Entering "The Club" Having been a computer technician, I guess I should know better. There is a kind of a club that evolves around each group of technicians in a company. You do not ever just "enter" this club, but rather "earn" your way into it by demonstrating over a period of time (and problems) that you really do have the know-how. Of course things such as paper-work and a known history help out a lot in this regard too. Outsiders Although there is nothing directly wrong with this sort of club forming, there is a problem that occurs the moment a technical issue arises. You see, if you are not in this "club" then you simply are not a technician. If you are not a technician, then you cannot possibly know about anything technical. Therefore all of your thoughts and ideas on the problem really are insignificant. In the eyes of those belonging to the "club", you are a dunce, a drop-out, a know-it-all that knows nothing. Saying that you actually belong to another "club" just like the one that the kindly gent looking at your equipment belongs to only serves to cement their certainty that you are a know-it-all that really knows nothing. The worst part about all of this situation is that even if the tech you are talking with OBVIOUSLY knows very little about your particular problem, the assumption is that he still knows a tremendous amount more than you. Even if this happens to be your area of specialty. The Dance So when it comes to reporting a fault or problem with computers, I need to go through the same dance every single time. The one thing that I have learned however is that there is absolutely no point in telling them that you are a tech. After all, if you ARE a tech, why are you not solving the problem for yourself instead of involving us in it? The fact that you bought the item from their shop and want them to deem it faulty has nothing to do with anything. The dance goes something like this: bring the faulty item to the tech and tell him that there is a problem with it. Watch while the tech does the same things as you did and then tells you that your item has a problem with it. If he doesn't find the problem first off, then the dance continues. Insist that there is a problem with the item, and explain how it occurred and why you think that there is a problem. Watch the tech repeat the same steps as before, totally ignoring your explanation of how to locate the problem, and tell you that there is nothing wrong with it. Repeat this insistance, but this time, as the tech goes through the steps, tell him what he needs to do step by step, until he finally does it. Listen to him tell you that your item is faulty. A Problem Arises Now that I know this dance, life has become much easier. So when one of the items I bought in Ciudad del Este failed to work as expected, I needed to race back to the shop again to start my dance. I had bought myself an external hard drive case and a nice 250Gb hard drive to go inside of it. But it was not working. Time was very limited, as the shops shut at 4pm Argentina time and it was 3pm when I discovered the problem. I did not go through every step possible nor read through the documentation as I would normally do to ensure that there was not a simple explanation for the problem. This explains the final outcome. The bus journey from Puerto Iguazu through Brazil to the Bridge of Friendship took 40 minutes. It may have taken longer but there were only two of us onboard so our driver took the short way there. From here I climbed aboard a motor-taxi and raced over the bridge to the door of the shop where I had bought my drive. And then my dance began. Doing The Dance The problem was that the drive was making some very nasty noises and refused to start spinning up to the 7200RPM that it was rated at. Well, it just refused to start spinning. So I explained this to the young technician, who listened to the drive and agreed with me that there was a problem, but told me that they had already closed up for the day and that I should come back in the morning. After a heart-pleading cry stating that I would be in another part of the world (Corrientes) in the morning and that I raced back here from Argentina to fix this problem, I finally coaxed them into action, and recieved my replaced drive. But the drive comes in two parts, one part is the drive itself and the other is the box that encases it. The new drive was doing the same thing, making the same noises as before. So it must be the box. There was another technician nearby who off-handedly said that "they all do that". This was enough for the tech attending me to tell me that this was not a problem at all and that I simply needed to install the drivers and prepare the drive for use in Windows. This seemed odd to me, so I insisted that they check the box and show me the drive working. After much pleading, the tech started the process of showing me, but never succeeded. I assumed it was the box, and told him that if he could replace the box and it did the same thing then I would believe him that it was the "normal" thing and that I simply needed to install some driver and all would be well. But the box was not under warranty, only the drive. I had to buy another box. False Hope Truly believing that this would fix my problems, I raced over to the counter which was now closed. A shout from behind me told the guy sitting uninterested behind the desk to attend me. Computers were off so he nonchalently found a book and went through the manual process of paperwork. I sat waiting in a now almost vacated building, listening to the second hand tick off the minutes. Finally he finished the process and I paid for then received my new (and hopefully working) box. After putting everything back together again, I plugged it in expectantly. I was waiting for the whizzing sound of a whirring drive. That sound never came. It was the same horrible click click noise. There were two techs standing there now, both looking at me with that sort of look on their faces that said, "I told you so." I believed them too, after all, what are the chances of two boxes failing in one time. I must have been wrong. So with two boxes in my hand, one with a drive in it that still went "click click", I headed back home to install the mystery driver and set up my drive for Windows. The Problem Persists Another drive on a motor-taxi over the bridge and a bus ride through Brazil and I was back in Argentina again. The problem was that no matter what I did with this drive, it just never worked. So now I am left with two boxes, and one drive. I assume that the drive works, but the boxes don't. Perhaps they were never designed for such a big drive. So what do I do now? Well, I hope to find a solution somehow. It should have been resolved by the tech, but instead the problem has been left with me. Maybe I am wrong still, but the future is looking dim. But this is a great example of why computer technicians do not help.