Computer Repair

Posted by: Sean | Posted on: August 29th, 2009 | 0 Comments

I enjoy messing about with computers and learning new ways of doing things or how to get the most out of a computer. Having knowledge of how a computer operates is very usefully when something goes wrong.

I have been using computers now for about 10 or 11 years and since my first day with them i have now become a lot more familiar with fixing problems. Before when i had little know-how on how a computer operated i would have to get someone down to have a look at the computer and fix it. So they would usually end up taking it away and then coming back a day or two later saying it would cost a fair bit of money.

I reckon that whenever a tech person takes away your computer, they probably have one look at it and most likely 99% of the time they will know how to fix it and it will probably only take a few hours, in most cases a run of an anti-virus program would sort out most problems. Then in that other 1% a more in depth investigation will be required to find out what is the problem.

Since i have such an interest in computers i was keen to find out how to fix them. Now if something goes wrong with my computer i can fix it easily with no hassle at all :D . It saves you so much time and money. By fixing it yourself it will not be broken for as long since you do not have to wait for your computer to be returned to you and also you do not have to pay those mental fees people try and ask for!

I talked to a few people before and they told me that they would take it to a PC clinic, like the ones they have in PC World. Before most places like this even look at your computer they will straight away charge you a standard fee of €50! That is just mad money, then on top of that you will get charged for any parts required etc...

Friends of mine always get me to have a look at their computers, and most of the time it would be something simple to fix such as a few viruses or maybe some spyware or even errors that have occurred. A lot of the time people ask, why is my computer going so slow?

A few simple things could be done to fix that big problem that you have, first make sure you have enough space on your disk drive, check for viruses / spyware , remove unnecessary programs,  and try a defrag of your hard drive. Most of the time that will work no problem and you will have your computer back up and running smoothly again.

It is strange that whenever i start to fix one person’s computer, suddenly loads more computers break and i end up getting asked to fix them. I think it is odd that they all break around the same time as each-other, or maybe it is just me thinking they do. I enjoy fixing them, and it also gets me a bit of money on the side whilst i am not at work ;) .

It Has A Mind Of Its Own

Posted by: Sean | Posted on: June 27th, 2009 | 1 Comments

For the past week i have been having trouble with my wireless card on my laptop. Usually i would just use my desktop PC however the rest of my family use the laptop a lot.

They recently started telling me that the wireless was cutting off a lot and also sometimes it would not pick up the broadband signal at all, even if they sat right next to the router!

I spent hours trying to figure out why the wireless card refused to work, and i had no useful result :( I tried many things such as resetting my routers wireless settings, unblocking firewalls, also removing all existing connections on the laptop and then just added back in the wireless internet connection, and unfortunately none of these worked.

I also tried to update the wireless cards driver, also i removed and reinstalled the driver for the wireless card and that also did not work. Then i just became really confused on how it used to work and then suddenly stopped.

I then restored my pc back to an earlier date, to around the beginning of the year, and then suddenly it was back working perfectly. Then about a week later the same thing would happen again and i would have to keep doing the same thing.

It was not worth restoring the PC back to an earlier date all the time, so i just decided to completely wipe the laptop and start fresh again, and it has worked perfectly. Now there is nothing wrong, and the wireless card is working perfectly now :D

I still have no idea what caused the wireless card to stop working, i did not install anything that would of interfered with it. the only change to the system was the widows updates that would automatically install. So although i did not figure out what was wrong, i am glad to finally have it working again, but it would be great to know what caused it in the first place, in case it happens again in the future!