People that request personal tech support

[CrazyTPFan]

If their is one thing that bothers me is when people bother me about personal tech support. I was on reddit today browsing r/ThinkPad and a message popped up. It was this guy who expected me to know about how to tighten the R400's hinges because I use one. Who does he think I am? His free go to tech support whenever he has a issue? I told him I know nothing about what he asked and have not recived a reply back. Is it really that hard to just look it up and find it out for yourself? Or, are people just to lazy to to it themself's .

I don't know how to tighten the hinges and I don't know if you should buy new ones.

Thats what I told him because I'm not going to let him use me as free tech suport.

[Thinkpad4by3]

If their is one thing that bothers me is when people bother me about personal tech support. I was on reddit today browsing r/ThinkPad and a message popped up. It was this guy who expected me to know about how to tighten the R400's hinges because I use one. Who does he think I am? His free go to tech support whenever he has a issue? I told him I know nothing about what he asked and have not recived a reply back. Is it really that hard to just look it up and find it out for yourself? Or, are people just to lazy to to it themself's .

I don't know how to tighten the hinges and I don't know if you should buy new ones.

Thats what I told him because I'm not going to let him use me as free tech suport.

May introduce you to the concept on laziness, a condition where someone doesn't do something properly in favor of getting an easy way out or not doing it at all. Some people possess this trait more than others. There are a lot of people on the internet. The internet contains some very lazy people. Sometimes those lazy people decide that you are their easy way out and they ask you.

So you ask, "what can you do about it?!?"

Well 1: don't answer them so they don't come back
and 2: do what ajkula66 does...write a big sign that says "PMs requesting personal tech support will be ignored."

I don't think you should have wrote that [your quote here], more along the lines of "I am not free tech support, I will not answer your question and do not PM me again about tech support." I think by saying I don't know about hinges kind of opens a box like you know things about R500s that he can get answers out of you for.

Just my 0.02$

[TPFanatic]

I appreciate reading through the experiences and gaining knowledge from the conclusions drawn from other users' time, effort, and money spent on ThinkPad projects, to be shared for the Internet to benefit. I admire this. That said, my participation on this forum (and the subreddit) is out of my free time and my primary motivation is indeed personal recreation, then growth in knowledge, and at times I'd like to think I have some knowledge in ThinkPad and general laptop support to share as well. All I can end up sharing is general service tips, extravagant theories, and photo galleries. But with admiration for those who give and wanting to give back kept in mind, when I have been asked for technical support I have responded in the interest of helping.

That said it's impossible to tighten the R400 hinges. R400 actually uses the same hinges and entire lid as T400. Replacing the hinges is only a temporary solution, of course, since they all develop play with use.

[GrifterGuru]

I have been in the same position a number of times and where it is a request from someone I do not know, I simply reply with "Google is your best friend" or completely ignore them.

Everything has a learning curve. If people want to shortcut that via laziness, then they will soon find a brick wall. OTOH, if people do a little research, can not find the answer, then ask about the issue, detailing that they have tried to find the answer biut could not, then that is a different kettle-of-fish, providing they do it in the right way, in the appropriate place, instead of picking on one individual who appears to know "something" about "X device"....

[Cigarguy]

Easy enough to ignore those people. Having said that ajkula66, RBS, and TuuS have been my personal tech guys over the years by simply reading their posts. The few times I PM them they have been nothing but classy and helpful.

[CrazyTPFan]

Well 1: don't answer them so they don't come back
and 2: do what ajkula66 does...write a big sign that says "PMs requesting personal tech support will be ignored."

I can't say PMs requesting personal tech support will be ignored because I'm on reddit. But, If I ever get a PM requesting tech support on this forum I will do so.

[MikalE]

I get calls every week asking for free tech support. I tell them to bring in the system as I don't do phone diagnostics.

$35.00 for the first hour.

[Thinkpad4by3]

I get calls every week asking for free tech support. I tell them to bring in the system as I don't do phone diagnostics.

$35.00 for the first hour.

I get calls from tech support every once in a while. I fire up my IBM PC 5150 and let them try and fix that.
"What do you see on the screen"
"An orange C:/>"
"Can you see the desktop?"
"What's a desktop?"
...
"Yeah can you look in the lower left hand corner"
"I see F5"
"No no no not there in the lower left hand corner"
"Yeah I see F5"
..from here he went on a rant on how I need to go see a doctor and I'm crazy

All because he didn't know about the XT keyboard layout

[mpcook]

As I was reading and scrolling through these posts, I started laughing and accidentally got a smear of yogurt and a few tiny pieces of granola in the scroll wheel of my mouse. How should I fix this? It is a Microsoft Mouse Model# 3500. The yogurt was organic, as was the granola...

[GrifterGuru]

[snip]How should I fix this? [/snip]

By not doing it in the first place perhaps?

[mpcook]

[snip]How should I fix this? [/snip]

By not doing it in the first place perhaps?

Well, I shoulda hada burger for lunch instead.

[GrifterGuru]

To be honest, when I have "fouled up" (being polite here) with something like that, I have unplugged then stripped the mouse and doused it in/with IPA. I buy the stuff by the gallon since I use so much, so cleaning a mouse is nothing in comparison....

[Thinkpad4by3]

To be honest, when I have "fouled up" (being polite here) with something like that, I have unplugged then stripped the mouse and doused it in/with IPA. I buy the stuff by the gallon since I use so much, so cleaning a mouse is nothing in comparison....

According to Thinkpad law #564 section 42: every Thinkpadder must have isopropyl alcohol on hand at all times.

Clearly you abide by it just as much as I do

[GrifterGuru]

Aye, My T420 gets at least a dozen wipe downs a day since it is my daily machine at the moment. Once I rebuild it though, that will change and my My X220 will be my main machine for a while post-rebuild, whilst I get the T430 how I want it.

Then I have the L412, the Latitude e5500 for an emergency, my Q1-Ultra tiny tablet for surfing, oh, and my X31 needs sorting too, if I can ever get it to power up (I miss using my MoGo mouse)!!

[Thinkpad4by3]

Aye, My T420 gets at least a dozen wipe downs a day since it is my daily machine at the moment. Once I rebuild it though, that will change and my My X220 will be my main machine for a while post-rebuild, whilst I get the T430 how I want it.

Then I have the L412, the Latitude e5500 for an emergency, my Q1-Ultra tiny tablet for surfing, oh, and my X31 needs sorting too, if I can ever get it to power up (I miss using my MoGo mouse)!!

I just looked up MoGo mouse. I think I'm going to drill a hole in the side of my laptop now for it.

[GrifterGuru]

MoGo Mouse sits in the 54mm express card slot out of the way. Great to have when you want to take a mouse with you when on the go. Easily portable and sized to perfectly fit the express slot for storage and charging, which is a bonus

You may need a BT USB adapter though, as I did on the X31, if you do not have native BT on the machine.

A word of caution though, MoGo takes a couple of hours of use to fully get used to it. Once you are though, well, you'll wonder why you never had one before. You'll also want a cover of sorts for the port end of it that nestles into your palm. Best to avoid getting crud in the small ports

[TonyJZX]

1st thing everyone should be doing is reading the HMM for you model.

This is good for 99% of issues.

But I know few people want to go to this trouble.

[GrifterGuru]

1st thing everyone should be doing is reading the HMM for you model.

This is good for 99% of issues.

But I know few people want to go to this trouble.

That ^^^^ Is why I have all the HMM's relative to my TP units stored on an external HDD, along with the M$ drivers for the relative O/S I run....

[MikalE]

As do I. Plus a few for machines I've worked on for others.

[CrazyTPFan]

I just looked up MoGo mouse. I think I'm going to drill a hole in the side of my laptop now for it.

What laptop do you plan on using it with, That is if your actually going to use it. I can't tell if your for real or not.

[Thinkpad4by3]

I just looked up MoGo mouse. I think I'm going to drill a hole in the side of my laptop now for it.

What laptop do you plan on using it with, That is if your actually going to use it. I can't tell if your for real or not.

I'm not. The trackpoint serves me well .

[ajkula66]

The trackpoint serves me well .

Amen to that...

[Thinkpad4by3]

The trackpoint serves me well .

Amen to that...

Funny enough I actually found a use for having both the trackpoint AND the touchpad.

CAD work. I need panning and zooming functionality at the same time, so I pan with the middle click, and I set the trackpad to zoom and I can do both easily. It is impossible without a mouse or either pointing device alone.

And of course, Fusion 360 uses both non-changeable mouse combinations and clunky on-screen buttons, and there was no way I'd get anything done using the on-screen buttons.

Thank you Thinkpad(haha, 2005 calls and says hi, and those machines didn't have UltraNav as far as I remember)

(I have found a few other uses, as it works better for scrolling and zooming and clicking links every one and a while, but real mouse work gets done with a real pointing device)

[CrazyTPFan]

What laptop do you plan on using it with, That is if your actually going to use it. I can't tell if your for real or not.

I'm not. The trackpoint serves me well .

In my opinion the TrackPoint is better than any pointing device on the market. Although, I would use a mouse to play games