I just got back from a house call for IT support. It was two small networks, each with two computers and an access point. All that needed done was to connect the computers to the APs and then call it a day. Of course, that was a very easy task. I was surprised that the netgear usb wireless adapter actually worked. They had two of them and neither one was acting up. I remember Jeff getting a usb wireless adapter before and raving about it sucking (that was like two years ago though). Anyway, the second computer that I was working on was a two year old HP media center. After I installed the drivers for the usb adapter, I rebooted and was welcomed with at prompt that said,

Hard drive failure imminent. Backup your data and replace the hard drive. F1 for setup, F2 to continue.

I asked if the woman had ever seen the message before and the answer was no. So I explained what it meant, the whole time thinking what could be going through her mind…

He broke my computer

Before I left, I started a S.M.A.R.T scan on the drive and told her I hope it is a false positive. The life of a geek can be not so glorious at times. We show up to fix your computer and if something just so happens to go wrong (or bad) while, or after we are on the computer, well then it must be our fault. It just isn’t fair. People need to understand that things can just flat out malfunction and it might not be anyone’s fault at all. This really shouldn’t be bothering me this much, she never even blamed me, it is just what I was expecting because it has happened to me before at IMC. I come in to a company and install updates on a person’s system and the next month I get to hear that person say to me

What did you do to my computer last month. Ever since you were here it is no longer functioning the way it used to be.

How can you say to the person that you didn’t do anything. All you did was check the update history. You never even installed anything. ALL YOU DID WAS OPEN INTERNET EXPLORER AND THEN CLOSE IT 30 SECONDS LATER! My ranting and raving is now done. Just something for all you non-geeks to think about. IT ISN’T OUR FAULT!