Where do you go to ask for support?

A lot of the time I look for answers or ask questions here, if a Google search or the program's documentation doesn't provide an answer.

Usually to forums, and you go to the right one for the right task:

Generic hardware problems: PCHardwareForum
nVidia problems: nZone
PocketPC/Windows Mobile Help: PocketMatrix
Gaming: Gamespy's ForumPlanet
Everything else: Usenet (that great under-utilised tool and dinosaur of the ARPANet era)
For answers in a quick, but not necessarily the most helpful: Something Awful's Serious Hardware / Software Crap board.

Another really useful site I've happened accross was EventID.net - effing godsend! Why isn't Microsoft's support site searchable like this?

Experts-Exchange is good, so long as you patch your cookies so you get the answers without having to sign up, I don't really understand how their business model even works.

I get a lot of "free" information from "subscriber only" websites that make all their information available to Google but not regular users (for which you have to pay), simply change your UA string and you're in. Stupidest. Protection System. Ever.

And blogs are only of any help when they have articles covering my problem. Interestingly enough, the first blog I read regularly was after searching for a solution to a problem (albiet, not a technical one)

google
google groups
c9
friends/coworkers in IM

With google and so much user feedback on product sites I rarely have to post anymore.

In a rough order:

support.microsoft.com
Google/Live search
Product team blogs/support sites
Other blogs
Reference books
Usenet groups

i use irc alot.  There is a tonne of great networks to get help from, #windows95 on dalnet, alot of coding channels on freenode.

If microsoft offered a good online real person technical help facility where perhaps you'd pay $1-3 per query that'd be really useful as i find being able to chat over the internet rather than by phone much better.  however i suppose you'd have to develop it so that if you need to reboot you can get back to the same agent you were with.

Jaz wrote:

If microsoft offered a good online real person technical help facility where perhaps you'd pay $1-3 per query that'd be really useful as i find being able to chat over the internet rather than by phone much better.  however i suppose you'd have to develop it so that if you need to reboot you can get back to the same agent you were with.

Well yeah, isn't phone support like $45 per incident or something equally extortionate?

Email support isn't any cheaper. Methinks consumer law needs to be changed: customers need more than 2 "complimentary" support incidents to last the life of a product. 5 is the absolute minimum, around 7 is more appropriate.

Of course, with an OEM system things get different, to my knowledge Microsoft imposes no minimum standards on OEMs, they can get away with providing no support, or charging more than Microsoft.

Here's a little bit of irony: it's cheaper to buy an OEM Windows XP Professional and a 5-incident pack than it is to buy a retail XP Professional box with 2 incidents. The price difference is less pronounced in the states (you guys get XP Pro almost a third cheaper than us) but it's still cheaper.

SlackmasterK wrote:



zian wrote: Dell, I'm talking about you and your grammar-less chat agents

zian wrote: If the fatal error is caught by Microsoft's Error catcher and there is additional help from OAC and the help is relevent, then I follow it's instructions. If there's no improvement, then I follow the steps I wrote earlier.

If we're going to be technical about grammar, you should note that "it's" is a conjunction equivalent to "it is". Would you say "I follow it is instructions"?

I put my quotational punctuation on the outside of quotes unless they're part of the quote, because I believe popular grammar to be incorrect in this matter.

If we're going to be technical about grammar, you should note that "it's" is a contraction, not a conjunction.  A conjunction is a word such as "and" or "but" and connects two words, phrases, or clauses.

Haven't you watched Schoolhouse Rock?

zian wrote:

Dell, I'm talking about you and your grammar-less chat agents

zian wrote:

If the fatal error is caught by Microsoft's Error catcher and there is additional help from OAC and the help is relevent, then I follow it's instructions. If there's no improvement, then I follow the steps I wrote earlier.

If we're going to be technical about grammar, you should note that "it's" is a contraction equivalent to "it is". Would you say "I follow it is instructions"?

I put my quotational punctuation on the outside of quotes unless they're part of the quote, because I believe popular grammar to be incorrect in this matter.

CannotResolveSymbol wrote:

A conjunction is a word such as "and" or "but" and connects two words, phrases, or clauses.

Haven't you watched Schoolhouse Rock?

Touché; I just wanted to be a smartass and apparently failed. Coincidentally, I blogged about Grammatical vs Programatic correctness when deciding where to punctuate quotations (link). Thoughts?

SlackmasterK wrote:



CannotResolveSymbol wrote: A conjunction is a word such as "and" or "but" and connects two words, phrases, or clauses. Haven't you watched Schoolhouse Rock?

Touché; I just wanted to be a smartass and apparently failed. Coincidentally, I blogged about Grammatical vs Programatic correctness when deciding where to punctuate quotations (link). Thoughts?

Language isn't programming--  if there's a punctuation mark inside the quotation mark, putting another punctuation mark outside is redundant.

CannotResolveSymbol wrote:


Language isn't programming--  if there's a punctuation mark inside the quotation mark, putting another punctuation mark outside is redundant.

I think of it as being like @"int.parse(DatabaseObject.ToString());".

Hi, me lookin at theze komon sites...

answers.yahoo.com
c9
projectw.org
p2p.wrox.com

1. The product's help manual
2. If it's not a Microsoft problem, then I go to step 4
3. A search on www.microsoft.com
4. A search engine (http://www.clusty.com)
5. If it's a hardware issue, I look at the manufacturer's website and forums (if it exists)
6. I give up and uninstall the product

Looks like a QBasic program.

Edit: I forgot about the Microsoft Error catcher.

If the fatal error is caught by Microsoft's Error catcher and there is additional help from OAC and the help is relevant, then I follow its instructions. If there's no improvement, then I follow the steps I wrote earlier.

Edit: If it's a hardware problem and the hardware is under warranty, then I bug their support people (and Dell, I'm talking about you and your grammar-less chat agents).

This post has been edited to correct grammar and spelling mistakes.

slackmasterk wrote:

If we're going to be technical about grammar, you should note that "it's" is a contraction equivalent to "it is". Would you say "I follow it is instructions"?

I put my quotational punctuation on the outside of quotes unless they're part of the quote, because I believe popular grammar to be incorrect in this matter.

Thanks for catching my grammar mistake.

No, my AP English Literature teacher and I think you're wrong.

By the way, contraction is usually a noun. You should have used contractional. You also missed a misspelling (alliteration intended).

zian wrote:

Thanks for catching my grammar mistake.

No, my AP English Literature teacher and I think you're wrong.

By the way, contraction is usually a noun. You should have used contractional. You also missed a misspelling (alliteration intended).

So your teacher and you think "it's" was correct, or you think I'm wrong about the literal string translation?

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