I'm starting a new rule at work.

[draggar]

It's quite simple:

If you demand, beg for, or whine for a new computer you get put on my "tough (poop) and seal with it" list.

Seriously.

I had SIX people email me today, all with the same exact symptoms. "Constant blue screen of death" and "takes me forever to do anything".

I'm so glad I can browse their drive without them even knowing. Only one actually had minidump files that are recent (by recent I mean in the past 3 months). It had two. One was caused by Zone Alarm - funny, we don't use ZA at work. The other was caused by a driver. Either way, reload the OS and they're good to go.

Another one had an OS load that was over 4 years old. Yes, over 4 years old. This means they have 4 years worth of updates, installs, uninstalls, cache, etc.. as well as 4 years worth of file fragmentation. I was actually surprised that their PC still worked.

Of course, most of these people are on the same team and their boss is emailing me that "they'll lose multi millions in sales if they have any downtime". While it is frustrating, I can't BS tickets nor can I just make up reasons to swap out everyone.

Since IT departments usually have the lowest budget $ per employee this means that I can't swap out everyone (I'd love it if I could, seriously, it would shut you all up). But I cant so people will need to deal with what they have. Time to pull out the oldie but goodie.

[EvilEmpryss]

I had SIX people email me today, all with the same exact symptoms. "Constant blue screen of death" and "takes me forever to do anything."

Hee-hee! I was my military IT department's spy in my office. As soon as someone would start whining about needing a new computer because of blue screens, I got called and asked to take a look at it and recreate the problem. After all, if was happening "all the time", I should be able to get it to happen at least once within three days.

I helped them out so often that the one time I asked for an upgrade to be able to run a new program, it was approved without question. . . even though they knew perfectly well the program would run on the computer I already had.

[protege]

Hee-hee! I was my military IT department's spy in my office. As soon as someone would start whining about needing a new computer because of blue screens, I got called and asked to take a look at it and recreate the problem. After all, if was happening "all the time", I should be able to get it to happen at least once within three days.

Ugh. My boss was the worst for this! He'd usually wait until whatever "problem" he was having because "serious," and then bitch at me to fix it, since it was happening "all the time" and "interfering with work.' But, because he couldn't tell me what he was doing at the time, or what program he was running, I couldn't recreate the problem. Instead, I got bitched at since "it's a no-brainer" (I fucking hate that phrase. Last time I checked, *every* activity required some cerebral input) and that I shouldn't be wasting time running tests.

For example, he brought in an older monitor, and said it was acting "strange." I tried to ask if it was shutting down, flickering, etc. but he wouldn't elaborate. So I hooked it up, sat at that machine for an hour, and nothing happened. I told him that, and he threatened me with termination Apparently, it's somehow *my* fault that he's being vague about the problem. So again, I wasted an entire afternoon on that stupid "problem," playing solitaire (the machine I was using wasn't in the main office), surfing the 'net, etc. Again, the thing was fine. Again, I got called an idiot because I can't recreate a nonexistent problem!

Bastard. Anyone want to guess what happened later? Next day, our third-party tech was delivering some equipment, and my boss ran the 'problem,' by him. This time, he was a bit more detailed--the screen would suddenly "jump" while he was using it. Turns out, it was degaussing itself Why the fuck didn't he tell me that sooner?

[EvilEmpryss]

Instead, I got bitched at since "it's a no-brainer" (I fucking hate that phrase. {snip}
For example, he brought in an older monitor, and said it was acting "strange." I tried to ask if it was shutting down, flickering, etc. but he wouldn't elaborate. So I hooked it up, sat at that machine for an hour, and nothing happened. I told him that, and he threatened me with termination Apparently, it's somehow *my* fault that he's being vague about the problem. So again, I wasted an entire afternoon on that stupid "problem," playing solitaire (the machine I was using wasn't in the main office), surfing the 'net, etc. Again, the thing was fine. Again, I got called an idiot because I can't recreate a nonexistent problem!

I hated that. I'd get told it was my fault the machine wasn't acting up. Uhm, isn't that a good thing? Not if the lieutenant wants a new computer it isn't.

Alternately -- and this usually happened on deployments when we didn't have any IT guys with us -- if something was acting up and I couldn't immediately discern the problem, I was told I was incompetent. Hold on there! I wasn't an IT person! I was a skilled normal, at best. Sure, I could lay CAT-5 cable and network the office printers, but I had zero way of troubleshooting a deployed location's server problems. At best I might have some vague idea of what was going on if I'd seen the problem before and chatted up my home base IT guys about it.

This made me a goddess if I could get something working, and scum if I had no clue how to accomplish something outside my job description.

So much for perspective.

[Daemonmonkey]

I had a time when "everybody" complained about BSOD's, and naturally I couldn't find what the problem was, until I decided to deactivate the "restart on BSOD" function by domain policy.

This resulted that I could actually see what the problem was, and indeed, there were some BSOD's, not because the computer was faulty, but because somebody had found a password-keeper and shared it among the office. Many Oh-Noes here.

First, it wasn't an IT-dept approved app, second it was an old app made for previous versions of Windows, and so on... Of course, as I removed that app from their system things started to work again

But oh, the complaints I got after that, because it was Soooo bothersome to remember three passwords

[Midorikawa]

But oh, the complaints I got after that, because it was Soooo bothersome to remember three passwords

Wow.

I had I think 32 passwords at my last company. Granted, I was a sysadmin, and after the company got pwnt by a hungarian hacker, everyone went uber secure and had a different password for everything. *shudder*

[Alryk]

I've worked in call centers for 6 years off and on. Pager companies, and insurance companies. Had a doctor call me at 4:30 on friday and wanted me to drive a pager out to him in new york city (I am in boston). Love the poster!! It's hilarious and I can definately relate

[mattm04]

When we do our normal PC hardware refresh we do it twice a year (around January and July). We purchase new PC's configure them and set them up for the users who are getting them. We take the old PCs and keep some as spares, re-deploy some to users who have very little need for a new PC, mainly PT staff and data entry type tasks, and recycle the rest.

CW A and B sit in adjacent offices and have basically the same task. CW A gets a new PC in Jan. refresh, CW B gets a new PC in July refresh. For almost a month CW A kept demanding a new PC after CW B got a new machine. They insisted their 6month old PC kept crashing and could not handle the same tasks the previous 3 year old PC did. Eventually they gave up.