tech support is f*@&% awesome...
[rant]
Okay, so I just got my computer up and running after almost 2 hours of insanity.
I get home, boot up, everything's peachy. I started surfing the net a little and d/ling some usenet headers. Everything's going okay. Maybe 1/2 hr into the session I can't retrieve message bodies anymore. Road Runner news servers suck, so I figured it was down again. But wait, I can't connect to any web pages. ...glances at modem... damned cable light is blinking. Great.
Now, this has happened before, sometimes it's a planned outage I don't know about. So I call the local tech line. They have a prompt, and I push 2 for "blinking cable light." I get an operator, tell her my problem (I thought I already did that when I hit "2") and she passes me off to someone to help me. Now I *KNOW* this is a problem on their end. The signal wasn't coming through and that's not my fault. So the guy starts walking me through the basic steps. Unplug my modem, reset, blah blah blah. I know it won't do any good, but I also know asking to be pushed to a higher level tech won't do any good either. They *have* to go through the steps... *sigh*
So we do all that nonsense, still a blinking light. Now he tells me to go into the network properties and oops, I have two network cards showing and two TCP/IP protocols. Why? I don't know, I only have the one card. There's only one card showing in the device manager. Not being particularly knowledgeable about networks, I follow these steps. He tells me one of them is bad, but there's no way to know. So guess and delete one (guess.. huh, I coulda done that). I delete one, still doesn't work. Delete the other... okay, done. (memory a little fuzzy here.. lost lots of blood from my brain.. ) Windows starts adding the new hardware, and it's time to reboot. Reboot. Load..load..load... dead. The monitor is no longer getting a signal. uh.. okay. Reboot, try again. Same thing. It dies before the desktop loads. Mother...
So now we go into Safe Mode to try and fix the problem. Nothing is showing up in the network manager. NIC isn't showing up in the device manager. Can't add new hardware in safe mode. Tech guy has to talk to supervisor. This isn't on his script. Comes back after a few minutes and says he's passing me up to a higher tech. I'm on hold for 5 or so minutes. Same tech guy comes on. WTF? He can't understand it either. Says I got bounced back because he didn't ask for permission to send me up when he already did. Jeezus, now I'm getting a little irritated.
Finally get to a higher tech after another 10 minutes of waiting. I explain the problem. He goes through some of the things we already tried. By now it's been about 1.5 hours since I called to report a god damn blinking light. And my computer still isn't working. Guy doesn't have a clue what to do, so he says he's gonna send out a tech in the area. Click.
15 minutes later the guy shows up. Comes in, doesn't even take off his coat, clicks a button (I'm still in safe mode). Reboot... Windows loads normally. Not even five minutes to fix the problem. He asks me how I got in this mess. I told him. He looks confused. "wait, they told you to do those things when all you had was a blinking light?" yep... "that's our fault, that has nothing to do with your computer. they shouldn't have sent you to the first tech guy." really? no shit...
Now, I'm sure this bored some of you to tears (so why'd you read it?) Both techs were really nice (even the guy who fucked up my computer in the first place), but god damn. That was moronic. If I knew more about networks and all that good stuff I could have saved myself damn near 2 hours of aggrivation. Or, if I had been passed to the right place they could have said it was their fault and that they'd look into it. Arrgh..
And so ends another tech support horror story. Thanks for indulging me.
[/rant]
[rant]
Okay, so I just got my computer up and running after almost 2 hours of insanity.
I get home, boot up, everything's peachy. I started surfing the net a little and d/ling some usenet headers. Everything's going okay. Maybe 1/2 hr into the session I can't retrieve message bodies anymore. Road Runner news servers suck, so I figured it was down again. But wait, I can't connect to any web pages. ...glances at modem... damned cable light is blinking. Great.
Now, this has happened before, sometimes it's a planned outage I don't know about. So I call the local tech line. They have a prompt, and I push 2 for "blinking cable light." I get an operator, tell her my problem (I thought I already did that when I hit "2") and she passes me off to someone to help me. Now I *KNOW* this is a problem on their end. The signal wasn't coming through and that's not my fault. So the guy starts walking me through the basic steps. Unplug my modem, reset, blah blah blah. I know it won't do any good, but I also know asking to be pushed to a higher level tech won't do any good either. They *have* to go through the steps... *sigh*
So we do all that nonsense, still a blinking light. Now he tells me to go into the network properties and oops, I have two network cards showing and two TCP/IP protocols. Why? I don't know, I only have the one card. There's only one card showing in the device manager. Not being particularly knowledgeable about networks, I follow these steps. He tells me one of them is bad, but there's no way to know. So guess and delete one (guess.. huh, I coulda done that). I delete one, still doesn't work. Delete the other... okay, done. (memory a little fuzzy here.. lost lots of blood from my brain.. ) Windows starts adding the new hardware, and it's time to reboot. Reboot. Load..load..load... dead. The monitor is no longer getting a signal. uh.. okay. Reboot, try again. Same thing. It dies before the desktop loads. Mother...
So now we go into Safe Mode to try and fix the problem. Nothing is showing up in the network manager. NIC isn't showing up in the device manager. Can't add new hardware in safe mode. Tech guy has to talk to supervisor. This isn't on his script. Comes back after a few minutes and says he's passing me up to a higher tech. I'm on hold for 5 or so minutes. Same tech guy comes on. WTF? He can't understand it either. Says I got bounced back because he didn't ask for permission to send me up when he already did. Jeezus, now I'm getting a little irritated.
Finally get to a higher tech after another 10 minutes of waiting. I explain the problem. He goes through some of the things we already tried. By now it's been about 1.5 hours since I called to report a god damn blinking light. And my computer still isn't working. Guy doesn't have a clue what to do, so he says he's gonna send out a tech in the area. Click.
15 minutes later the guy shows up. Comes in, doesn't even take off his coat, clicks a button (I'm still in safe mode). Reboot... Windows loads normally. Not even five minutes to fix the problem. He asks me how I got in this mess. I told him. He looks confused. "wait, they told you to do those things when all you had was a blinking light?" yep... "that's our fault, that has nothing to do with your computer. they shouldn't have sent you to the first tech guy." really? no shit...
Now, I'm sure this bored some of you to tears (so why'd you read it?) Both techs were really nice (even the guy who fucked up my computer in the first place), but god damn. That was moronic. If I knew more about networks and all that good stuff I could have saved myself damn near 2 hours of aggrivation. Or, if I had been passed to the right place they could have said it was their fault and that they'd look into it. Arrgh..
And so ends another tech support horror story. Thanks for indulging me.
[/rant]
