Cable Shortening

[TheCustomer]

Hello, Customers Suck! This is my first post and I really couldn't come up with something better to say in my first two sentences.

I've lurked for a long, long time, and I thought it was about time to share a bit.

As of the moment I don't have a job, but have the position of the-tech-guy-in-the-neighborhood-that-everybody-pesters-all-the-time. Also, once in a while my mother will ask for help at her job (and for it I got quite a prize as well - a kick-ass PC) Usually, I don't mind - I enjoy working with computers, but there are incidents that just make me want to bang my head on my desk. There was an emoticon for that.... There we go.

Here's what happened a couple of days ago.

An elderly couple I know very well were having trouble with their computer - namely, their PC wouldn't boot up. It gave them an error related to a missing drive to boot up to and wouldn't do anything after that. (fiy, it's a very, very old Dell) They were busy and leaving their home for a while so I took the computer home and hooked it up to my "PC Repair Station" (which consists of a second monitor, keyboard and mouse, and power and internet connections).

So I start diagnosing the system. I get into the BIOS config and everything is set correctly, but apparently the drive can't be seen. At all. I decide that it might be a connection problem, so I open up the thing and push all the connectors in place on the hard drive and the mobo, and try again, but the hard drive still doesn't connect.

I start thinking about the various possibilities for the problem, a bad mobo, connector, HD, etc., etc., and then notice something.

The IDE ribbon cable has been CUT IN HALF and the two halves TAPED TOGETHER with packing tape.

I fetched a spare cable from my spare-everything box (it's filled) and replaced the "patched up" cable.

Everything booted up fine.

Guess who cut the cable?

The elderly lady's husband. Apparently, the handyman decided to take a "hands on" approach to learning computers by cracking the case open (which in itself is a feat - I struggled with the darn thing for at least half an hour) and inspecting and fiddling with everything in the PC.

The reason why the cable was cut?

He thought the cable was overly long so he cut a piece out of the middle, and taped the other pieces together.

That's all I've got for now.

Thank you, Customers Suck, for the wonderful site!

[MrSmiley]

Of course that solution of taping 2 sides together might actually work, if they were EXACT and taped up together strong. Electrical tape mind you, since a cut would probably remove some of the shielding on the cable.

Of course this is easier said than done and most shoving together of wires involves a soldering gun for best results.

Plus if it was an very very old Dell, it might have some of those quirky IDE cables that... uh... I can't actually remember... but they weren't straight from beginning to end.

[Hyndis]

Shortening a cable like this actually can work, but so long as you reconnect the wires inside the sheath correctly.

Blindly cutting and then simply taping it together, with no effort taken to ensure that the wires inside the sheath are also reconnected, means that the cable will not work at all.

[Seshat]

Plus if it was an very very old Dell, it might have some of those quirky IDE cables that... uh... I can't actually remember... but they weren't straight from beginning to end.

Crossover cable?

Where at one point, pin A at one end connects to pin B at the other, and vice versa.

[TheCustomer]

Unfortunately the guy had no experience with wires and had simply taped the two pieces without any effort to reconnect them.

It's been only a few days, yet I can't remember if it was a crossover or not. I sometimes feel like I have goldfish memory.

[bsaana]

I sometimes feel like I have goldfish memory.

Sounds more like the memory of a tech....

Sometimes I'm so busy going between sites that I can't even remember which sites I was at, or what I did at said site the previous day. Until that is I look at the ticket system and see what was entered for the previous day.

Just be glad you didn't have to drive 2 hours one way to remove a single space from a configuration file that was preventing one of my sites from operating.

[Eric the Grey]

Sounds our final exam in an MCSE class. Our instructor lined up a bunch of computers, with "trouble tickets" to tell us what the "user" reported as the problem (funny that "Bob" the user always reported not doing anything to the box....), and we had to fix them, and then re-break them (if possible) so the next pair could diagnose the machine.

I walked up to one machine and opened the case while my partner picked up the ticket. It was pure luck that my eyes fell directly on the nearly sliced in half ribbon cable. I said "I see the problem already, do you?" It took him about 20 seconds to see it too.

I had a kick-ass partner in this class. We both knew enough to get through the exercises and tests quick enough to be done early. It was great.


Eric the Grey

[TheCustomer]

Just be glad you didn't have to drive 2 hours one way to remove a single space from a configuration file that was preventing one of my sites from operating.

Yes. Yes, I am glad. That sounds like a terrible waste of gasoline.

I walked up to one machine and opened the case while my partner picked up the ticket. It was pure luck that my eyes fell directly on the nearly sliced in half ribbon cable. I said "I see the problem already, do you?" It took him about 20 seconds to see it too.

Would've taken me a couple of minutes. I always assume the more complex situation.

[Geek King]

Welcome aboard TheCustomer!

Last week I had to show a user--a user who has worked here longer than I have and uses her computer everyday, mind you--how to capitalize individual letters. Yes, I actually had to teach someone how to use the shift key. I also got a talking to from my boss because, apparently, I make some people "feel stupid." I can't imagine why.

[Plank]

As of the moment I don't have a job, but have the position of the-tech-guy-in-the-neighborhood-that-everybody-pesters-all-the-time.

Welcome to the club! And to customerssuck ofc

[EricKei]

I also got a talking to from my boss because, apparently, I make some people "feel stupid." I can't imagine why.

But...but...She DESERVED it! o_o

I can understand someone new to cmputers not knowing what I mean by "Desktop" (it's not exactly labeled) or "right click" at first....but...Even typewriters work that way! She doesn't have any excuse in that department.