Tech Support, How I Miss Thee
(Preface: One of our business’ locations lost power. I first spent an hour on the phone…)
Me: “Your power went out? Did you shut down the computers or did they shut down on their own?”
Them: “They just shut down, and now they won’t come up!”
Me: “So you have power now? Are your TVs and radios playing?”
Them: “Yes!”
Me: “What I want you to do is go to the computer and find the power cord.”
Them: “Okay, got it.”
Me: “Trace it to the battery backup. You will find it plugged into the back of it.”
Them: “Okay, found it.”
Me: “Plug it into a receptacle other than the battery backup. Plug it into the wall receptacle.”
Them: “Okay, done.”
Me: “Now try to power the computer up.”
Them: “Nothing.”
Me: “There may have been a breaker that tripped. Do you know your way around your fusebox?”
Them: “Yes.”
Me: “Go look at it and see if anything is tripped. If so, reset it, okay?”
Them: “Okay, hold on…”
(After a few moments…)
Them: “Nothing’s tripped and I have customers needing to make payments!”
Me: “Okay, I will be there in a couple of hours.”
(After a two-hour trip, I arrived with a new computer in my backseat. The first thing I looked at is the backup power supply. The problem? The computer was still plugged into the backup, but even better: they plugged the backup power supply into itself. Two-hour trip, one-minute solution.)
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