Sidetracked Charley

Some days it just seems like everyone is out to get you If you have never done a complete recovery on your computer let me mention right up front you do not want to. I have done one before. One I argued with the computer technical assistance about the need to even do. And in the end it did not need to be done then, but it was. It takes hours to do and then you have to reinstall all your programs and all your backups and remember all your passwords. Luckily it did not have to be done this time. And I dodged the bullet. As I waited for the recovery discs HP support was sending I was quaking in my boots. I was even ready to come out fighting to avoid the dreaded recovery. And it was a near miss. I read the directions carefully twice, inserted disc one of the set they sent and followed the directions to step 5. The computer refused to comply with its own suicide and did not go to step 6. I called the upper level tech support number HP gave me when I asked for a conversation about...

Where Fedex seems to think I live I was standing outside with some visitors to my studio yesterday afternoon at 2:00 when I watched the Fedex truck first go one way on down State Hwy 434 and then a few minutes later the other way. Yes, I can see the main highway from my house. And traffic on the road can see me. I have been known to wave at passerbys. I do not live in a cliff dwelling in the wilderness. The urgent package from HP,that I had paid to be delivered on second day, (mind you not next day because I know better) was not delivered. Why am I not surprised? Had it been UPS it would have been here. I groan when service or order departments tell me it is coming Fedex. I beg for alternatives. I have been known to whine when the product like a fix for my computer is sorely needed. So last night after my visitors from Florida (who found the studio) left I got on the internet on my laptop and tracked the Fedex package. It is in Eagle Nest. Why Eagle Nest? There is no Fedex fac...

If this is September can scenes like the one be far behind? Typing this from my laptop, Traveler. No, I am not traveling except in my mind. And once again my desktop is awaiting shipment back to the mothership of HP. I had cleaned my laptop of excess photos when Charley V failed and Charley VII was on order. That was end of November 2010. One thing would lead to another and I would not have my new desktop until almost the last day of that year. So when it failed yesterday I was well within my warranty time. Tech support always creates chaos in my not that orderly desk area. Which led last night to found things and lost things - including my temper. But in the cool light f predawn I find myself wondering where the last year has gone, how many photos it is possible to put on a hard drive in less than nine months, and maybe it is time while the desktop is gone to rearrange the office area like I thought last December. And is there a way to organize my  computer desk so when the ...

I told HP on Sunday I wanted a shipping notification within 48 hours or I was canceling the replacement HP Pavilion order and getting a refund instead. And low and behold the HP Case Manager did indeed get a shipping notification to me. However, Fedex has yet to receive the HP desktop computer to ship. For a while this morning the Fedex tracking number provided me by HP even said it would get delivered today. Frankly I was leery of that one because it gave a ship date of the 11th and I didn't give them my ultimatum until the 12th. I must admit this was a rather clever ruse. Too bad they are not as clever at giving good customer service. Meanwhile someone is marketing is sending out e-mails saying I can still order a computer today and get it before the end of the year. Interesting since I have been told I would be very lucky to get the one I essentially ordered in November before the end of the year. Really HP get your script straight. Is this sort of game playing really das...

I would like to say HP is the Grinch that stole Christmas but I am not sure they are any worse or better than 99% of modern business. It all comes from Mexico or China with support teems in India or Texas (both have impossible accents) and CEO's in the United States that only care about the bottom line and not customer satisfaction. I am so sick of being asked to take on line customer satisfaction surveys (even my computer nerd that destroyed the original HP had one) that I tell them it is really simple just note unacceptable for everything you ask me to rate. It doesn't help that because I do a very base rate on Qwest (because basically they were the first firm this year that lied to me) it is costing me 3 cents a minute to be lied to by HP. You know when they say this call may be recorded to ensure customer satisfaction? Well, I am thinking of recording them on my end to compare the lies they tell. Supposedly they have an open file on a computer (might HP case managers u...

I all fairness let me first say I am not really neutral on computers right not. I have been dealing for over a month with a three year old HP desktop computer that a local nerd, in the business to save computers, killed after losing 3 years of data. Yes, I backed up, but to an external hard drive that failed. So I was forced to go shopping for a computer when I did not have the time nor the money. Nor quite frankly was I feeling warm and fuzzy about the boxes or the people that worked on them. But computer shopping I had to do. I am a small business and while I have a laptop for play I need the desktop for lots of year end business stuff and beginning of the new year submissions of art for fairs throughout 2011. HP had a cyber Monday sale that extended through the following Tuesday and I found a computer, that while not the one of my dreams, met my minimum requirements, fit my budget and would be delivered within a week. The HP Pavilion arrived on December 6th and I un...