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Im running Win98se,IE6 (MyIE2) .. They would probably give me a bunch of BS about how I should goto newer stuff,etc.....
Newer stuff is not as user friendly,it wont let me do WHAT I WANT on my computer (Java,Flash,etc) and the user has ZERO privacy!!
However when I took my computer to a repair shop to replace 2 caps,they said "It was nice seeing Win98 in here again" I guess they dont get hardily any 98s anymore........
Its all what the user wants to run,what makes them happy.......... No repair person should come in and try to change stuff.... Thats as bad as Microsoft!!
I'm reminded of back in around 2000 before our middle school finally wised up and realized that schools had to have a tech person in each building with all the computer hardware that was being established in the schools. I was the principal in our middle school, and one of the more knowledgeable people on the staff re computers. But being able to slowly work through issues on one home computer was a far cry from what was needed in a fully networked school. If I got stuck, I'd go to one of the gifted/talented classrooms and explain what the problem was and ask if any of the kids (ages 12-14) could help. Some student would always come to the rescue, but I'd have to warn them to leave setups the way they were, just fix the issue at hand...because they'd always want to set up the computer 'their way', rather than the actual user's way.
Location: IN>Germany>ND>OH>TX>CA>Currently NoVa and a Vacation Lake House in PA
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Quote:
Originally Posted by phetaroi
I'll tell you why I defined this as "horrible".
Let's say you went to a doctor and he said: "I'm going to do open heart surgery on you and you have no say in the matter".
Or let's say you go to a car dealer and the salesman says to you: "You are going to buy this car whether you like it or not".
That's essentially what this guy was doing. He wasn't advising me to eliminate Firefox (and other programs). He was about to delete programs on MY computer against my wishes.
I hired one of these guys who does computer diagnosis and repair in your home to just do a general check on my 3 year old computer.
What a jerk.
He was going to dictate (and I mean that literally) to me what programs I should have on my computer, and was ready to discard programs I do use because he doesn't like them. He refused to do a virus check UNLESS I let him delete every program he didn't personally like. He mocked me for liking Firefox, saying "Nobody uses Firefox anymore"; well, I do, for some things, and I like it...for some things. And, worst of all, he was going to force me to upgrade to Windows 11, which I have no desire to do.
And it didn't help when he walked in wearing a particular political hat.
I finally told him to get out and tossed his $35 fee at him.
Good for you. But like YAB said, it's rife in the computer industry. I once took my old laptop to an independent guy in a small town in New Mexico with a single shingle. He was great. When he couldn't save it anymore, he found me a cheap version of my same laptop - it was a 1-2 year older same make and model. He never told me what to have or not have, or what browser to use. Very cool young man. A former intelligence guy in the military.
As for Windows 11, I am not happy I upgraded. It's junk. Couple weeks ago I fired up my older laptop that has Windows 7 on it, just for kicks. It barely runs now. I don't know why I keep it, I offloaded all the files and photos I want.
Good for you. But like YAB said, it's rife in the computer industry. I once took my old laptop to an independent guy in a small town in New Mexico with a single shingle. He was great. When he couldn't save it anymore, he found me a cheap version of my same laptop - it was a 1-2 year older same make and model. He never told me what to have or not have, or what browser to use. Very cool young man. A former intelligence guy in the military.
Curious, if the pro didn't give you any feedback about your system and merely work on whatever issue you needed fixing, would that really be a good service or would you prefer the tech disclosed all the critical issues that noticed during diagnostics?
Should a good tech even run diagnostics to inform you or any concerning issues?
If something else occurred soon after picking up the machine, would you blame the tech or even if you didn't, would you have preferred that they at least informed you about it?
I agree, if what OP wrote initially was all totally accurate, that guy was a jerk, also a bad tech, too.
IMHO, a smart customer should ask the pro for their opinion on anything relating to their item or issues.
And a good tech should mention all issues, anything of concern to the customer and, if needed, should make recommendation without bias.
That type of good, honest service would created trust which is what ultimately customers seem to value over other factors, or am I wrong?
Good for you. But like YAB said, it's rife in the computer industry. I once took my old laptop to an independent guy in a small town in New Mexico with a single shingle. He was great. When he couldn't save it anymore, he found me a cheap version of my same laptop - it was a 1-2 year older same make and model. He never told me what to have or not have, or what browser to use. Very cool young man. A former intelligence guy in the military.
As for Windows 11, I am not happy I upgraded. It's junk. Couple weeks ago I fired up my older laptop that has Windows 7 on it, just for kicks. It barely runs now. I don't know why I keep it, I offloaded all the files and photos I want.
In my opinion Windows 7 was the best of the Microsoft operating systems. Still at their best Microsoft operating systems eventually all become bloatware due to the way MS handles updates and the horrific underlying file system that never is optimized or efficient.
Windows 10 and 11 are unstable bits of garbage that amounts to spyware and should be treated like the virus it is. I retired this week and spent time converting a pile of old laptops (even a old 486 and Pentium) to various flavors of Linux. The performance difference and stability astounded me when compared to Windows, even my much beloved Windows 7.
My guess is your old computer can be given a new lease on life via one off the many Linux Distros for older hardware. Distro is just Linux talk for a distribution which translates into an operating system or in this case i am referring to an operating system, desktop, and applications with one simple install. As long as your old machine has half a gig of RAM or better you can still get a serviceable machine in a graphical user environment that is more stable and secure than any version of Windows. Best yet, it is free and you can try it out without even having to install anything on you current machine as almost all Linux flavors for desktops will run off a USB key (called a live key) that is plugged into a usb drive or even from a CD or DVD drive.
Moreover it is easy to do. Videos abound on youtube. All these suggestions were selected with a Windows user in mind.
If you have 4 or more GB of RAM look at Linux Mint
For 2 GB of RAM or more look at MX Linux
If you have 1 GB Ram look at Linux Lite, LXLE, Lubuntu, Manjaro
At half a ½ a GB or less look at Anti-X, Porteus. SliTaz (can run with only 24 MB RAM!)
Above all I suggest you ditch Windows for home use and embrace the free, safe world of Linux. It is easy these days.
Had another tech in today. Great experience. He acted as a consultant in decided what actions to take. Gave my computer a clean bill of health. And some advice/suggestions. Also acted as a bit of a teacher.
Had another tech in today. Great experience. He acted as a consultant in decided what actions to take. Gave my computer a clean bill of health. And some advice/suggestions. Also acted as a bit of a teacher.
Glad to hear it. Keep his name handy in case anything comes up in the future.
A friend of my son actually commented one time that they were surprised that any problem that came up 'your folks know a guy' to handle it. In her house it had never been that way, they had just replaced a problem item, suffered along with it or took it to the authorized repair shop or dealer. He told her that it comes from living in one place for a long time, being active in community groups and being friendly to people. I said it also comes from admitting that sometimes others know more than you do and being willing to pay a fair price for that skill.
If you have 4 or more GB of RAM look at Linux Mint
For 2 GB of RAM or more look at MX Linux
If you have 1 GB Ram look at Linux Lite, LXLE, Lubuntu, Manjaro
At half a ½ a GB or less look at Anti-X, Porteus. SliTaz (can run with only 24 MB RAM!)
I will say I have run Linux Mint on older machines with less than 4 GB of memory using the XFCE desktop with pretty good success. Even I ( who mostly run 10+ year old machines) have junked machines with less than 2 GB of memory.
I do keep one ancient Dell with I think 1 GB of memory that runs XP just to feed my Civ 2 addiction. But it hasn't been on a network for at least 10 years ( I think it still has a modem in it because My mother used it for dialup before she died way back before 2012) but for 'real use' I believe 2 GB of memory is pretty much the floor these days.
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