(no subject)

[bzarcher]

In the past 2 days:

1) Got -literally- screamed at because someone asked me for suggestions on building a new computer, I put together a build for him, and what I sent him was unacceptable because "It wasn't nearly expensive enough."

2) Got bitched out by someone at work (from another team) because we implemented a password self-service tool that makes him do -less work-.

Conclusion: Stop doing nice things for people. It apparently isn't worth it.

Comments

[martinhesselius.livejournal.com]

Got -literally- screamed at because someone asked me for suggestions on building a new computer, I put together a build for him, and what I sent him was unacceptable because "It wasn't nearly expensive enough."

*Blink*
Y'know, I need to upgrade my main system...

[bzarcher.livejournal.com]

Well, see what you think of this and decide if I'm too much of a cheapskate.

Power Supply
Hard drive (Two of these babies)
CPU
RAM (2 sets of these, too)
Motherboard
Sound card (Totally optional. On board sound's a lot better than it used to be, and frankly, I've been using a USB headset (with it's own sound driver) a lot lately so I can do vent and such, and it's just fine too.)
Ze DVD Burnah.
Video Card (Also X2, to be run in SLI)
Vista (sadly, but OTOH it lets you really use all that tasty, tasty RAM)
And a case.

Oh, and if you're bored with your monitor, try That.

At the time, with some Newegg sales codes for the holiday, that came in under $1,300 for the entire build and $300 for the monitor. But apparently if I'm not spending $5,000 it must suck.

[buschap.livejournal.com]

Jeez. My MythTV box didn't cost much more than that power supply ;)

I have one of those "X-Fi" cards, cause I wanted a PCI Express card, as I had limited PCI slots. But it's not really an X-Fi card, it's a rebadged ... Audigy LS, I think. And I couldn't get it to work with Linux, so I went with Turtle Beach, and found a PCI Express HDTV card.

But I didn't get around to returning it in time, so, blah.

[martinhesselius.livejournal.com]

Nice!

[bzarcher.livejournal.com]

Yeah, not shocking. OTOH, your MythTV box didn't need to drive this much heat. :D

The X-Fi/LS doesn't shock me too much - long as it works. And like I said, I just included it as an option for the person I originally put this together for because I didn't know what they wanted in that regard.

[bzarcher.livejournal.com]

Thanks - glad to know someone doesn't think it was a waste of time, anyhow.

[psywildfire.livejournal.com]

Not expensive enough?

...

...WOW.

Okay, so here's what you do. Say you're going to go back and make a new build. Keep it the exact same, but inflate the prices.

Call it the jagoff tax and keep it for yourself.

Because seriously. They're gonna be THAT much of a douchebag about it they deserve it.

-WF

[bzarcher.livejournal.com]

No, no. I'm just not going to do jack shit for him, and if I get a call from the 513 area code for the next, I don't know, year, I'm not answering the phone.

He was also pissed off because his fiancee had messed up something on his current PC, but he didn't want to take it to a geek squad or another local PC repair place because "Tech guys will snoop around. They never just do what you tell them to do."

In retrospect, I'm impressed that I just said goodbye and hung up the phone instead of spiking it into the floor. Maybe anger management is working!

[buschap.livejournal.com]

Under Windows, it'll work, but it won't have the Crystalizer things that the X-Fi does, at least not in hardware (I think it does some of them in software).

But it's a good way to inflate the price a bit.

For me, it was a matter of needing optical out to avoid a ground loop.

[bzarcher.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that's true enough.

I forgot about the optical out - good point.

[psywildfire.livejournal.com]

True, that's the better thing to do.

Still, it's what he DESERVES.

Let's just say this: I deal with cranky people on a regular basis and one of my favorite ways of dealing with the stress is figuring out how I can make them feel like they're superior when in reality they're getting jerked over.

-WF

[bzarcher.livejournal.com]

We'll see.

Supposedly this person is my friend. I have no idea if that's still the case, or if I want it to still be the case.

[flying-landon.livejournal.com]

I'd just laugh at him and say "It's obvious you need someone else to build your system for you, if you're basing computer performance purely on price."

[bzarcher.livejournal.com]

That, or "Buy Dell."

[kaote.livejournal.com]

Heheh, #1 reminds me of a dear guildie of mine who has the BEST PROCESSOR AND VIDEO CARDS on the market, but for the life of you can't tell you what they are. I think he went shopping with his dad and the sales guy sold him OMG THE BEST COMPUTAAARRRR AVAILABLE and he likes to remind people of that. I once asked him whether he was using DSL or cable to connect, and he said "wireless".

He's about 16 or 17, so it's excusable and kind of cute.

[bzarcher.livejournal.com]

Yeah, the difference is this guy is 30 and an asshole.

[alathaniel.livejournal.com]

I think this says it all.

[bzarcher.livejournal.com]

Hah!