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Thread ID: 62160 2005-09-28 19:21:00 Techs Disasters pctek (84) PC World Chat
Post ID Timestamp Content User
391808 2005-10-01 00:00:00 I would only have paid him for 5mins, cause thats how long it should have taken a techy to spot that. It should have been the first thing he looked for.
It's amazing how easy it is to overlook the blatantly obvious though :)
MyHost (8982)
391809 2005-10-01 00:39:00 I think I got all my mistakes out of the way by trying to kill a heap of old 486s. It is amazing the kind of punishment those old computers can take, but if all else fails, they never survive the little red switch of doom.

I removed the CPU while the computer was running, swapped out almost every removeable component while it was running and it still worked when I replaced everything & rebooted. Plugging the output from the soundcard into the input was interesting. It started smoking & screaming.
Greven (91)
391810 2005-10-01 03:43:00 I removed the CPU while the computer was running, swapped out almost every removeable component while it was running and it still worked when I replaced everything & rebooted. .
Wow, wonder how many mechanics can say the same. :D
pctek (84)
391811 2005-10-16 20:15:00 I think I got all my mistakes out of the way by trying to kill a heap of old 486s. It is amazing the kind of punishment those old computers can take, but if all else fails, they never survive the little red switch of doom.I was reading a text book on computer repair a while ago, it was one with little side boxes that have things like "Note:" or "Tip:" as the title.

One of the "Tips:" was to play a joke on a co-worker (assuming you were all computer techs) throw the little read switch as this will 1/2 the internal voltage, and stop the PC from booting up. It will take the ages to work out what is wrong, and it won't hurt their PC haha.

I was left wondering how many neophyte techs outside the US had tried this with the "it was written in a text book, it must be right" attitude.

-qyiet
qyiet (6730)
391812 2005-10-17 00:11:00 If it was an American book, then turning the switch to 230V and plugging it into their 110V mains may not be as catastrophic? Jester (13)
391813 2005-10-17 00:21:00 Friend bought an A+ manual.
Quite amusing. Still very DOS orientated...
It had one comment about DOS files, if you can't delete it - thats because it might have an attribute on it. So use the command deltree.
Hmmmmmmm.
pctek (84)
391814 2005-10-17 00:21:00 It was an amercian book, and if you do what is described, in the states, it should halve the voltage, and stop the PC from booting as described. (Never been there to try it)

But the book was purchased in NZ. It was aimed at a broad range of people too, so I would be willing to bet that more than one person in a 220V power area has thrown that switch without thinking it through.

I was a little bit stunned because the person who wrote the book had not thought this through, they had obviously had a fair number of ID-10-T error s in their time, and seemed smart enough to know that their audience was about as smart as the rest of the world with PCs :)

Anyway.. it was a small mistake that will teach a valuable lesson to those who follow instructions blindly :)

-Qyiet
qyiet (6730)
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