How NOT to do Tech Support - over the phone, to a technophobe, half a day after the problem was encountered, when the remote user doesn't have the laptop in front of them.
Oh, and said user is my mother, 40 miles (an hour's drive) away, and the laptop is at my sister's house (she's currently on holiday so left mum in charge of feeding the cat and attempting to learn how to use the internet from scribbled messages on post-it notes), about a mile away from mum.
The past couple of days, mum actually managed to turn on the broadband router (cue a phone call to me on Sunday to ask what all the lights were for, while I in return had to supply definitions of the meaning of the Internet, DSL, Ethernet, Wireless status lights - I figured she'd probably know what the power status light was for...), log into the laptop, load IE, and do a spot of surfing. Until today, when things started going wrong. Here's the information I've managed to obtain - not that it makes much sense to me... can any of you make head or tail of this:
Turned on computer (Toshiba laptop, Vista Home Premium).
Computer installed three updates on boot (well, mum saw it was taking its time over the first update, so completed a sudoku puzzle until the login screen appeared).
Logged on, loaded Internet Explorer.
Message appears:
Title: Google End User License Agreement
In the page itself:
This program cannot display the web page
Most likely causes
(list of three)
What you can try:
(list)
Press for further information.
(Mum did)
DNS is not readable.
DNS does not have listing for website domain.
(Strange pair of errors, unless what it really means is that it's decided it can't find the wireless network. Mum tried to shut down)
(Computer popped up balloons informing her that Yahoo and Adobe updates were ready to install. Mum dismissed those messages)
"Error in C:\Windows\System32\spool\DRIVERS\w32x86\31LXCStimeRunDLLEntry"
"Press F12 to reboot"
(So mum diligently pressed F12)
"Please wait"
(A few minutes later)
"Could not reconnect all network drives."
(Err...what network drives? The laptop's previously been on a LAN, but you would have thought mum would have noticed this message if it had appeared when the computer was previously working)
Shows Google EULA screen again.
-oOo-
Any ideas? About the only advice I could offer was to check whether the wireless connected icon was showing in the system tray, and if all else failed, since the laptop is apparently only a few feet away from the broadband router, and the router has a pair of network cables plugged in it (but not into anything else), to try plugging a network cable into the laptop.
Comments
windows system restore
In vista under the control panel go to system and security then select system backup and restore. After doing this select restore system settings to a previous date before she started this whole situation and it should hopefully fix the problem.
Hugs,
Jenna From FL
Moderator/Editor
TopShelf BigCloset
Hugs,
Jenna From FL
Moderator/Editor
TopShelf BigCloset
It is a long road ahead but I will finally become who I should be.
reformat?
ok, not a viable option (besides which, they might take you literally.. like my mom tried to do). uninstall Yahoo, uninstall Google, uninstall any other trash, reboot. Find out what the network settings are and see where they point to (the neighbor's wifi that is security enabled?). Vista loves to reset the private router settings to public and then disallow any traffic through it as untrusted... Set it back to private and trusted again.
Note: These answers are from memory of my own family's network issues, YMMV
hugs
Diana
Wait a sec, wireless settings on the router; does she need to set the wifi security up on the laptop too? Just a thought, also log into the router and check if it is connected to the network (router status?)...
Bear in mind...
...this is a complete technophobe I'm talking to, and there's a fair chance that when she phones she won't be near the computer in question.
But sending her a text telling her how to disable browser toolbars etc. might be useful, as well as introducing her to msconfig (if only I could chat in real time, I could find out what cr*p Katie1 has set to run on startup on the laptop).
Hopefully this evening I'll find out if my suggestions to check whether the WiFi is connected and to try plugging a patch cable into the laptop help. Mum turns the router on when she enters the house and off when she leaves it, and as the laptop is being used a few feet away from the router, it should be able to latch onto the WiFi signal more readily than any neighbours.
1: Katie, my sister, who's laptop it is. It wouldn't surprise me in the slightest if there's a ton of cr*p and junk installed.
There are 10 kinds of people in the world - those who understand binary and those who don't...
As the right side of the brain controls the left side of the body, then only left-handers are in their right mind!
Google EULA
This might have come up if your sister uses Gmail and Google changed something.
A lot of people have their mail client come up at boot time. (guess: I don't). If the mail client can't connect at that point it may throw up other errors as well.
Otherwise... well, have fun herding cats.
Penny
You can always try
what I am getting fed up enough to try. 1) Get out the BFH or 2) a 40 cal mercy round right between its eyes (or two of those flashy lights they like to have.) ;)
Wireless Router
She might try to unplug the wireless router for 30 seconds, then plug it back in. I couldn't connect to our router and talked to a call center where english was NOT the first language. After 3 hours on the phone and many computer procedures, I was able to connect to the internet. The next day the problem appeared again. This prompted another call to the call center. A different tech told me to unplug, then plug it back in, problem solved. Now, if the electric blinks in a storm, the router and computer won't talk, so, I do the unplug thing and presto, back online. Also some laptops have a button on the front that get accidentally hit that turns off the wireless. My Compac has a button next to the power button, but my wife's Toshiba has a button that is located in the front that she will accidentally hit.
let me get this right ok?
Your sister left your technophobe mother home alone with her laptop and home network with a broadband connection and some notes on how to "use it"? Then your mother screws it up and calls you to help her "fix" it? Over the phone? And you are silly enough to try to help? And, your sister's laptop is running Vista obviously with "automatic updates" turned on?
That is really rich! It sounds like the intro to an Andy Rooney segment on 60 Minutes!
Geez, and I thought I had problems. The DVD drive quit in my partner's Toshiba laptop, and it's about to go out of warranty. I took it in to walk-in support yesterday and asked the tech just to verify that it really was the drive and not competing media players or something, before I shopped it. After a 30 minute lecture including the phrase "nothing lasts forever" (her laptop is not quite 3 years old) he said their first order of business would be to reinstall Windows and if that didn't fix it they'd forward it to a factory service center. So did I want to pay $60 for a backup (I already have one) and another $60 for Windows re-installation so I could collect my no deductible warranty? (hmmm...) So last night I figured, okay if it boots the recovery disc it's Windows & I can fix it myself right? Of course it didn't. I hope the guy is there today, I'll ask him how he's gonna reinstall windows using a dead drive 'cause I can't do it.
Dilbert to tech support: "I can't get on the network this morning."
Tech in Network Support: "I'm too busy to look at that right now. Send me an email."
Dilbert: "But I can't get to my email because I can't log in."
Tech:"Oh okay, log a trouble call over the internet."
Dilbert: "But..."
Carla
Ann