I just started a new IT job as a Technology Sales Supervisor and I need help.

[alexintech]

Hi everyone, my name is Alex and I just started a new position as a Technology Sales Supervisor at a retail store and I need help. I have multiple certifications in computer repair from Lenovo but I was wondering what would be the best way to start learning about PC parts and what my customers might need if they want specific things in computers. Like faster speed, more storage, and other questions. Any help is greatly appreciated and feel free to drop links in the thread to LTT videos or other sites that could help me get and learn information on computers.

 

*EDIT

After reading the comments, thank you for those who have put information that is helpful down there. For those asking about my certifications, I got them in High School years ago because we were a Lenovo Certified Repair center within our highschool. 

[LloydLynx]

USB standards and naming got really messy after version 3.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USB#History

Start readin'

[SansVarnic]

Dont take this the wrong way, but you said you have "multiple certifications in computer repair" would that not include knowledge on pc parts? Only asking to get a better idea on how to answer your question.

[Somerandomtechyboi]

14 minutes ago, alexhenson said:

Like faster speed

Sata/nvme ssd (latter is preffered)

 

If gaming performance better gpu (sometimes better cpu if its cpu dependant games like minecraft)

 

If there are no parts to upgrade then debloat windows, clean install + debloat script is preffered

 

15 minutes ago, alexhenson said:

more storage

Bulk storage hdds or sata ssds

If not bulk storage only need like <4tb just a sata/nvme ssd

 

18 minutes ago, alexhenson said:

other questions

Any examples of other questions?

Im just gonna assume noones gonna ask about oc and since you seem to not know that much about pc parts i doubt youd get into ocing, but if someone does just refer them to msi afterburner for overclocking gpus (no risk at all as no volts are being raised)

 

16 minutes ago, alexhenson said:

I have multiple certifications in computer repair from Lenovo

Im kinda curious as to what youve done to get these certifications, id be expecting someone that can troubleshoot and replace faulty parts on mobos (ex faulty smd) and can read beep codes / postcodes

[Arika]

2 hours ago, alexhenson said:

Supervisor

I don’t want to come across as being too mean…but either you lied on your resume, or your new employer has made a gross misjudgement. How did this not come up in the interview?

[Alex T88]

9 hours ago, alexhenson said:

what my customers might need if they want specific things in computers

From personal experience, the most important aspect in any PC build/upgrade, etc. is the customers budget. As a sales supervisor, you need to have an extensive knowledge in regards to PC parts and whatever your domain of activity is, in order to be able to identify (in some cases) and include the minimum needs of your customers in accordance with their budget. Sometimes, the customer is not willing to spend even let's say extra 5 dollars for something better. That's when you have to come in and provide a suitable, medium to long term solution to your customer. And it can get difficult if you don't have extensive knowledge, which only comes with time. On a personal note, I think that the key element is to be passionate about what you do and enjoy doing it. Knowledge comes with time. I've been dedicated to working in this field for over 10 years (my main qualification is as a high school history teacher) and I still think I've barely scratched the surface. I learn something new almost on a daily basis, but I really love what I am doing overall, even though it can get frustrating, especially when dealing with people that are not tech savvy, but are extremely stubborn and have a bad attitude. It takes time to learn. Be patient and opened to anything new. And do not deflect challenges. Having friends/relatives who also activate in this field and are way more knowledgeable than myself, has helped me a lot, especially in my younger days, when information was not so present and easily accessible as it is today. Experience and knowledge come with time. It might sound as a cliche, but be prepared to make mistakes. And to own them. That's how you learn and become a better person and better at what you do. I wish you the best of luck !

[dkoudijs]

Today I learned that having repair certifications does not cover standard broad PC knowledge.

Saying that, you need to learn the standards on the PC (PCI, CPU, Memory, Video card generation naming)

If you get an outline of the generations, and how they intermix (Gen 13 Intel works with what generation of memory?) you can suggest to customers the right mix.

This mix can be strong on one side (GPU) and weak on CPU and have a very different outcome than a heavy CPU vs. weak GPU. You roughly want to keep everything close togther.

This is just a starting point, but should at least get you knowledgeable enough to help people make decent purchase decisions.

[e22big]

Personally, I would start by trying to figure what kind of customer I have. 

 

There are always two type of people who build a PC - people who prioritise price to performance, and people who just want the best of the best of better brand integration of whatever.

 

I am willing to bet that the vast majority of us is the former, and so I would focus my homework on how to cut corner, rather how to make it run as fast as possible. There are a lot of ways where your customer can save money without losing anything on their tech needs. If they want to game for example, they should absolutely spend as little as possible on the SSD, even something as cheap as DRAM-less SATA would have extremely marginal impact (if any) on their gaming experience (but there's probably no need to go that far anyway, as a lot of entry level NVME is cheap enough to be competitive even to SATA.) Or if they want to game at 4k, they probably don't need a top speed RAM for their use case. 

 

You should also be able to explain the part where they should never skimp on even if it doesn't have a direct impact on performance, PSU for example. Or one that many not have directly impact on the performance but can have a very substantial impact on the user experience like display. 

 

Most people probably don't need your help to recognise that they need a high-end GPU and CPU to have the fastest system possible. So, you should probably focus on the nuance knowledge that aren't super obvious but important to any PC builder.  And please, for f sake, don't spread marketing bullshit that are obviously false (like 1ms LCD monitor)

[wanderingfool2]

Going to guess, Staples?

 

With a retail job, I would say the way to approach it would be a few things.  For the majority of things, I have found that most retail ones don't really know much anyways and tend to misguide (or in cases  of commissions or job performance metrics pushes you to the more expensive things).  If their metrics on performance is how you upsell stuff and you are okay with that, then look at the differences between different hardware and learn the "cons" that sound bad  to customers.  e.g. TN panels, the colors look bad at angles, stock case fans will be more loud, make sure to use our kasper antivirus otherwise just by going to a website you could be hacked etc kind of thing.  The whole "future proofing" kind of talk

 

Now, if the job isn't about just selling the product; but actually recommended lets say the best product though, then it's something where I think knowing different types of software and what they use will become the bigger importance.

 

The reality is though, for a very large majority of people a basic stock PC more than meets their needs.  My parents for example, they could run on Intel Graphics, pretty much any of the current i3 tier and not really notice a thing...as long as they have an SSD for the boot drive.  The SSD as a boot drive is really the only thing I get any of my family to upgrade to, and because I don't want them coming back I usually recommend at least a 512 GB boot drive/1TB boot drive (because they undoubtedly will install stuff onto there and the price gap isn't that large anymore).

 

The general idea though is to try understanding what the client will be using their PC for.  If they want to be gaming on it, or the idea they might decide to start gaming, then it's important to know which games they want to play.  Each game will have it's own requirements or what types of hardware works best.  Some games are more CPU bound, while others are GPU bound.  The only way you can know that is building up the knowledge overtime or looking up benchmarks.  Then trying to keep current on different technologies like DLSS.

 

I would  not recommend basing your knowledge on LTT videos.  Their quality/consistency is no where near good enough to reliably make conclusions about hardware (they have made too many catastrophic mistakes in the past)

[alexintech]

14 hours ago, SansVarnic said:

Dont take this the wrong way, but you said you have "multiple certifications in computer repair" would that not include knowledge on pc parts? Only asking to get a better idea on how to answer your question.

I received the certifications years ago when I was in High School and I know that technology is always changing and I haven't kept up with the recent changes.

[Outta_Hwrw]

You seems so perfectly qualified for this job, I'm sure the staff you will be supervising are going to have huge respect for the knowledge you possess that secured your the job offer.

[Outta_Hwrw]

17 hours ago, alexintech said:

 a Lenovo Certified Repair center within our highschool. 

Uh... Lenovo's Certified Repairs are done by school children ? That's shocking, yet another reason to avoid this brand. Um hardy surprised though, based on other deplorable things I've heard about their global operations.

[alexintech]

8 hours ago, Outta_Hwrw said:

Uh... Lenovo's Certified Repairs are done by school children ? That's shocking, yet another reason to avoid this brand. Um hardy surprised though, based on other deplorable things I've heard about their global operations.

Our high school used Lenovo computers as every student and teacher got one each year. We fixed our own computers and studetns computers, not retail customers.

[Kisai]

On 9/19/2023 at 6:29 PM, alexintech said:

Hi everyone, my name is Alex and I just started a new position as a Technology Sales Supervisor at a retail store and I need help. I have multiple certifications in computer repair from Lenovo but I was wondering what would be the best way to start learning about PC parts and what my customers might need if they want specific things in computers. Like faster speed, more storage, and other questions. Any help is greatly appreciated and feel free to drop links in the thread to LTT videos or other sites that could help me get and learn information on computers.

 

*EDIT

After reading the comments, thank you for those who have put information that is helpful down there. For those asking about my certifications, I got them in High School years ago because we were a Lenovo Certified Repair center within our highschool. 

 

Hmm... I question how you got the job if you don't know this stuff.

 

I'll quickly summarize what you "should know" but, keep in mind that you should already know this stuff.

 

"I want a faster (part name)"

Hard drive - NVMe > Mechanical drives ; PCIe5 > PCIe4 > PCIe3 > SATA

 

GPU - NVIDIA digit in the 10's is better. 4090 >4080>4070>4060>4050 with the same digit in the 1000's. When someone is upgrading in the same performance range, they either go up one in the 10's or 1 in the 1000's, or both. So an upgrade from a RTX 3060 is a RTX 4060 or a RTX 3070. For AMD parts, this is a bit muddier due to changes in product naming convention (eg no prefix, X, HD, RX) So RX 6000> RX 5000 is a generation change, while a change in the 100's is equal to the 10's in nvidia, eg RX 7900 XTX > 7900XT > 7800XT > 7700XT > 7600XT. 

 

CPU - For Intel this is always a bit of nonsense, but the easiest way is to look at the full part number, eg 13900K, and break it down into Gen - Series - Feature. So someone going from a 11700K would want to go up to a 11900K or a 12700K or a 13700K. Intel is going to change how this is named in the next generation of chips, so this is going out the window soon. Suffice it to say, not every part is a gauranteed upgrade. Like going from a 6700K to a 7700K is nothing, in the same way as going from a 10700K to an 11700K is. Going from a 11700K to a 12700K is a larger step up due to the change in the memory (DDR5) so an upgrade has to take into account the memory bandwidth by the new chip. 

 

For AMD, follows the exact same pattern as Intel, 1000's digit is the generation, 100's is the series, and any letter following it is a feature. Ryzen 7000> 5000 > 3000; 7700 >7600. The key difference is that AMD also has a "Threadripper" series which is basically a cut down version of their server chips and follow the same numbering pattern but actually use the 10's digit to further narrow the series, where as this is only used by the highest Ryzen chip (7950 > 7900.) Unfortunately even though the highest end parts on AMD and Intel are "faster" by virtue of having more cores or cache, they aren't always the best option for a "faster" computer, as they have lower base clocks, and not all cores operate at the same frequency.

 

RAM - DDR5>DDR4 , the problem here is that this is dependent on the CPU. Unless someone is willing to tweak things, the best memory configuration for a PC is whatever the maximum specified by the manufacturer, otherwise you might actually leave more performance on the table by picking faster memory from the added latency. Take note how the memory configuration has to be setup, eg Ryzen 7000 series: 

 

So only two modules can be inserted at DDR5-5200. 4 modules can be inserted but they have to run at DDR5-3600.

Intel's spec's are similar:

 

To actually learn what a CPU supports you have to look at the datasheets, and this is usually not worth the time, because you see stuff like this:

And then you have to check the motherboard to see if that IS actually a supported configuration.  It's often easier to just go to the RAM manufacturer's website (eg Crucial) and use the motherboard compatibility table and reverse look up what is available.

So if Intel says "DDR5 5600", then you look up a board, eg an ASUS Prime Z790-P WIFI , and look at what it shows:

So no 2x48GB models.

 

Now check the manual:

Okay, looks good, 4 DIMM's right? Maybe? Didn't Crucial and Intel say 192GB max?

 

Sometimes you will run into discrepancies like this. If in doubt, the "MB manufacturer" is probably correct as far as what you can install, but the CPU and RAM manufacturer are correct as far as speed's are. So In this case I would probably recommend someone install 4x32GB DDR5-5600 If they want to max out the computer.

 

More RAM is always better, but NEVER guarantied faster. So there may be a tradeoff if the motherboard compatibility is poor where it will train the memory to run at a lower setting instead of using the XMP settings.

 

So that covers Hard drive, GPU, CPU and RAM.

 

Those are the four things that impact the "I want a faster..." question.

 

Everything else, is usually not in the hands of the user to change. So if someone wants to upgrade the USB from 3.0 to 3.1 to 3.2 to 4.0 etc, that usually means they have to replace their motherboard and chassis (as most PC chassis use proprietary front panels, so you can't upgrade a USB port to support something a new motherboard has.) Changing the MB then means changing the CPU and RAM. 

 

Upgrading a motherboard from one with a A/B/H chipset to a Z/X chipset is often not a worthwhile investment, and many MB's offer "more budget friendly" versions of the high end chipset by cutting SATA ports, USB-A ports and WiFi from the package.

 

There are conditions where replacing the Chassis is also required:

- Upgrading the GPU from like a GTX 1060 to a RTX 4090 would require a new chassis, since the x80 and x90 nvidia parts are over-sized and do not fit in small chassis.

- Adding more mechanical hard drives than the previous one supports (big chassis can sometimes support 6 HDD's, while small ones often only support 1)

- Adding AIO liquid coolers, as these are often only possible on large chassis.

 

Rule of thumb is that people should not spend more than half the price to buy a new system when considering an upgrade.

So if you have maxed out a DDR4 system with 128GB of RAM and a 11900K/12900K, your only path forward is to upgrade the MB and CPU to a DDR5 system, which means replacing everything but the GPU and NVMe SSD.

 

If you can buy a new, prebuilt system for $2000, but all the available upgrades to an existing one costs $1000, you are still not going to have the performance of that $2000 system. 

 

It's really easy to forget that a PC should not cost $5000, so spending a lot of money while sticking to an old chassis with an old PSU, or even sticking to a proprietary build (eg Dell) out of necessity is not usually a good idea.

 

To that end, everyone has a different budget, and it might be more affordable for someone to buy a system with less capability and replace parts as they can afford it. Like someone might replace a GTX 1060 with a GTX 3070 and then a RTX 4070, while sticking to a 9th gen Intel as long as possible because they don't have a compelling reason to upgrade the CPU until they need more RAM. By then they have to replace the MB, CPU and RAM as one bundle.

 

But because of how little overlap there is between CPU socket and RAM, someone who is planning to piece-meal upgrade, is probably better off on the AMD platform than the Intel one. Intel tends to change the socket every second CPU, where as AMD pretty much kept the same socket across the entire memory (eg DDR4 on AM4, DDR5 on AM5) lifespan. So that could be as many as 5 CPU generations

 

 

Basically you need to know what parts are going to work with what. Ordering RAM that neither Intel or AMD list as supported is something to leave to "special order"'s only and not to keep piles of it in stock. Even though a motherboard might say it supports DDR5-7000, that is only in an overclocked setting, and not many people are going to do that. 

 

Likewise, not everyone will want the best hardware due to budget reasons, so for those builds you want to offer i5/i3 and Ryzen x7xx and x6xx parts. As for what motherboard. It's a matter of taste, but usually certain computer stores favor a certain manufacturer due to marketing reasons (eg MSI is often heavily promoted, but ASUS tends to be the higher quality build) so whatever you keep in stock, should be a mixture of feature boards (eg z chipsets on intel, x chipsets on AMD) and basic boards(B chipsets for both Intel and AMD, H chipsets for Intel, A chipsets for AMD)

 

 

So to summarize, you need to know how these parts work together, which parts can cross-grade (eg 16GB to 32GB RAM with the same speed) and which parts require replacing half the computer (Eg going from a 11th gen Intel CPU to a 13th gen Intel CPU requires replacing the CPU and MB at the minimum, and the RAM if the MB doesn't have DDR4 slots.)

 

If you're trying to sell pre-built systems to people, you need various budgets. If you're just selling upgrades, then it's critical that you sell parts that you know work.

 

Sales people often DO NOT know what they are talking about. So a sales person who doesn't know what they are talking about, trying to sell an upgrade to a customer who doesn't really know what they are buying, will lead to a negative experience when they return it for not working. It's very easy to be caught with your pants down trying to fumble your way through a sale without knowing what you say is impossible.

 

So if you're working for Staples or Best Buy. Good luck.

 

[Vishera]

On 9/20/2023 at 3:29 AM, alexintech said:

I was wondering what would be the best way to start learning about PC parts and what my customers might need if they want specific things in computers. Like faster speed, more storage, and other questions.

It's baffling how you got assigned into that position without knowing this.

These kind of things you don't get to learn in one day.

On 9/20/2023 at 3:29 AM, alexintech said:

faster speed

It depends on the workload and what is the bottleneck in the system for that workload.

On 9/20/2023 at 3:29 AM, alexintech said:

more storage

Just add storage...