A Tale of Computer Troubleshooting
I’m a tech. And a one-man Help Desk. And I’ve been one for a long time.. since Windows 95, to give you an idea. The other day I get a call. (No surprise there.)
The caller tells me that when they went to turn on their computer that morning.. the screen is solid black. And they are quite concerned, of course, as they have tons of work to do that needs doing yesterday.
They tell me it’s an old Dell with Windows XP, and, no, (unprompted) they hadn’t visited any naughty sites, nor seen any ‘strange behavior’.
So I ask some questions, and have them try rebooting, you know, I go through the SOP.
They tell me the power light comes on, they can hear the fans, and that it “sounds normal.. there’s just nothing on the screen.” (am I hearing a case of the notorious “black screen”? No, this is a Desktop.)
So what would your diagnosis be?
You might guess the monitor died.. right? That they need to go buy a new one?
Well, I tell the caller that there are several possibilities (causes) as for their ‘black screen’ trouble, either hardware or software, and the only way I could zero in on it would require I have access to the machine (not over the phone), and that in all fairness they should be thinking about buying a new machine instead of repairing that old XP. (I wrote It is time to face facts and finally dump Windows XP way back in early 2011.. 2 years ago now.) Pay me to rescue and transfer their data, not keep a relic alive for another .. who knows how long?
Well, that’s not an option, so can I come over? And .. I don’t have much money.. (why do people always say that..?)
So I go over to their house and quickly verify that, as I suspected, it is not a dead monitor (by plugging one of my own).
See, my first suspect, and line of thought as I was driving over, was that a Windows Update had ‘gotten stuck’. Why? Because the day before the call was ‘Patch Tuesday‘, and Update glitches are a cause of startup failures (and black screens). I knew this last batch of Updates had had some troubles.. as two other calls, the day before, had shown. In short, a software failure.
And I knew there were other possible suspects. I have been doing this a while..
But when I powered up their machine to test my monitor/video cable. I heard something my caller had failed to mention — five long beeps, with a short beep. Which points at hardware. Those beeps are a code, you see, and their number and sequence tell a tech what is wrong (um.. at least, that’s the idea behind POST Beep Codes.)
So I powered up my laptop and went to the Dell website and downloaded the technical manual for that model, and looked up the beep code and discovered that the code I was hearing meant that their problem was a failure with the RAM memory.
Which will also produce a ‘black screen’.
So I looked at the RAM specs and then went out to my car and grabbed my package of 2x 1GB PC3200 DDR modules out of my kit (for just such occasions) and went back in their house, opened the computer’s case, popped out the old RAM and put mine in, and BINGO! — their computer started right up, faster than before. (Because their old modules were only 512 MB’s).
And I charged them $75. (One half-hour labor plus the parts.)
My client was delighted and flabberghasted. They were expecting to pay much, much more.. And they not only were able to get right back to work, but had gotten an unexpected upgrade.
I tell you this story not to blow my own horn, or drum up more clients. I tell you this because my client, upon hearing the bill, expressed what I find to be an extremely prevalent conception out there in “average computer user” land — that technicians are crooks, gougers, and/or incompetent, and/or always tell you to buy a new device.
Or they think they can “Google it”, and fix it themselves.
I tell you that story to try to explain why that conception, out there, common though it be, isn’t fair to us techs.
We know what to look for (and listen for), what questions to ask, and can (usually) get right to the heart of the trouble and get you back online again in jiffy. In today’s marketplace, with literally TONS of unemployed IT types willing to fix your computer, we simply cannot gouge in our pricing (were we so inclined).
And if we tell you a part needs replacing, it does. And I (and I’m sure other techs, too) do not profit on parts — we order ’em cheap and pass the saving on to our clients.
.. to test my theory, try googling ‘black screen’. See how many answers you have to read before you find “replace your RAM”.
I know this little story isn’t going to change the world’s view of repair techs but.. if your computer won’t start up, the screen is black, and it’s beeping at you? Be sure to tell your tech about them, won’t you? Have a great day, everyone!
Today’s reco: Windows Repair (All In One) – A GREAT Utility For The Tech Toolbox
“When it comes to computers we can find ourselves getting into all sorts of situations where it is very difficult to assess and fix the problem. For example, a couple of friends of mine recently ran into a situation where the windows updates service was broken on a computer they were working on and they had to resort to researching the matter on the internet in order to get a fix.” Read more..
Today’s quote: “You may not realize it when it happens, but a kick in the teeth may be the best thing in the world for you.” ~ Walt Disney
Copyright 2007-2013 © “Tech Paul” (Paul Eckstrom). All Rights Reserved.
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All we really have, in the end, are our stories.
Make yours great ones. Ones to be proud of.
Apple’s New “Lion”, and More for Your Monday
Apple announced that it had 1 million downloads of its newest operating system, OS X 10.7 codename “Lion”, on its first day of availability. Available through the Mac App Store for $29.99, Apple says people are buying Lion faster than any other OS release in Apple’s history.
Microsoft could take a lesson from this (IMHO). Not from adding a feature or two and a dozen tweaks and calling it a new version (with a new name), but to get a clue about their archaic pricing structure. If I could get Windows 7 Home upgrade licenses for $30 – $40, I would buy a dozen of them today.
I am not an iFanatic, and do not know any more about Apple machines than what I have to as a Technician living in Appleland (aka ‘silicon valley’) — yes, I fix Macs. But I don’t use them. I haven’t powered up my “Tiger” machine in.. oh, let’s call it 2 years. And, so far, I do not own any iGadgets either.
With that said, I have looked at various “reviews” and it seems to me that the main thing Lion gives you (new) is direct integration with the iStore, and touchscreen ‘gestures’.
Hmmm… I don’t want either of those things.
It kind of looks to me like Apple is “blending” their operating systems for their gadgets into their desktop OS. (People are accusing Windows 8 of this same kind of thing..)
It also has something called “natural scrolling”, which apparently nobody likes.
I will say, it is kind of hard finding less-than-enthusiastic reviews.. ahem. Such as this one: Here Are 12 Amazing Hidden Features In Mac OS X Lion
“Lion touts more than 250 new features, but Apple only advertises a few of them. We picked out some of the best tips for customizing and making the most of Lion. Read more..
I dare you to look at those, and then I ask you think about the definition of the word “amazing”, and then find any correlation. (And note that one of the ‘tips’ is how to turn off natural scrolling..)
I was kind of surprised that some of the ‘features’ are only now available…
I had questions if improved 64-bit capability would make Lion “faster” than Snow Leopard, so I found this article interesting (though, it is way too early to really tell): Snow Leopard vs. Lion: Performance head-to-head
Since we had the 27-inch iMac on hand, we thought we’d see if OS X Lion introduced any performance changes. Read more..
(And for those considering “upgrading” to Lion, I would suggest reading the comments, too.)
As I said earlier, I am not an “Apple guy”, and I do not have any ‘hands on’ experience with Lion. So I am not going to presume to advise you Apple users on whether to upgrade to Lion or not. I will only offer (repeat, really) my ‘general policy’ which goes — yes, you want to keep all your software up to date with the newest versions; but, you do not want version 1.0 of anything.
A seeming contradiction.
I – myself – would wait a bit on Lion. Until the first patches have been released. Then I would upgrade. And learn the new “productivity enhancements” like “spaces”. Maybe (probably) even buy a “gestures” mouse.
If you are at all curious about Apple’s new operating system, (“The World’s Most Advanced Operating System”) the place to start is to take a look at the official Apple page, here.
Today’s reading reco: Four Things Google Plus Could Do To Fix Google Plus
(There are “big” issues here.. I urge a read.)
“Saturday’s Google Plus user account deletion purge plunged the new social network into a crisis of user trust: the community wants it fixed.” Read more..
“Google+ is not warning users before deleting user accounts, and some people have reported being locked out of all Google services, including docs and Gmail.”
~
Today’s quote: “Joy is a flower that blooms when you do.” ~ Unknown
Copyright 2007-2011 © “Tech Paul” (Paul Eckstrom). All Rights Reserved.
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About the Recovery (D:) Drive
A Reader Asks a Very Good Question About the “Recovery Partition”..
Q: Paul,
When I open up the My Computer icon on my desktop to check my hard drive, the recovery disk is usually close to 2/3’s full and it is in GB. Is this a drive I want to do anything with? I have plenty of drive space on my C drive but this takes 3-4GB of space.
What is the recovery drive for and should I try to recover the the disk space it uses?
A: When you click on “Computer” (or, “My Computer” in XP) an explorer window will open showing the storage devices (aka “drives”) attached to your computer (storage “memory”). These storage areas will be assigned a “drive letter”, and usually start with the area which contains the Windows operating system and is responsible for “booting” your computer — labeled drive “C:”
Why doesn’t it start with “A:“? Well, back in the day, it did. Long ago, computers came with A and B drives – which were 5.25” ‘floppy’ drives (which contained the operating system. Windows didn’t exist yet). When the first “hard” drive came along, it had to go next in line.. thus C:\ (c: equated to “hard disk” [with a “k”]). Eventually, operating systems were designed to run from “hard” disks, and – eventually – “floppies” went the way of the T-rex. (But “hard disk” still equates with “c””)
I digress, but! I need to keep talking about computer history/evolution for just a bit longer. Long ago, computers used to come with CD’s. Either a Windows CD or a Windows CD relabeled by the manufacturer to something like “Dell Recovery Disc”. These were used in the sad case of really bad errors crashing the computer, and tech support told you you had to “reinstall Windows”.
(Sometimes called “disaster recovery”)
At some point in time, some brick-headed, idjit barnacle of a CEO made the absolutely dumbest decision ever made by Man — in the hopes that they could save 3¢ per computer sold. (Can you guess what I would say to this *person* if I met them?) They decided to do away with the Recovery CD and instead put those files on a special section (called a “partition“) of the hard disk — which came to be Drive D:\ (aka “the ‘recovery partition’)… the topic today. Ahem, sorry.
Back to the topic: When you first start up your computer (aka “boot up”) you will see a drab screen that says something to the effect of “Press F11 to recover your computer” (or some F key.. maybe F10, maybe F2..) This function is used in the sad case of really bad errors crashing the computer, and tech support tells you you have to “reinstall Windows”. (Sometimes called “disaster recovery”)
This “recovery process” will wipe (aka “erase”, aka “delete”) your C:\ drive, and copy the “image” stored on D:\ over to there — thus returning your PC to “factory condition”.. complete with crapware, such as Connect to AOL and Polar Penguins, and minus all your installed programs, updates, and … files.
You do have a backup copy of all those.. right?
This disaster of a disaster recovery method was not necessarily the case if you had/have a disc. Which is why the CEO mentioned above is a jackass. And why you want to read, Windows 7 Owners, You Want To Do This…
Answer the question, Paul: Okay okay okay
The drive D: aka “Recovery” is a special, protected area, which contains the files necessary to restore your computer to factory defaults. You cannot modify it. Short version: Pretend it isn’t there, and … hope you never need it.
(If you are eyeballing that ‘open space’ because you have filled up your C:\ drive.. well, no. What you need to do is install additional storage [ aka “upgrade” ] and/or go in and remove stuff from C:\)
* Okay.. maybe not the dumbest…
Today’s reco’d reading: Warning: Surprise spam trojan on Facebook
“Ever received messages from your Facebook friends containing a notice or invitation, such as an invitation to visit a particular site, added with an interesting message, like “Hey watch this, so cool!”? In most cases, the recipient of the message will be happy to follow it, especially if the message was sent by one of your best friends, which you trust. However, did you ever think that it could be sent by an intruder, spam, or even viruses?
Like yesterday, one of my friends received a “surprise” from Facebook, but then soon realized that his computer was now infected with the trojan, as well as making it a “spam machine.””
Copyright 2007-2011 © “Tech Paul” (Paul Eckstrom). All Rights Reserved.
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A Tech’s First Impression of Windows 7 64-bit
As I promised in yesterday’s post, Windows 7 and the Era of 64-bit, I deleted the partition on my machine containing Win 7 beta and installed a 64-bit version of the Win 7 RC.
I have to say that my first and most immediate impression is — I am disappointed.
Why?
click on images = large
Because: the only thing that clued me that I was now “rolling with the 64” was — if I looked at my system properties — I could see a tiny, normal-sized line of text saying “64 bit Operating System”.
There was no banner — anywhere — that trumpeted, “Success: CONGRATULATIONS PAUL! You are now rolling with the big dogs!“
No balloons fell from the ceiling.
A marching band did not fill the room and play We Are The Champions.
There was, in fact, none of that.
There also wasn’t any glitches, snags, hang ups, curious error messages… and, when I clicked on Device Manager…
There was no yellow exclamation points, red X’s, etc., indicating that I needed to put on my safari outfit and go on a device driver hunt.
Huh.
So I tried plugging in a few USB devices — a camera, a multi-function printer, a joystick, and a storage device (I was, after all, all dressed for the hunt). All of them auto-installed with no action on my part — not even a click “Yes, search for drivers on the Internet”, or any of that.
Huh, again.
So I feel totally robbed. I was fully expecting to have to do some work… some troubleshooting… some driver hunting… feel some Installer’s Aggravation.
I was looking forward to it actually, as I thought it might make for some article fodder.. you know, Tech Paul Goes In Search Of The Elusive 64-bit Driver or What Size Hammer Made 64x Win 7 Fit My Machine.. or some such.
All I got was…
And, darned my luck, Windows Easy Transfer worked flawlessly too.
Huh.
Maybe (hopefully) I’ll run into trouble with networking… stay tuned.
[update: I did recently encounter a headache trying to install a device. See, Troubleshooting Installing Programs On Win 7]
Today’s free link: to see all my Win 7 articles, click Windows 7 articles.
Today’s free download: Click here to download Windows 7
Copyright 2007-9 © Tech Paul. All rights reserved. post to jaanix
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• About Tech Paul
I am a Retired computer & network technician. I used to think the machines were pretty cool. Now I don’t.
They’re anything but.
I regularly posted how-to’s and tricks & tips and general computing advice here starting in 2007. (Use the Search tool to find answers. But be aware, many are rather dated.) Sometimes I answered (your) specific questions in an article if I believed the answer was generally helpful to “everyone”. All the writing you see was my own, typos and all. There always is/was an implied “IMHO” in what you see here.
Note: You are responsible for using this blog and its content. I am in no way liable for any losses caused by user error, viruses and/or other malware, hardware or software failure, or any other conceivable reason.
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