Magic Electronics

[HawaiianShirts]

Two of these people in the same day. I just don't get it. And I'm not even going to try coming up with an explanation. It'll either scare the pants off me or break my brain, and I can't afford to lose either pants or brain at this point.

Magic Printer
First customer tells me she has a Mac.
Okay...
And she just got a wireless mouse for it, which works fine.
Okay...
She also has an HP 3-in-one printer from a year or so ago. That worked fine for printing, scanning, and copying until she installed the mouse.
O...kay...

Me: I'm assuming you've checked all your cables and found them still connected properly.
Magic Printer Girl: That's just it. I've never had it connected.
Me: You... uh... You don't have a USB cable connecting the printer to the computer?
MPG: No. Never had one. And it worked just fine.
Me: Is this a wireless printer?
MPG: No.
Me: Is it hooked up to a router or a printserver or another computer or anything else at all?
MPG: No. It was just on the desk. I plugged in the power cord, and it worked. Only now I installed the mouse, and both the computer and the printer are giving me a message that says something about there being no connection.
Me: And it printed before the mouse?
MPG: Yeah. It did everything.
Me: Now, I know it could print photos from a camera card and make copies without a computer attached, but it printed from the computer too?
MPG: Yeah.
Me: Without a cable of any kind?
MPG: Yeah. What's wrong with it, do you think?
Me: I'm thoroughly confused. I have no idea why it would work without being connected or being wireless. I'd suggest trying to connect it with one of these USB cables.

Still believing it would not work, she took the cable and said she'd give it a try.

Magic Music
Not twenty minutes after Magic Printer Girl, I met Speaker Wire Guy. He had a monitor with speakers built into it and an external speaker set with a sub and two satellites. He said that one day he suddenly started getting sound out of only one speaker, but it would switch from one side to the other. That didn't make much sense to me, but I could see the possibility. Then he explained the rest. His speakers were connected to the computer. His monitor's audio cable was not connected. It was the monitor speakers that were making the sound.

I had a conversation with him similar to MPG. He said he even disconnected the speakers and made sure there were no audio cables connected to his computer at all but still got sound out of the monitor, one side at a time. He showed me some audio adapter and asked if that would fix the problem. I told him I had no clue if it would fix the problem or not because I didn't understand the problem at all, but he was welcome to give it a try. That answer was good enough, and off he went.



I can't say this is the first time I've encountered stuff like this. My old roommate's computer turned itself on whenever I entered his room, and we had a DVD player that turned itself on in the middle of the night once. But I think I could come up with reasonable explanations for those. This stuff...

Just weird.

[Killer Bees]

You know Hawaiian Shirts, since science invented magic, this stuff happens all the time.

[MadMike]

Magic Music
Not twenty minutes after Magic Printer Girl, I met Speaker Wire Guy. He had a monitor with speakers built into it and an external speaker set with a sub and two satellites. He said that one day he suddenly started getting sound out of only one speaker, but it would switch from one side to the other. That didn't make much sense to me, but I could see the possibility. Then he explained the rest. His speakers were connected to the computer. His monitor's audio cable was not connected. It was the monitor speakers that were making the sound.

Could his speakers have been picking up a radio station? Mine did that once. I could hear them faintly, and I thought my son had left the radio on in his room. He went up, checked, came back downstairs, and told me it wasn't on. Took me awhile to figure out where the music was coming from.

Then one day, it stopped just as suddenly as it began.

[LostMyMind]

Well, since they invented bluetooth and IR-Serial. It's entirely possible to have a printer not directly connected to the printer.

But still Neither bluetooth or IR-Serial works without you actually doing something.

[Pezzle]

This is as awesome as the time my original Sony Walkman played 3 tracks of a CD that wasn't inside of it. (It was a CD I played religiously, one of the 2 I owned).

[Racket_Man]

heck when I lived in the Chicago area (lived about 1/4 mile from O'Hare) I used to get apporach and departure control radio messages through my stereo system no matter what radio station the tuner was set to or what device I was using. the wiring acts as an anntenna just like in rare cases people could get radio stations playing from their braces

[Broomjockey]

This is as awesome as the time my original Sony Walkman played 3 tracks of a CD that wasn't inside of it. (It was a CD I played religiously, one of the 2 I owned).

See, this one I can get. If it had the anti-skip thing, anyway. Since how that works is reading ahead on the CD, if the anti-skip was for 10min or so, then that'd cover about 3 tracks, depending. So if those tracks just got stuck in the anti-skip buffer somehow, viola!
Me is smart! *goes off to smack stupid glowy box*

[Dreamstalker]

Me: Now, I know it could print photos from a camera card and make copies without a computer attached, but it printed from the computer too?
MPG: Yeah.
Me: Without a cable of any kind?
MPG: Yeah. What's wrong with it, do you think?
Me: I'm thoroughly confused. I have no idea why it would work without being connected or being wireless. I'd suggest trying to connect it with one of these USB cables.

Still believing it would not work, she took the cable and said she'd give it a try.

Sounds like what a friend of mine did. Last week he was on the phone with me when he decided to check his printer cartridges. Ordinarily you open the cover and the cartridge assembly slides out for easy access, right?

Nope. He tried to manually pull the assembly out, all the while bitching about how badly the printer was designed and how I should never buy that brand ever (WTF dude, we have the same printer and I've never had a problem with mine). Eventually (after a few minutes of me trying to seriously dumb down the explanation of why one should Not Do That), it dawns on him that the thing is not even plugged in (mmm, yeah, electronics generally do need some sort of power to operate).

[Pezzle]

See, this one I can get. If it had the anti-skip thing, anyway. Since how that works is reading ahead on the CD, if the anti-skip was for 10min or so, then that'd cover about 3 tracks, depending. So if those tracks just got stuck in the anti-skip buffer somehow, viola!
Me is smart! *goes off to smack stupid glowy box*

I figured as much though I cannot claim to know much about opti drives and disc players, it's not my forte =). That's pretty neat though, I didn't know the buffer for that held tracks that far in advance though.

- Signed, she who is too lazy to google

[DGoddessChardonnay]

Could his speakers have been picking up a radio station? Mine did that once. I could hear them faintly, and I thought my son had left the radio on in his room. He went up, checked, came back downstairs, and told me it wasn't on. Took me awhile to figure out where the music was coming from.

Then one day, it stopped just as suddenly as it began.

I had a boombox that would pick up the local R&B station without it even being turned on. . . I could plug in my headphones, turn the volume all the way up and hear the broadcast fine.

I think that may have had something to do with how close the station was to our house, but I'm not sure.

[sms001]

Magic Printer
First customer tells me she has a Mac.
Okay...
And she just got a wireless mouse for it, which works fine.
Magic Printer Girl: That's just it. I've never had it connected.
Me: You... uh... You don't have a USB cable connecting the printer to the computer?
MPG: No. Never had one. And it worked just fine.

Freaky, but I'm just gonna have to go with "Dirty Rotten Liar! You don't know what you're doing!!!!!" on this one.

Magic Music
I had a conversation with him similar to MPG. He said he even disconnected the

I can't say this is the first time I've encountered stuff like this. My old roommate's computer turned itself on whenever I entered his room, and we had a DVD player that turned itself on in the middle of the night once. But I think I could come up with reasonable explanations for those. This stuff...

I was once sitting peacefully in my little home office when I heard the unmistakable sound of radio traffic from the living room. I lived in a errrr, mmmm, "active" neighborhood so didn't think much of it until it persisted and became louder. I walked out to the front of the house and all was quiet. The wife's Mac was out there but was COMPLETELY shut down. So you can imagine my degree of startlement when her speakers suddenly blared out at me as I inched closer. Turns out a (VERY) good mobile ham unit had no problem broadcasting through them, although it took a good ten minutes of wandering around the 'hood to figure that out. Although that one was relatively easy to explain, I have to admit that I've moved more from coldly rational to slightly anthropomorphic with every year of working with electronics.

[Andara Bledin]

Although that one was relatively easy to explain, I have to admit that I've moved more from coldly rational to slightly anthropomorphic with every year of working with electronics.

I've always said that electronics like me.

I used to have a CD player that only I could make work.

And I cannot even begin to count the number of times friends, family, and coworkers have come to me about something not working and I'll stroll up, push a button, and it works just fine.

^-.-^

[Broomjockey]

I've always said that electronics like me.
^-.-^

Lucky. When I was younger, I had to threaten the TV to make it play my NES properly. -_- Threats like sending it to the dump and such. Hitting it didn't work. Only threats.

[protege]

And I cannot even begin to count the number of times friends, family, and coworkers have come to me about something not working and I'll stroll up, push a button, and it works just fine.

^-.-^

LOL! I go through that too. Many devices fear me for some reason...mainly because I rip them apart when they no longer work Most recent was my father's lawn mower. For some reason, my mother couldn't start the damn thing. After the third crank, it fired up fine for me Before that, she was ranting about "that POS Lawn-Boy" and was asking if she could use my Toro. Uh, yeah...if you want to walk 2 blocks to get it. Keep in mind that because it's a four-stroke, it's heavy as hell. Oh, and it no longer drives itself. Have fun

[sms001]

...I have to admit that I've moved more from coldly rational to slightly anthropomorphic with every year of working with electronics.

I've always said that electronics like me.
I used to have a CD player that only I could make work.
And I cannot even begin to count the number of times friends, family, and coworkers have come to me about something not working and I'll stroll up, push a button, and it works just fine.
^-.-^

It works the other way too. An entire office of people can have no problem with a printer, fax machine, copier, etc...... except one. I KNOW the machine doesn't know who's is pushing the button, but when results are quantitative and repeatable...... Well, it's just plain strange.