Having once again been very lax with the blog, here we are again. One of our clients had a computer that would not boot up - it was dead until it started to bleep in agony but with no video, so nothing could be seen. Colin decided that it needed a bit of a make up so he went to the pound shop to buy some very expensive tools!

These expensive tools were unfortunately of no avail. and there was no resurrection.

Othe jobs were to check a computer for infection, and to install AVG Anti Virus and to give helpful advice.

Back to Work

Having had a busy day.
We started by testing video cards that we had in stock - both were sent for recycling. Two computers needed some TLC. The hard disks were checked with the Checkdisk utility and AVG anti virus was installed and updated. Both seemed to be working at the end of the session.

Holidays

As I was in the caravan for almost the whole month of August (and I will be setting out in it again this afternoon) this blog has not been updated for some time. Spent the first half of the month in the National Eisteddfod in Mold helping to run the caravan site (1000 pitches)

We were very lucky with the weather as the caravan field had been flooded the week before we arrived, and we were very busy in the first few days moving all the pitches and reorganising the whole field. The whole week was however a complete success.

A Very Rushed Surgery

Today's surgery for me was rather a rushed affair, and I apologise for my rushed exit, and especially to Colin who had made me a very nice cup of coffee that had to be left suddenly so that I could go to sing with my choir in a wedding. Colin and Dai, under the watchful eye of Mike kept the surgery goung very efficiently.

This is a snap of the Pelenna Valley Male Voice Choir on their trip to Catalunia last year.

Having looked at the jobs that seem to be coming in to the surgery lately, we seem to be working a lot wit laptops, and most of the problems are software. It was interesting to see the little BBC video about the possibility of laptops for all. with interesting comments about ways to prevent problems - keeping moving parts to a minimum being a priority to prevent mechanical breakdown. (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6908946.stm)

What a day! What a month! Flaming June and July Came into the Centre nice and wet. Cup of coffee first then the first problem was an old parallel port printer that could not be connected to a modern laptop. the ideal solution, unfortunately seemed to be a new printer, as a printer could be obtained cheaper than the adaptor cable. We are still working on a laptop that will not start. At the moment things do not look too good as the hard disk seems to be somewhat corrupt.

What's a Floppy Disk?

We have a rather difficult problem which has taken us some research to possibly resolve.

One problem with old motherboards is that they are unable to recognise hard disk drives above a certain level. One way to get over this is to put on a "cap" jumper. The motherboard should then recognise the HDD but its capacity would be limited to the maximum allowed by the motherboard. We thought that it would be necessary to update the BIOS, and to do this we needed to use a floppy disk (whatever that is - I think I have some vague memory of things like that!!)

The actual problem was, however far more complex, and to date has not yet been resolved.

Other problems this week were a set of disappearing shortcuts and a problem with installing a new printer.

Back again

I have been very remiss about this blog of late!

Today we were as usual very busy. The first job was to try to revive a computer found on a skip. Attempts were made to install XP, but without much success as we write!

The next job was far more successful. A very slow E-Machines computer was brought in. We suspected a bad virus infection, but the easiest way to sort this out was to backup all documents and then reinstall XP. This was done succesfully and the computer was then running as new. An important point, however, was that there was no anti virus program on the computer, and Service Pack 2 was no longer installed. This would have to be done by the customer.

Finally, Dai installed Service Pack 2 on another computer, and a wireless router was re-installed, again this seemed to work well.

Spring Clean!?

Mid morning we were faced by the dreaded Blue Screen, and a computer refusing to boot up properly

Was it

• The Power supply?



• The Hard Disk?



• Memory?
  


• Anything else???
  

Power seemed OK, so the Ultimate Boot CD was employed. Even this caused problems so we looked at the processer, which seemed by now hot enough to cook lunch which was fast approaching. On removing the cooling fan for the processor, this is what we found and then did.

Before:



After

Back again after Half Term

Very busy today. Saw Margaret who we met two weeks ago with the very nice Mac in the Doctors surgery - very happy with the computer, but still needs to connect to the internet.
Left that surgery with my medication to go to the PC surgery.

When I arrived, found Steve hard at work on a computer which had no power, but Colin seemed to be the one really lumbered with the job of sorting out the connections but he was not the one caught on camera - or at least my phone!

Dai was taught how to Install Dreamweaver on computers in Ammanford from the comfort of his seat in Glynneath. This really was interesting, and had saved Nicky a long trip as well as saving the class in Ammanford.

Busy time today once again, Margaret wanted to set up her new Mac - Very nice! but to us a learning curve as it was the first time to try out a Mac - could possibly be converted.

Colin was kept busy installing a PCI USB2 card which really helped the transfer of data. The customers left feeling happy, and we could have a well deserved cup of coffee, as Boss Mike had to go off to college early.

In The Dove

Very busy day at the dove to-day, having a plant sale,which is taking alot of hard work by the staff. preparing and setting out the plant`s

Dental Problems

Sorry there were no comments about the surgery last Friday, as my gum infection now seems to have developed into an abscess, so I had to make rather a rushed visit to the dentist in Neath!!

After another week of antibiotics, this seems to be clearing (I hope!!!)

Thanks

Thank you for your very nice comments about us Debbie!

Further Problems

Dai had a difficult job sorting out the sound and video and needed
to download up to date drivers for the graphics card. At least we had a chance to have a cup of coffee kindly supplied by Steve.
None of the downloaded drivers worked, so we suspected problems in the hard disc. New drivers caused the dreaded BLUE SCREEN. HELP!!! Checkdisc was run to try to improve matters, and problem left with Nicky.

This is getting boring, and Nicky is getting hungry!!

Another Hard(!!!) Day's Work

Today we need to sort out Catherine's computer by sorting out its anti-virus which was out of date. Colin and steve loaded free AVG anti virus and AdAware. There was a problem with loading software for a Walkman MP3 player which was not charged. Debbie came to see us and help with the Blog as well as to check up on us. Her blog has been added to the links.


Nicky at the Helm

LUNCH

Nicky is now very happy to go for his lunch.

Friday - after the Election

Busy day today after recovering from the whole night looking at Television for the Assembly results. Windows XP was re installed to a computer which had been badly infected with viruses, which was a salutary reminder to all of us to have an up to date Virus Checker installed.

Connecting a computer that has been brought into the centre to the Internet can be an absolute nightmare, and it makes it difficult to verify settings, anyway we're here to help!! Nick is now very worried about missing his lunch.

12:40 The computer which was brought in is now open having another hard disc fitted - Nick is now getting paranoid about his dinner