So where are the new pictures?

So where are the new pictures?

Sigh.

There are some things which are out of my control. One of them is the amount of time I have to work on the PC downstairs. Here’s the basic rant:

Why I am Ranting at Microsoft:

They publish software that allows you to upgrade from Windows 98 to Windows XP. So, you’d think that SOMEONE within the MULTIBILLION DOLLAR COMPANY would TEST THE PROCESS on something approximating ACTUAL USER CONFIGURATIONS and realize that THE PROCESS WORKS ABOUT AS WELL AS TRYING TO CONVINCE A WILDEBEEST THAT THOSE LIONS ARE VEGAN, NO, REALLY, THEY ARE. TRUST ME.

Why I am Ranting at CompUSA:

I realized I was probably at the end of my technical rope, one that’s pretty short to begin with these days what with Jacob occupying my free time. So, I contacted CompUSA for their at Home Repair service. This was a one-time charge of $150.00 for them to send a tech out to the house and fix the computer. We schedule a time, but over the phone, I hear the person taking calls say, “oh, from 98 to XP, huh. That’s bad.”

Sigh.

Basically, the home computer was rebooting every 5 minutes or so for no apparent reason. In addition to this, it would reboot when I tried to switch screen savers. (?!)

So eventually, the tech gets to the house and tells me the equivalent of Dogbert’s Support Line. “Reinstall XP from scratch on a clean drive.” Because he felt bad about spending so little time on the issue, he didn’t charge us the full $150.00. It was only $86.00 for approximately 20 minutes of work.

So I back up everything of value onto a different drive, doing it in safe mode because everything else will crash the blasted system.

Then we reinstall. Then we put the wireless drivers on. Then we watch the machine crash crash crash.

But now we can change screen savers. Woo hoo! Progress!

I’m ready to call the support guy back and basically read him the extended version of the Riot Act (see www.ultimateinsult.com for details). Then Laureen tells me “oh, by the way, Nick (the support guy) said that if the reboot didn’t fix the issues, there wasn’t much he could do because our hardware is so old.”

Now that’s an insult to my geek pride. While I don’t have the most modern configuration, I do have an Athlon 800MHz processor and enough RAM to keep things running. And as far as I know, my operating system and wireless card software are supported by my hardware configuration. I’m just extremely angry that I was told that there was nothing he could do.

There are several things I can do:
1. Do a card pull and reset, including new drivers for all of the cards.
2. Check to see if the Power Supply is adequate.
3. Check airflow in the system by checking the internal temperature of the Athlon chip in the BIOS.

But did Nick suggest any of those to me? No, I had to go online (at work) and find these out from annoyances.org.

A google search on the terms CompUSA and horrible should have warned me off.

So, once I run through those scenarios, after I come back from racquetball tonight, I’ll attempt to deconstruct my machine. If all else fails, it’s new mobo, new processor, new RAM, and new PS time.

So, that’s why I haven’t put any new pictures up yet. It’s gonna get done. I promise you that.