Month: March 2013

About anything Microsoft says or does, that is.

This, of course, does not bode well for my continued employment in this field. I've been doing PC tech support full time since 1996 and as part of other job duties for an additional ten years prior to that. Obviously there was something that kept me engaged for all those years, but it's long gone.

For years I dealt with the continual patches and updates, the virus outbreaks, the malware, and the ever increasing bloat that was Windows and MS Office. The annoyance with all things Microsoft began several years ago, but was manageable and really didn't come to a head until I started running Windows 7 on my personal laptop back in the summer of 2009. One day, for no reason whatsoever, it simply refused to display my chosen wallpaper. No amount of cajoling or voodoo worked to rectify the situation, and faced with the prospect of wiping everything and reinstalling Windows again, I said ENOUGH. That was it; I was through with Microsoft. I had to deal with this crap at work; I didn't have to at home.

Within a week I was a Mac owner. I'd be lying if I said the transition was painless, and I am not afraid to admit that Apple does have issues—but they're nothing compared with what I've had to deal with from pretty much anything coming out of Redmond.

For the last year I've been running Windows 7 on my work PC. About three weeks ago it started refusing to do something with Internet Explorer (to be honest I don't remember what it was at this point—not worth committing to memory), so I wiped the damn thing and loaded XP.

I was amazed at how much faster the machine ran. This confirms my belief that despite the 120+ patches and fixes that came out after SP3, Microsoft basically got it right with XP.

I've been able to keep my disgust and ever increasing apathy toward all things Microsoft (and Dell) concealed on a professional level since then, but it's becoming increasingly difficult. During meetings with our network consultants, they're rattling off architectures and protocols and how the next big thing from Dell—or whoever—is going to fundamentally change our lives. Seriously dudes? Years ago I might've actually been interested enough to ask what all this meant (or at least research it myself later), but at this point I simply don't care.

Don't even get me started on the total lack of even he most elementary of computer skills in the workers my company hires (a despair I share with more than one of the managers). For example, today I got an email from one woman who wrote, "It never prompted me to change my password. How do I do that?"

Seriously.

I replied, "Knowing how to change one's Windows password is a basic computer skill," and then wrote out the steps to do it. I'm sure I'm going to get feedback on that.

But I don't care.

And for some reason, people never think of rebooting when they encounter a problem. No, it's so much easier to call me so I can tell them to reboot.

And then they give me attitude. "You always tell me to do that!" Well yeah, it's because it fixes whatever's wrong 90% of the time, asshole.

There's a reason your I.T. guy is surly. We don't start out this way. Like a clogged pipe, it takes years to get to this level of contempt for the people you're supposed to support.

So what's the solution?

I'm not sure. If I knew I wouldn't be still hanging around the place I am.

I would like to find an Apple shop; some business that uses Macs and OS X instead of plastic Dell crap running Windows. I think that might rekindle my interest in this technology. I once thought about applying to work at an Apple store, but while I was once able to feign caring, compassionate customer service, I can't even fake it any more and I wouldn't last a day in that environment.