Thursday, May 21, 2015

Computer Woes: Tech Issues that Apparently Only Happen to ME

I am so tired of computer and technology issues that seemingly only have ever happened to me. It's a pattern that I've put up with--as a PC Guru, a title I've unwillingly taken on--for many years. It goes like this:

A problem or quirk--sometimes very minor, sometimes quite major, but always annoying--will crop up on my PC, or in recent years on my MacBook Pro, Android Phone or other electronic device. I'll try to sort it out myself, but then will seek out answers on the Googles and Bings. Rarely, I'll find the answer I'm looking for, and bada-bing, problem solved.

More often, it goes like this:

- Problem crops up. Usually, it's replicatable, and often it has happened before to me on other systems, and was never resolved.
- Seek answers via Google, Bing, what have you.
- Find several responses that seemingly fit my query.
- Several responses lead to paid "help" sites, arcane uber-techy sites, hard-to-navigate forums, and often, dead links.
- Some answers list steps for resolution that either a) have no effect, or b) have steps that simply can't be done, because that menu or link or button doesn't exist on my system.
- Some answers begin with fishing expeditions by other techies who obviously have no idea what the issue is, because they start with, "well, what were you doing when it happened," "what programs are you running," "what are the CPU loads when that happens," "why are you trying to do that," "try turning off your virus checker/firewall/whoziewhatzit," and on and on. They don't know. They're fishing for a cause, because this problem has no known resolution to them.

I end up frustrated, mostly because it's impossible I'm the only one this happens to! Let me give you some examples of the problems that regularly occur that piss me off:

- Typing--just typing--slows to a crawl in a browser, usually in a simple response box, such as a comment board in Slate, Salon, or other news/blog area. It can be something as basic as a comment box using Facebook's or Disqus' format. Glacial, character-dropping, time-delayed typing. Something that should be so simple and basic that it never happens.

- While trying to scroll a Twitter feed, the feed begins bouncing around, pictures inflate and deflate, sending the whole feed up or down, and making reading very frustrating.

- A browser tab will bring up a white screen with no text, and the twirling "wait" cursor icon. This isn't too odd, but then it will knock out the rest of the computer's brain, affecting other programs, the task bar, dimming the display, sometimes everything, until the wait state is done. . .doing whatever the hell it's doing.

- My old Samsung Galaxy S4's overheating and battery devouring problem. A known issue that the Googles apparently don't remember, and offer no useful solutions for (I feel guilty for trading that phone in, for the guy who buys it reconditioned).

- My old Samsung Galaxy S4's (and The Other Half's S4's) inability to work properly with Bluetooth, in cars, and often other devices, and seemingly birthing a secondary problem where the speaker and/or microphone would simply stop working.

This is a very short list of the things that have happened to me, mostly across multiple devices, where I'm met with. . ."well, what is your model number/serial number/processor version/Windows version/Android version," and other forms of fishing. I totally get that a person has to ask questions with unfamiliar troubleshooting issues. But why are these problems unheard of, if they happen to me across devices???

I'd like to point out also that I'm kind of an early adaptor, and when it's financially possible to have the latest-and-greatest, I try to get it. Well, maybe not top-of-the-line, but decent, well above entry level. My main PC is 64-bit with a high-speed, quad processor, and scads of RAM. Should time delayed typing really be an issue? It can't be just me if it's happened on all of my systems, at work and at home, in various versions of Windows for years.

/rant

1 comment:

  1. I don't know.
    My 7 year old computer works just fine.
    Along with my 20 year old TV's.
    And my 6 year old phone.
    And my 10 year old freezer.
    And my 11 year old car.
    Just wish my old body would act as well as these old appliances.
    Maybe new technology is not the best.

    ReplyDelete

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