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Amazing what a notice that you need to format does....

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  • Amazing what a notice that you need to format does....

    I always love how clients are stupid or refuse to accept your answer until you tell them that you're going to erase their hard drive, or that they need to buy recovery CDs.

    Example 1:

    A woman calls back to run the recovery (O/S reload) on her PC after the last tech told her she needs to. Her PC was an HP and they put the recovery info on a separate space on the hard drive. Well I have her enter the recovery program and I tell her to click on advanced options. On the HPs, the recovery program has two options: a non-destructive which simply overwrites the O/S (and half the time it does not work) and a destructive with erases the C: partition and puts a fresh install of everything there and it's only accessable by clicking on advanced options. The big difference is that option B erases EVERYTHING on the hard drive. So, conveniently the woman cannot find "advance options." I tell her to look again - still cannot find it. So I tell her that she needs to order recovery CDs from HP which WILL contain the destructive recovery option. All of a sudden she sees the option to click on, and proceed with the format....

    Example 2:

    I am the 4th tech this guy is talking to, and it appears we cleaned his PC of all the malwares, cleared his startup, cleaned his registry.... and yet the comp is still running slow. I connect to his PC via remote access and the only thing running is Norton 2006. Now mind you this is the ONLY software running besides the usual windows files, so I told the guy that I want to remove the Norton to see if it fixes the issue. He refuses. Again, I tell him that if it does not fix the issue we will troubleshoot further but it's worth a shot and he can always reinstall it. Again, he refuses. So I try to get him to give me the go-ahead, and he again refuses to the point he said he was going to cut off my remote access if I wouldn't listen. So I tell him, "Okay sir, at this point I kindly ask that you back up your data and call us back so we can erase your hard drive, format and reload the O/S." Well he then (in a snotty tone I might add) tells me to go ahead and take it off. I do so, reboot, and clean the registry again, and guess what? System is running like a champ! He said thanks, but not a word of apology for acting like an ass.

  • #2
    I got my computer from a company called Premio about 6 years ago. They supply a rescue disk with all of there computers. You can reformat the hard drive with it and reinstall the OS. I love it. Although I have reformatted my hard drive numerous times over that 6 year period, it saves me from having to call tech support about every 6-9 months.

    Usually when something isn't working right or something goes wrong, or if I keep getting error messages, is the only times I will reformat it.

    Although my comptuer is still running strong, regardless of the amount of upgrading I did, it is a Win 98SE and is no longer supported by MS. It is time for an XP. The system itself isn't strong enough to ungrade the OS to XP.

    I got a job working online with my computer but since it is just 98SE it is not stong enough for there software, so I lost that job. I figured that with the job I could eventually afford a better computer to do the job with, but I need the computer to do the job in the first place. They told me once I upgrade to a better comp to call them back and they will give me the job. BTW, it 'is' a legit online job (not many out there).
    Woman are like guns, if you don't treat us right, we'll blow up in your face!

    Pain is your bodies way of telling you that you're still alive.

    I am also known as Liquid Skin and Silkekitten.

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    • #3
      Luckily, I've never had a problem if I had to wipe the hard drive. In fact, they usually told me up front, "Go ahead and wipe everything out if you need to." I only do that as a last resort, because I feel I won't learn anything if I do it that way everytime, but sometimes it's so FUBARed, that's the only thing you can do.
      Sometimes life is altered.
      Break from the ropes your hands are tied.
      Uneasy with confrontation.
      Won't turn out right. Can't turn out right

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      • #4
        I routinely do a full reformat of my system partition on all my machines (one server, several workstations) two or three times a year. Defragging can only do so much. When my clients bring an old, run down computer to me to fix for them, the first thing I recommend is a full reformat of the system partition (if whoever built their computer was sensible enough to separate the OS from the rest of the hard drive).

        I explained it this way to one of my clients once:

        Reformatting is like the inevitable vommitting that comes with a night of partying...you can't start getting better until you've cleaned out all the crap.

        He's still a regular client.

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        • #5
          ugh i lost my recovery dics long ago and have resigned myself to being to lazy to find it. I hve no idea how my cpu runs without a reformat in 3 years. In fact I have never on this cpu. And it still runs doom 3 and WoW and HL2 like a dream! But im sure one day it will come back to bite me in the ass and I will buy them damned discs.
          Fan? This is shit. Shit? Meet fan.

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