum but really? How hard is it to open a locked smartphone by swping? 

[Koeshi]

On 8/30/2019 at 7:39 PM, wkdpaul said:

/r/TechSupportGore is one hell of a place ...

 

I'm sorry, but are those drill holes?  Trying to understand what has happened here.

 

And yeah, see some great stuff posted to that sub

[WkdPaul]

1 hour ago, Koeshi said:

I'm sorry, but are those drill holes?  Trying to understand what has happened here.

 

And yeah, see some great stuff posted to that sub

Yeah, I remember the story, the tech drilled holes in the back of the SSF case to mount it somewhere ... He did that twice ...

[Gegger]

people not ejecting flash drives properly then wailing when they can't get their data

[WkdPaul]

5 minutes ago, Gegger said:

people not ejecting flash drives properly then wailing when they can't get their data

Device was removed unexpectedly

 

WTF are you on about Windows, I was totally intending on removing that USB drive, it wasn't unexpected!!!

[XenosTech]

2 minutes ago, wkdpaul said:

Device was removed unexpectedly

 

WTF are you on about Windows, I was totally intending on removing that USB drive, it wasn't unexpected!!!

Had an instance this week where the lady just unplugged her 3tb external drive in the middle of copying files then was badgering me about recovering her data

[WkdPaul]

25 minutes ago, XenosTech said:

Had an instance this week where the lady just unplugged her 3tb external drive in the middle of copying files then was badgering me about recovering her data

Yeah ... Usual (l)user bs!

[XenosTech]

2 minutes ago, wkdpaul said:

Yeah ... Usual (l)user bs!

I don't think she liked the price I told her recovery would start at as a minimum ($300 USD) 

[Gegger]

oops accidental post

[Gegger]

Introducing a new series: Stupid FreeGeek eBay Descriptions

 

From a Pentium G620 listing:

The Intel Pentium processor delivers great desktop and mobile performance, low power enhancements, and multitasking for everyday computing.

 

From some 3D printer filament:

All units are inspected and wiped to federal standards by our team.

 

From an i3-2100:

The Intel Core i3 processor is the perfect entry point for a fast, responsive PC experience. This processor comes equipped with Intel HD graphics, an advanced video engine that delivers smooth, high-quality HD video playback, and advanced 3D capabilities, providing an ideal graphics solution for everyday computing. A smart choice for home and office, the Intel Core i3 processor also features Intel Hyper-Threading technology, which enables each core of your processor to work on two tasks at the same time, delivering the performance you need for smart multitasking. Do not let too many open applications slow you and your PC down. Get smart performance now.
 

From a Maxtor DiamondMax HDD:

The storage is 200GB as opposed to 250GB.

 

From a Seagate Barracuda HDD:

The Seagate Barracuda 7200.8 is the perfect 3.5-inch hard drive for extending the storage capacity of your home or office computer. With a 200GB hard drive, this Seagate 3.5-inch hard disk enables you to store all of your data. The spindle speed of up to 7200 RPM in this Seagate 200GB hard drive quickly reads data off the disk, giving superior performance. The serial ATA/150 interface in this Seagate 3.5-inch hard disk provides superb connectivity with other networks. The Seagate Barracuda 7200.8 offers 95 Mbytes/sec internal and 100 Mbytes/sec external transfer rate for moving data with a great speed. With a seek time of 8 ms, this Seagate 200GB hard drive locates a particular piece of data at a faster rate.
 

From a Core 2 Duo E7500:

Get more performance for your power consumption and improve your system’s lifespan with the efficient Dual Core E7500. The 45nm process used in this device reduces power consumption to 65W. Not only does this low consumption reduce your electricity usage, it also leads to lower temperatures, helping to improve your system’s longevity. Intel’s Enhanced SpeedStep Technology and Idle States improve efficiency even further, ensuring it consumes only as much power as necessary. However, just because this system is efficient doesn’t mean it lags behind on performance. With a Front Side Bus speed of 1066 MHz and a 3MB L2 cache, this processor gives quick access to data and keeps up with demanding games and enterprise applications. This balanced mixture of power and efficiency allow this processor to fit well in both home and business situations.
 

[GrockleTD]

3 hours ago, Genwyn said:

Saw a build recently on craigslist where someone appraised their PSU as being worth at least 170$ because it was 170$ on amazon.

The PSU in question is a CX 430m

 

They refer to this tower as a "gaming cpu" but do not list the CPU info anywhere in it at all.

You can view for yourself here:

https://chicago.craigslist.org/nwi/sop/d/valparaiso-gaming-cpu/6975685739.html

bloody valparaiso... of course. of course in indiana? why should we be expected to know what we're talking about before selling something online...

[Bananasplit_00]

13 minutes ago, Schnoz said:

The school I go to is going to get rid of a very nice, barely-used Broadcast Pix Slate G server. I emailed them. They won't let me have it because of some dumb federal law. That thing has a Core 2 Quad and like 5 different PCIe cards.

just nab it once it hits the container

[GrockleTD]

4 minutes ago, Bananasplit_00 said:

just nab it once it hits the container

Ye, just slurp it up like an electro-mechanical spaghetti

[WkdPaul]

Can't believe people are still using Norton (the consumer version) ... nobody should be using that, even if it's free.

 

One of our tech couldn't figure out why the VPN wasn't working on a user's personal laptop. He was connected remotely and I checked with him, Norton was doing a background scan that took +/- 20% CPU and was accessing the HDD like crazy, making that laptop seems like a useless piece of junk (even though it's a not so old HP with a 7200u and 8GB of RAM).

 

One we realized all the problems came from Norton, we were quick to fix it, but still! Please people, don't use Norton Security, it's junk!

[GrockleTD]

2 minutes ago, wkdpaul said:

Can't believe people are still using Norton (the consumer version) ... nobody should be using that, even if it's free.

 

One of our tech couldn't figure out why the VPN wasn't working on a user's personal laptop. He was connected remotely and I checked with him, Norton was doing a background scan that took +/- 20% CPU and was accessing the HDD like crazy, making that laptop seems like a useless piece of junk (even though it's a not so old HP with a 7200u and 8GB of RAM).

 

One we realized all the problems came from Norton, we were quick to fix it, but still! Please people, don't use Norton Security, it's junk!

But I like the cookie...

[The King of the Undead]

1 minute ago, Schnoz said:

True story: A guy at my school swapped the "Tab" and "Backspace" keys on one of the Cornbooks with each other, as well as the "Shift" and "Enter" keys. Guess what happened after that.

this sounds like a epic prank.

[GrockleTD]

1 minute ago, Schnoz said:

It was pretty epic.

 

I also told a guy to come in a Morphsuit painted in Black 2.0 for Halloween. That stuff absorbs 99 percent of all light so he'll come in looking like the void.

Wow your school sounds about 98% more people interesting than mine

[WkdPaul]

9 minutes ago, Schnoz said:

True story: A guy at my school swapped the "Tab" and "Backspace" keys on one of the Cornbooks with each other, as well as the "Shift" and "Enter" keys. Guess what happened after that.

Back in my days, we actually forced the IT department to up their game in the security department ; we realized that when they created users, they always used the same password ... for everyone!

 

The next batch of students got a surprise ; we found out the new users usernames, logged into their accounts (there was no prompt to change the password) and dropped a batch file in the start folder that opened 20 browser Windows(if I remember right) another 20 video files (hidden on a server somewhere) and a few other things.

 

Needless to say the IT dept. wasn't happy ... at all! That had the effect to crash part of the network when all 25 or so new students tried to login!

 

But at least it had the effect of them not using one initial password on new accounts! lol

[GrockleTD]

I actually just remembered a story of where a computer actually caught on fire in one of my classes because people kept stuffing paper in them.

[X-System]

A day, I was high school student. In the computer room for high school students, I had changed Windows 95 startup screen (logo.sys), I had put a custom startup screen.

 

And other day, an IT administrator had seen this custom startup screen. What was he doing? He had formatted it and reinstalled Windows 95...

[Mitko_DSV]

Just read the thread about thin and light laptops and remembered how people at university reacted to my laptop. Well my laptop is a HP EliteBook 8470p (specs in sig if you're interested). So some of them think that my laptop is super old and slow because it's thick and has a DVD drive.

So one day a coleague was sitting next to me during a break and saw that my laptop booted rather quick.

Him: How did your laptop boot so quick?

Me: I've put a 240GB SSD in it.

Him: Why have you bothered upgrading this laptop at all??

Me: Why wouldn't I?

Him: Just look at it. It's so old, even older than mine. And it's probably really weak as well. Can't run anything.

Me: It's not that old. It even has an third gen i5 and 8GB RAM.

Him: What?? That's impossible!

So I showed him the specs of my laptop and as it turned out his laptop was the old and slow one (it had a Pentium and 4GB RAM, he then upraded it to a first gen i5).

This same guy said that he had pirated Windows 10 and would reinstall his laptop with genuine Windows 10 because pirated windows is slower somehow. And this is just wrong unless he downloaded a tampered with copy from a shady website (not sure if this sentence makes sense).

Well, there's more, but this is all I can remember at the moment.

[SenKa]

Just had a pretty good one.

 

Folks are boomers, completely illiterate to technology. They have a smart TV and a TiVo box (TiVo is like AppleTV/Roku/Chromecast).

 

The WiFi went down and I got yelled at over it for some reason. So, I sit down at their computer, which is right next to the modem, and check the internet (I don’t use their WiFi, I have my own router.) Lo and behold no internet over WiFi. So, I run through basic troubleshooting as my parents explain the issue to me. They keep saying “the TV is connected to the computer”, and I keep telling them that it isn’t. Turns in to a screaming match before I realize they just refer to the modem as the computer...

 

Even after I corrected them they keep saying it... ffs