r/TalesFromTechSupport - STOP Using That! It's going To EXPLODE!

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Karma Stories Podcast Links:

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Karma Stories Rob
227-207 Dundas Street East,
Trenton, Ontario, Canada
K8V 1L8

The Karma Stories Podcast is hosted by Rob and covers stories from Malicious Compliance, Pro Revenge, Nuclear Revenge, Tales From Tech Support, Entitled Parents and other amazing Reddit Subreddits! You can find us on EVERY Major Podcasting Platform and on YouTube!

#redditstories #karmastories #revengestories

Chapters:
00:00 Introduction and Podcast Info
00:34 Story 1: Friends and Family Tech Troubles
02:47 Story 2: Lightning Strikes and Network Woes
05:10 Story 3: Server Room Aircon Disaster
07:24 Story 4: 80s Airport IT Challenges
10:39 Story 5: Major Incident with Outlook
13:32 Story 6: Julia's Contact List Limit
16:17 Story 7: Exploding Laptop Battery
19:30 Conclusion and Call to Action

[Juggzy]

And wow that last one, MY heart rate went up quite a bit just listenin to that one lol. Jeesh! I was waitin to hear somethin like “it exploded while under the hood.” Or “it went up in flames just before they took it away from near the dumpster.” Ugh scary as hell!

[zapoqx]

Just to point out on the first story, I told a person to show me how they "turned off" a laptop. They closed the lid. Instant education cause it was, in fact, NOT THE SAME THING as turning it off. Also, sometimes people won't "lie" about not installing something on a PC. Sometimes that fateful "next next next" is all it takes. Few times on mobile devices, I might ask if they updated something on a free app that they got. They get upset when it turns out that was the cause.

2024 and sometimes we still deal with people that think I.T. is just fix a problem by pushing a single button to get it working, and with everything running smoothly, "why would we pay you? Why can't we just get something from [Insert a blue and yellow store] and call it a day?"

Some people just need to learn the hard way.

[michaelvilain]

"I'm a tech support and systems administrator. I used to people lying to me." is a good response when being screened for jury duty.

[Loki-and-Thor]

“That means I’m not allowed to have fun anymore, for the rest of my life.” That’s a pretty unbelievable statement when it’s said while you’re wearing a really fun shirt!

[Cygesx]

I am listening to this while driving home from my tech-support job. I work for an international company that makes video switches. We work for companies like NBC CBS CNN Fox and a lot of independent news media sites as well. We do sports all sorts of jazz you would be shocked at how inefficient at troubleshooting, these mega conglomerate companies are. Most of them don’t even want to troubleshoot. They just tell you it’s broken fix it or replace it.

[Juggzy]

I love the “Tales From Tech Support” stories! I can’t get enough of them! Most are funny haha!

[joedarkness]

Most people can't tell the diffence between sleep and restart .. I had a tech director telling me he restarts every day and my software is wrong ... I give up

[HappilyHomicidalHooligan]

Server Room A/C Story: If OP was wise, they'd IMMEDIATELY set up a 4-6 hour, Off-Site Backup Cycle (so the entire Server Rack backs itself up every 4-6 hours to a Server in another building) and start pricing out a new Server System so when, not If, WHEN that Server Rack cooks itself to death, OP has all the Quotes needed to order a replacement system which will save time getting the system back up and running with minimal data loss...

Even if it's only 5-10% hotter than normal, that is SERIOUSLY reducing the system's lifespan...computer components do NOT like heat...the more heat they feel, the faster they die...

They also don't like dust...dust clogs heatsinks, clogged heatsinks don't remove heat from the component they are supposed to cool, clogged heatsinks kill Processors REAL quick...dust also clogs fan bearings, making fans stop working which also stops heat from being removed from Server Racks...

[helenconnor]

I'm so glad we had great IT folks where I worked. Nowadays when something isn't working correctly, they can remote in, with your manual acceptance, and watch what is happening. This way they can see any keying errors or that the user is correct in what was happening. If needed, they can take control of the machine and troubleshoot or visually show you proper steps without having to come to your office, including all our remote offices. What a time saver for all involved!

[autobotjazz]

Story 3: That hole knocked in the wall absolutely would be used by the insurance company to get out of having to pay any claim.

[Warrickomega]

How can a Chairman override the authority of the CEO?

[feldamar]

For those who don't know, that bulging is coming from compressed hydrogen gas. In a sealed case with VERY high surface area lithium metal.
Making that a compressed hydrogen metal fire. Functioning as a primitive thermobaric explosive.

[KennethLongcrier]

Hole knocked in wall:
Not only problems with Fire safety, a fan that large means that your server room (and therefore your client data) is no longer secure. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[palehorse]

The trick is to make them think the wrong answer is what you what you want them to do. If you want to know if they restarted the device you ask them "You didn't restart it did you?" when they say no then you have them restart it.

[stevenlennaman]

BTKAS (Between The Keyboard And The Seat) joint problems. Users LIE always.

[merlinathrawes]

Android phone story: Cause and effect? You mean stuff like that is real?

Lightening strike story: Actually, it makes sense the cat-5 cables would be the problem. Of course the power connections would be surge protected given that's a known source of power problems. If power can surge thru the cat-5 cables it would make sense to protect them from surges as well.

A/C story: Good grief! So instead of a nominally "clean" server room you're now blowing the office air dust and vapors (coffee, ect.) into the server room on top of it being too warm. Hope the chairman enjoys explaining to the rest of the board why business ground to a halt after frying the servers, simply because he wouldn't authorize a repair/replacement of the server room A/C.

Report commands story: I would have refused to do it myself and courier it over. That would only lead to them EXPECTING OP to do it for them every time.

Julia story: It seems Julia was a knowledgeable, friendly and helpful person.

[Amarouq]

Story 2: Had an industrial client where the building was hit by a direct lightning strike. This completely cooked the server running the security cameras. The motherboard and power supply had caught fire. This camera system was really, REALLY old and used coax with BNC connectors to connect to the cameras. I recommended that, since I had to build a new server anyway, they upgrade to newer hardware and higher resolution cameras that used PoE to, hopefully, future proof that system as the old hardware was no longer produced. They agreed to a slightly upgraded server but wanted to use the current camera system as the add on camera interface cards from the old server still “worked”. So here I am, building a new server and promptly installing Windows XP (new system was designed to run Windows 10 pro) as the drivers and control software would not run on anything newer, even when trying to force it through using compatibility mode. So, yeah. I built the world’s most OP Win XP machine for a client all because they wanted to save a few bucks.

[jamesyoung]

I suggest buying a UPS (uninterruptable power supply). If you've spent more than $1, 000 on a PC, would you trust a $10 surge protector to protect your PC?

[daleraney]

Been in Telecommunications almost 40 years (phone guy). Been working with networking since it's inception. Not an ITte h by any stretch of the imagination but I know troubleshooting. You'd be surprised by how many IT techs and admits don't know how to do basic troubleshooting. I mean isn't that part of their job requirements? I would think so anyway. Obviously this and the use of cable managers aren't taught to anyone getting any kind of certifications in my area.

[glitter]

The outlook story gives me flash back from my own boss.
He comes to me saying that his phone doesn't have storage, 128gb just gone. I give it a look and outlook is taking 50gb, as i'm not IT and just the secretary i use google photos to clean 15gb and tell him to go to an IT person. Guess what he asks me to do next week? Yes clean his phone cause now outlook is taking 75gb of space. Next week he just buy a new phone and reinstalls outlook 🙄
Why i didn't cleaned the outlook? I have no ideia how outlook works and boss like to point fingers because of his mistakes :v