Newbies' victims...?

[AlienDyne]

What parts were your first victims when starting work as a Tech? Did you burn anything?
Share your list...

------------------
"Matter is passive. In spite of its power, it can't be controlled without the human mind." Sokrates

Photos Of My Work
http://www.geocities.com/alienhardware

[This message has been edited by AlienDyne (edited August 11, 2000).]

[This message has been edited by AlienDyne (edited August 11, 2000).]

[3fingersalute]

My first part I remember burning was a 40MB Seagate IDE HD. I was working on a system after school one day, (at that time I was the only tech we had and I was in high school) and I couldn't tell if the drive was spinning up or not, so I bent over to listen to it....I forgot to take my earring out after school that day (I wasn't supposed to be wearing an earring here at work) and ZAP!!! that earring hit the circuit board on the bottom of the HD !!!.....Fried that drive, and I figured out that yes, it WAS spinning, but never again would it spin!!!

------------------
[email protected]

[lysergic]

CDRom. Took it apart to clean the lens and then layed it on top of the metal shell to test it without bothering with an antistat bag. Found out very quickly that solder points and metal do not mix well. Although the smoke was very nice looking.

[SavagePenguin]

I was always cautious. The worst thing I've done was fry a few CD's when I got my CD burner.

However, last month I worked with a kid who wanted to be a tech. He bought a couple high speed ethernet cards so he could set up a network at home.

A couple hours later he called the shop. Neither computer would boot up.

It ends up he skipped step #1 on the installation instructions sheet... which was "Turn the computer off."

(I figured this out when he said he saw sparks when he plugged the cards in)

[SavagePenguin]

Now that I think about it. I did screw something up on one of my first calls.

I had a call to upgrade several computers. I was supposed to move the secretaries hard drive to another computer, and put a new hard drive into her computer.
She told me that she didn't save anything. The only thing she used the computer for was for printing labels.
I accidently ghosted her drive with a blank HD... making two blank hard drives. That was fun.

They had no backups. All her software (except the OS) was "borrowed" so she had no CD's to reinstall anything.

The lady was irate because her DOS label making program was gone. We offered to get her another copy but she had no idea what the name of the program was. We bought her MS Office but she hated that program.

She kept calling and complaining. We tried to show her how MS Office was better but she'd been using her "mystery program" for years and couldn't be convinced. We sent several techs out there on free calls to give her lessons. Still, she couldn't be satisfied. She called for weeks to complain. Finally our manager told her that since the issue involved software that she had been using illegally we could not help her. Furthermore, even though she had installed the software, her company would be responsible for any legal ramifications from using the pirated software. All our support would cease immediatly. She was welcome to call the police if she didn't like the situation.

We never heard from her again.
I still cower in fear when I drive past that business.

[MAYHEM]

I didn't think it was posible to plug a floppy power cable in off by on pin. I was wrong, WRONG I tell you, wrong wrong wrong. Why, oh why, didn't I just look at what I was doing? Poor little floppy drive. never stood a chance. And it was such a good little floppy, never did anything wrong. Never did anything to me. And I KILLED it. How can I live with myself. I'll never forget him. Poor little floppy.

------------------
There is no Spoon!

[shawnMt]

386 - AT power supply - plugged psu into board (didn't notice 1 of the connectors was off by 1 pin) - flipped power switch - zap

------------------
Cannot find REALITY.SYS. Universe halted

Paint your old laptop!

[scutterboy]

I've made a couple of cool cock ups over the years.
A Japanese NEC PC named Banzai remains my personal favourite. I was asked to fix it but did was unaware that it had a 120V PSU, I connected it to the standard UK supply at 240V ....

A first I was totally unaware, I just thought bloody hell this PC is booting like something nasty off a well polished shovel 8) but then it ground to a halt and started to smell a bit heinous. I had just enough time to realise <"there is a distinct electrical and silicon burning smell."> before the main circuit breaker tripped and I ruined my underwear. There were a fair few irate people who had lost work but I don't think many people knew I was to blame.

Another favourite wrecking was done by a programmer who was writing a Playstation game. On the back of the PSX Development Kit was a 15 Pin Din, the same connector as is used for a monitor. He moved office and, while reconnecting, he accidentally plugged his monitor cable from the output of his GFX card into an output on the Dev Kit. There was a big bang as some capacitors blew and a big blue spark. He destroyed every single component including the £15,000 dev kit. The end product was a smouldering lump from which only the case and the power supply were salvaged.

------------------
And Control Enter STILL wont let me post a reply.

[archangel]

My first mishap was my dads new video card. this was many years ago. My dad bought a new video card and I begged him to let me install it. He agreed and I took the computer to my carpeted room. I pulled the card from its protective bag and went on to open the computer. After a while of walking on the carpet, opening the case, I went to pick up the card. The first sign something went wrong was the slight shock it gave me. Luckely my dad was not to ticked about it and was able to get it replaced my a very understanding tech.

------------------
www.el-mono.com

[theBeast]

I only recall two "accidents". First, I forgot to turn a computer off when I installed the CD-ROM. ZAP! Luckily, I didn't damage the CD-ROM...
Then, I set a computer on a counter, and for some reason, it toppled to the ground, and landed right on its face. The case got a bit twisted and the face plate was smashed...our store wound up buying him a new case. Luckily, again, there was no further damage...HD was still fine. To this day, I SWEAR I set the computer on the counter properly, and I have no idea why it fell.

Now, for other techs screwing up in my presence... There was this one highschool kid who wanted to be a tech. We never had him do anything too fantastic to computers. One time we had him install extra RAM into a video card. We showed him how it was done, and he seemed fine.
Then, one fateful day, I powered up one of his computers. The video looked all funny, and I turned to the other tech to ask him if he thought it was a flaky card (we used a lot of crap parts, so it was possible). He said, "Umm...Turn it off!" I turned back, and plumes of smoke were rising from it. He put the PILL memory in backwards. We just laughed. Twas an honest mistake, really.
Then, I decided he was ready to install a power supply. We used the ones where you just take the wires off the switch to save from replacing the switch. We were using the ones with the black/white, brown/blue connectors but had switched to ones with just two connectors (made installing the new PSs much easier). I told the kid to put one wire on the front connector, and one on the back, and he nodded.
I powered up the computer. Nothing. I looked inside and noticed he put the wires side-by-side, so the circuit was never completed. I showed him what he did wrong, and tapped the wires...well, my fingers managed to complte the circuit, and I felt the jolt of 120V.

[Damned Angel]

First power supply replacement, connected the switch backwards.....poof...power cable turned to goo.
Been there done that with the video memory (asleep at the keyboard I guess).
had a notebook one time, don't remember the origional problem, but I did learn that if you open one up, remove the battery as well as unplug it.
recently started reparing monitors, didn't have a plastic screw driver. Went to adjust the focus, slipped....woaaaa, kewl....smells kinda funny though.

[Paul Cunningham]

I mistook a jumper for a fanc connector. Popped on jumper, watched it pop off again and hastily got rid of the smoke. That cost me a new motherboard, haven't done it again since.

------------------
feel free to comment on my website. http://www.bytesback.fsbusiness.co.uk

[Karatz]

I've done a few, but can't remember my first.

My little brother plugged a commodore joystick into my 386DX40, I think that was his first.

[dmshayd001]

I'm a little concerned. I've never burnt hardware. I'll admit to software screw-ups, but never hardware blunders. There's no excuse for that.

[theBeast]

You mean to say you've NEVER plugged an IDE cable in backwards, NEVER hooked an LED up wrong, and NEVER neglected to look at the power state of your computer before tearing it open? Even in your earliest days of tech support? I somehow find that a little hard to swallow.

------------------
***the Beast
- Fate drove me here...then told me to get out of the car...