Although not as bad as my hard disk crashing, the pain and suffering I had to go through today was not a pleasant experience. And I’m sure it all could have been avoided.
My virus scan software (I won’t mention names but the company is vaguely Scottish) asked me to update something. I say something, because I get these messages all the time and I just click on them and let them do their thing in the background. Big mistake.
When I rebooted my computer, I could no longer connect to the Internet. Or, more correctly, my Ethernet card thought it was connected, but I couldn’t use Internet Explorer or Outlook - no connections. I tried a bunch of things to try and get it back, but nothing worked.
Now, many of you know how much I love Dell technical support. I was forced to call for software support, and to add insult to energy, I had to pay. And not just the one-time incident fee of $29. Since this was a “networking” issue, I had to sign up for three months of support for $49. Even though I was pretty sure it was not a networking issue, but something happening with some kind of software incompatibility with the new virus scan crap.
So, after going through the pitch for a five year support contract, I signed up for the 90-day package and was sent to the tech support drone. He promptly told me they don’t handle networking issues. I thought this a bit rude since I was told that networking issues required signing up for the 90-day package. So I let it slide (sort of), and explained my problems.
He informed me that it was the Linksys router I was using, and that I would have to connect directly to the cable modem to have him help me. I told him the router was working fine since I have another computer hooked up to it, and it seems to be doing hunky-dory. He wouldn’t budge.
I then explained that the cable modem and the computer were separated by three floors - the office is on the third floor and the cable modem is in the basement. He told me I needed to go down and reset the cable modem and the router. I did this, and of course, it didn’t work. And then he told me I needed to connect directly to the cable modem.
After cursing while walking away from the speaker phone, I did connect the computer directly to the cable modem, came upstairs, and rebooted the computer per the tech’s instructions. Strangely, this did nothing. So he asked me to do a repair of Windows XP. Now why he didn’t have me do this first is beyond me since I clearly told him it was not the router and that there was something wrong with the software.
After doing the 45 minute repair (during which the techie would not sit on the phone), I rebooted and lo and behold, it didn’t work. I’m still hosed. Evertything is still the same.
Computers SUCK!
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