(no subject)
Apr. 9th, 2003 12:08 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ravencallscrowsTidbit of information #1: My first job in the tech industry was as a support engineer doing outsource support for Windows 95 (and IE 4 at launch).
Tidbit of information #2: I was, if i do say so myself, damn good at it
Tidbit of information #3: The most important thing i learned there was how to juggle three objects while talking to someone on the phone.
Tidbit of information #4: OEM support are inevitably lazy- they take the easiest route out of an issue often without regard for what's in the best interest of the end user. Good support engineers use the smallest "hammer" necessary to resolve the issue with minimal impact on the user whenever possible. Sometimes it's essential to use the BIG FUCKING HAMMER and totally wipe someone's system but fdisk, format, reinstall should be the last option in most cases.
Tidbit of information #5: Windows Me is a kludged together piece of shit, but, even if you've only ever run it in Hebrew and Arabic, it's possible to troubleshoot if you have a solid understanding of how Win9x and/or 2000/XP work.
I got to help![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
hottoastermama and her father fix a problem caused by someone who should not be allowed within 3.25689283753 parsecs of computer hardware and compounded by an inept OEM technician at Dell, who, as near as i can tell, didn't even attempt to diagnose their problem, much less find a suitable solution approach to it. Word of advise to the Dell dude- put down the hookah you've been toking with the annoying-ass kid that appears in the commercials and learn something about the products you support.
When installing a new piece of hardware causes a computer boot issue, the solution is not to run a system restore to an earlier software configuration. The solution is to diagnose the hardware issue and correct it- namely properly assigning IDE devices as master and slave and coaxing Windows into recognizing the change. Restoring Windows is only going to at best hopelessly fuck up the hardware enumeration, and, at worst (as happened in this case), cause WinMe to think of itself as Ouroboros and swallow large chunks of itself.
When Windows can't launch, say Add/Remove Programs from the Control Panel, it's ugly. When Find Files and Folders can find a particular executable, but Windows can't find it when attempting to launch it by double-clicking it from that same search window, that's double-plus fucking ugly.
Fortunately, in order to fix it, it's just necessary to have a cool head, know something about operating system dynamics, and be smarter than Windows ME (which isn't saying much). Convince setup to rerun; reinstall WinME on top of itself (otherwise all the software on the system will need to be reinstalled to reintegrate it into the user hives of the registry, which is a major pain in the ass for the user), which will rebuild the system hives in the registry, including, most importantly, the hardware enumeration and restore the basic OS system file structure. Forty-five minutes after gathering enough information to assess the problem, the system was back up and apparently stable, everything functions as expected, and none of the user data has been lost or compromised. Took an hour and a half or so longer than paving the system and starting over, but this was elegant and unintrusive.
revseandoe: Remember these words:"Thank you for choosing Microsoft products. I hope you've been very satisfied with the support you've received today?" Remember walking out of the building at Keane knowing that you fucking owned Windows and that if it was a bonafide software problem you couldn't fix it was pretty damn likely something so unsupported (or someone else's problem)that no one else was gonna make it work either?
*sigh*
I can't wait until major software manufacturers get really serious about releasing their products for Unix derivatives. Windows isn't much of a challenge to troubleshoot, even remotely, anymore. For what it's worth, i can fix a kernel panic on a Linux system, recompile a kernel from the command line, play with the OS, and run GIMP as readily as Photoshop, but i'd really miss most of the games which run under Windows but won't under the WinE emulator for Linux.
Tidbit of information #2: I was, if i do say so myself, damn good at it
Tidbit of information #3: The most important thing i learned there was how to juggle three objects while talking to someone on the phone.
Tidbit of information #4: OEM support are inevitably lazy- they take the easiest route out of an issue often without regard for what's in the best interest of the end user. Good support engineers use the smallest "hammer" necessary to resolve the issue with minimal impact on the user whenever possible. Sometimes it's essential to use the BIG FUCKING HAMMER and totally wipe someone's system but fdisk, format, reinstall should be the last option in most cases.
Tidbit of information #5: Windows Me is a kludged together piece of shit, but, even if you've only ever run it in Hebrew and Arabic, it's possible to troubleshoot if you have a solid understanding of how Win9x and/or 2000/XP work.
I got to help
hottoastermama and her father fix a problem caused by someone who should not be allowed within 3.25689283753 parsecs of computer hardware and compounded by an inept OEM technician at Dell, who, as near as i can tell, didn't even attempt to diagnose their problem, much less find a suitable solution approach to it. Word of advise to the Dell dude- put down the hookah you've been toking with the annoying-ass kid that appears in the commercials and learn something about the products you support.When installing a new piece of hardware causes a computer boot issue, the solution is not to run a system restore to an earlier software configuration. The solution is to diagnose the hardware issue and correct it- namely properly assigning IDE devices as master and slave and coaxing Windows into recognizing the change. Restoring Windows is only going to at best hopelessly fuck up the hardware enumeration, and, at worst (as happened in this case), cause WinMe to think of itself as Ouroboros and swallow large chunks of itself.
When Windows can't launch, say Add/Remove Programs from the Control Panel, it's ugly. When Find Files and Folders can find a particular executable, but Windows can't find it when attempting to launch it by double-clicking it from that same search window, that's double-plus fucking ugly.
Fortunately, in order to fix it, it's just necessary to have a cool head, know something about operating system dynamics, and be smarter than Windows ME (which isn't saying much). Convince setup to rerun; reinstall WinME on top of itself (otherwise all the software on the system will need to be reinstalled to reintegrate it into the user hives of the registry, which is a major pain in the ass for the user), which will rebuild the system hives in the registry, including, most importantly, the hardware enumeration and restore the basic OS system file structure. Forty-five minutes after gathering enough information to assess the problem, the system was back up and apparently stable, everything functions as expected, and none of the user data has been lost or compromised. Took an hour and a half or so longer than paving the system and starting over, but this was elegant and unintrusive.
revseandoe: Remember these words:"Thank you for choosing Microsoft products. I hope you've been very satisfied with the support you've received today?" Remember walking out of the building at Keane knowing that you fucking owned Windows and that if it was a bonafide software problem you couldn't fix it was pretty damn likely something so unsupported (or someone else's problem)that no one else was gonna make it work either?*sigh*
I can't wait until major software manufacturers get really serious about releasing their products for Unix derivatives. Windows isn't much of a challenge to troubleshoot, even remotely, anymore. For what it's worth, i can fix a kernel panic on a Linux system, recompile a kernel from the command line, play with the OS, and run GIMP as readily as Photoshop, but i'd really miss most of the games which run under Windows but won't under the WinE emulator for Linux.
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no subject
Date: 2003-04-09 01:02 am (UTC)*giggle-snort*
Yup. the most important thing i learned was "dont tell the person on the phone that you are standing as far away from your desk as possible with the headset still on, racing mini remote-controlled cars down the isle-way against the person who sits next to you, or that your putting them on hold to go to the bathroom."
Ah the joys fo phone support
Re:
Date: 2003-04-09 01:27 am (UTC)Keane uber alles
Date: 2003-04-09 09:17 am (UTC)Do you remember all the helpful Windows NT manuals the South African Bastard Squad gave us to be nice in front of M$? I got on the bus, all jazzed, until I realized they were manuals for NT 3.51
I still have a ton of old Keane stuff, damn geek packrat urge just won't let me get rid of it.
Re: Keane uber alles
Date: 2003-04-09 10:11 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-04-09 01:19 pm (UTC)"Convince setup to rerun; reinstall [windows] on top of itself"
(I was just browsing through...)
no subject
Date: 2003-04-09 01:43 pm (UTC)Re:
Date: 2003-04-09 01:50 pm (UTC)When setup starts, it should recognize that there's a presently existing Windows installation, and will give you the option to install to that directory (by default C:\Windows) or to choose a new one. Put it back into the default directory, and tell it to copy any files which are present on the system from the CD- because if you're in a mess like the one above, something has gotten corrupted but there's no easy way to determine what.
A few reboots later (during the install process, then after hardware detection, specifically), you should be back in business ninteen times out of twenty.
Re:
Date: 2003-04-09 01:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-04-09 02:15 pm (UTC)I have in my hand a 100g chocolate bar. If you feel comfortable giving a random stranger your postal address I can send it to you? 3-)
no subject
Date: 2003-04-09 02:23 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-04-09 02:29 pm (UTC)*laughs* As for linux kernel recompiles, I've had those instructions all nicely filed away for a few years now already and as far as I recall they only cost me a kiss and a thank you 3-).
Re:
Date: 2003-04-09 02:36 pm (UTC)Windows kernel isn't that bad either- just remove the Enum key and all its children from HKEY_Local_Machine via regedit and it'll do it itself. It's not really as much a pure recompile as just tromping the pointers to it, but the effect is the same.
no subject
Date: 2003-04-09 02:36 pm (UTC)What you saved was worth more than gold to my dad.
Re:
Date: 2003-04-09 02:38 pm (UTC)