MIGHTY Glad I'm Not a Doctor!

Published on December 28, 2007 By Gideon MacLeish In Personal Computing

OK, Now that the dust has (almost) settled and everything came out OK, I can share a story from last week, with a MAJOR word of caution.

A customer brought in a Dell Inspiron 1501 processor. The more I find out about these things (sadly, I own one), the more I am convinced they are overpriced, overhyped pieces of garbage. The computer had been running slowly and we didn't detect a problem when it came in earlier for repair.

The problem was that the CPU usage spiked to the 90-100% range as soon as Internet Explorer was deployed. Repeated A/V and antispyware scans showed nothing. Disabling all startup programs, antivirus and firewalls did not affect the massive CPU usage. We went through the running processes item by item and found nothing to give us concern. The only thing we did find was that the computer was reading only a single core of the dual core processor (a problem I have with mine and which, unfortunately, I just may have to bear).

So we attempted driver updates and tried to flash the BIOS.

Big mistake.

HUGE mistake.

Just for the record, consider a Dell Inspiron 1501's BIOS non-flashable. Because a failure will destroy your motherboard, something we found out the hard way (why Dell even SUPPORTS a BIOS upgrade on its site is beyond me at this point!)

Fortunately, we were able to get Dell to recitfy what should be regarded as THEIR mistake and issue a replacement mobo and RAM. But this happened last Friday afternoon, and I was pretty upset about the whole thing. I called it a day shortly afterwards, resolving to finish working on it after the weekend. After all, when you reach a certain point, it's better to grab a cold beer and deal with it later, I've found.

I'm just very glad I'm not a doctor. If "losing" a computer shakes me up like this, I'd hate to see what happened if I lost a patient!

Comments (Page 2)

Dr Guy

on Dec 30, 2007

Out of 50 PCs, we've had at least 10 failures so far (after about 14 months of using the boxes).

OUt of 40 file servers, we had 20 failures (mostly HDs, but enough MBs thrown in for good measure) in one year on Compaq. Thus why I will never buy comcrap again.

starkers

on Jan 01, 2008

I'm thinking a surgical career mightn't be such a bad thing in the doctor stakes...I'd specialise in political lobotomies so there'd be greater likelihood of popular political decisions.

DrJBHL

on Jan 01, 2008

You should be glad you're not Doctors.

We sit in school, invest love, time, caring and bucks to learn how to help people who don't listen, care or even vaguely understand how their bodies work or anything about disease yet figure their opinions are the equal or better than ours, take endless abuse, get defecated on by high school drop-outs working for "Insurance" companies, and regulated by a care nothing and know nothing government composed of (in the best case) bought and paid for, corrupt politicians and their parasitic/sycophantic staffs. Oh yes, and get paid next to nothing for it all.

Be glad, be VERY glad.

Gideon MacLeish

on Jan 01, 2008

Oh yes, and get paid next to nothing for it all.

Do you really get paid next to nothing, though? I know general practitioners aren't wealthy, but from what I've heard it's at least something at which you can make a living.

And for the record, almost every issue you have with patients, we have with our customers. There's nothing worse than having to fix someone's screw up because some high school kid with a level 70 dwarf on WoW told them that what they were doing to their computer was a GOOD thing (filesharing, anyone?). I am thankful, however, that our industry isn't highly regulated and that computers can't talk back (YET...lol!), even though their owners can and do, but there are more "issues" to being a techie than most people know.

I do have a few questions for you as a dr, though, and I personally hope you wouldn't mind dropping us a few blogs on issues like socialized medicine. We could use the expertise of a "pro" on this one.

DrJBHL

on Jan 01, 2008

Do you really get paid next to nothing, though? I know general practitioners aren't wealthy, but from what I've heard it's at least something at which you can make a living.

Honestly: When you factor in the risk, the overhead, the hours and HASSLE it isn't a living. Most of us didn't get into it for the money, but G-d knows...I wouldn't get out of it if there were some.

I do have a few questions for you as a dr, though, and I personally hope you wouldn't mind dropping us a few blogs on issues like socialized medicine. We could use the expertise of a "pro" on this one.

I'll help you as much as I can (undoubtedly for free?

)

Dr Guy

on Jan 02, 2008

And for the record, almost every issue you have with patients, we have with our customers. There's nothing worse than having to fix someone's screw up because some high school kid with a level 70 dwarf on WoW told them that what they were doing to their computer was a GOOD thing (filesharing, anyone?). I am thankful, however, that our industry isn't highly regulated and that computers can't talk back (YET...lol!), even though their owners can and do, but there are more "issues" to being a techie than most people know.

I have said before that we are the "Doctors" of the 21st century. Not in the respect that we "treat" people, but in the respect that once someone learns what you do, the conversation inevitably turns to "My computer has this funny little quirk in its side".

A big difference between computer docs and People docs is that our patients have no soul, so if we mis-prescribe something, it is just money. Not a life. But when I am out at cocktail parties (social gatherings), I hate telling people what I do for the reason mentioned above.

Gideon MacLeish

on Jan 02, 2008

But when I am out at cocktail parties (social gatherings), I hate telling people what I do for the reason mentioned above.

Yup. Many's the time I get asked to do a repair where the individual in question has no intention of paying me. If they genuinely have no money, I can usually work something out (I'll be trading out construction labor with one fellow; I received 10 pounds of meat on another job, homemade apple butter on still another). If they have money, though, I usually state my costs up front. Suddenly, they're not too keen on the idea, as they expected me to do it for free.

Dr Guy

on Jan 02, 2008

I received 10 pounds of meat on another job

That was an expensive job!

starkers

on Jan 02, 2008

If they have money, though, I usually state my costs up front. Suddenly, they're not too keen on the idea, as they expected me to do it for free.

Can't count the times on mine/my family's and all our ancestors fingers, how many times people wanted me to move them for nothing after they'd asked what I did for a living (and befriended purely me on the basis of my being a removalist). Didn't matter how well off they were... in fact, the wealthiest were often the worst by far for wanting something for nothing/a free ride.

I didn't mind helping out those who were genuinely struggling, but it was real hard to swallow when rich people expected it. One bloke in particular, a rather wealthy banker type, even went to the extreme of having his wife cavort around in front of us in a scant/see thru negligee... in the hope we'd accept another kind of 'payment' for our services. When the job was (almost done) and money was supposed to be changing hands, I told him that, I had a family to feed and his fridge, freezer, washing machine and dishwasher would be staying on the truck until he paid us the cash owing in full.

His threat of calling the cops, was met with being told: "Sir, I used to be with the QLD Police, and there are serious consequences for offering to pay for professional services via prostitution.", so without further ado he coughed up our fee plus an extra $100 from the fattest wallet I had ever seen.

So, it doesn't matter what profession you're in, there'll always be somebody wanting a free or cheap ride. As for the disrespect, well human nature dictates that occasionally we're gonna cop abuse and little or no thanks from some quarters, no matter how well we do our jobs.

Oh, and the rich banker swine got what was coming to him... about a month later I was moving his wife, who's obviously had enough and was leaving him.

on Jan 02, 2008

Wow. That's like hair-cutter and baldness. You just can't hide baldness from your hair-cutter.

I completely forgot what that work type name is, so I'm using hair-cutter.

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