Rant: Helping people build PC's

[jman01pa]

A really good friend of mine asked me to "help" him build a pc and has since said some things that are eating at me.

How told me how much he wanted to spend and the kind of system he wanted.

I researched the parts (reviews and ratings). I researched the best online places and came up with a couple of quotes. I like to buy the bulk of a single system from the same place so if there is a problem it is easier to reference where it came from. I have quite a bit of time invested in this.

I met him at his house. I went over the system specs from the different vendors with him and decided on Newegg. A great choice. I walked him through ordering the parts and now all we had to do was wait for them to arrive.

While talking about his new system he was getting to the guys at his work he finds out that an XP 2000+ is not a 2.0 Ghz processor. He is perturbed and wanted to know why I didnt choose Intel. I had previously explained to him the difference between Intel and AMD and how the XP thing worked. He didn't get it. The guys at his work that make cardboard boxes apparantly knows more about computers than I do.

He also told me that he found some of the components on Pricewatch for cheaper prices and that he could have saved $50.00 or so bucks on a $700.00 system. I explained to him the benefit of buying from trusted vendors and not from the lowest priced vendors on Pricewatch. He still has $$$ in is head.

I am just really bothered at how much effort I have put into this and and he seems to go out of his way to prove he could have done better. I am suppose to go over there this afternoon and help him assemble it, load the OS and put the other stuff on there.

Maybe I am making more out of this than what there is. I have run ito this before when "helping" people. I think paying customers are a lot more appreciative.

Thanks for letting me rant. Feel free to comment or add rants of your own...

[Martoch]

Hi!


I don't have much time to post as my 5 yr old just finished his 2nd breakfast and wants me to play now (he woke me up at 4:40am today).

Anyway, I can SO MUCH appreciate what you're saying about helping friends out! My God, it's like we're living parallel lives in different locations as far as computers are concerned.

I've been through your exact situation before and all I can say is be firm early...I was "Mr. Nice Guy" for too long, putting up with more BS than I should have. Simply tell your buddy to either let you work your magic (I'm with you about the vendor issue as well) or ask the other guys at work to build his system. Don't even try to explain the AMD/Intel issue, I've tried that before...all I heard was, "Waah waah waah, why didn't you get me a Pentium 2 gig instead of this AMD 1.7?"
*sigh*

I feel your pain my friend, that's all I can say. I even had one guy ask me to use my own credit card to buy all of his stuff and he would just pay me cash after I ordered it. Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight.

[Martoch]

Here ya go: Read all about my frustrations on this matter!
http://www.techimo.com/forum/showthr...threadid=21877

[Knothead]

Yep, Martoch nailed it. Especially...

all I can say is be firm early...I was "Mr. Nice Guy" for too long, putting up with more BS than I should have. Simply tell your buddy to either let you work your magic (I'm with you about the vendor issue as well) or ask the other guys at work to build his system.

I guess it's human nature for people to ask for your expertise, and then start "second guessing" you.

Look at it this way, Jman...once he gets it rolling, he'll be happy, and maybe he'll learn more about computers, and realize what you did for him, and he'll be grateful.

ugh i know how you feel, i helped the neighbors get a new computer and whatnot. and i load it up with winxp works flawless. they bought a crappy lexmark combo printer and it doesn't work. and they complain to me!!!

First off they ask for my help to get a computer, then they go off and buy a printer combo a lexmark at that too! and now i have to figure out whats wrong with it.

[robin801]

i was thinking about building computers for a side job.

but after building a few for friends (at no cost to them) i found that it takes the fun out of building computers.

i sold one to a co-worker and he was satisfied with it until he talked to someone at work and decided he wanted tv-out.

well i told him ahead of time that it was my second system that i put together for myself that didn't have a agp slot and it had onboard video.

i only charged him 450. and he paid in installments.

so i feel compelled to upgrade to a different mobo and video card when he wants to upgrade.

so now i am more choicy about who i help with computer problems and building computers for.

thanks for listening

robin

[Brainchild]

I find it's much better to build it then sell it, no matter what the specs are.I've had the same problem in both computers and cars. They always know more than I do about it Yet they ask me, cause THEY DON"T KNOW HOWMakes no sense to me.

I do agree with Martoch, be firm from the start, a lot less problems

[brandon184]

I'm the same way... Now when people want my help, its my way or no way.

~ Brandon

[thekingofpain]

Ive done this many times with friends/neighbors---they will usually listen not knowing much, the worst thing is you are expected to provide LIFETIME technical support afterwards---" my AOL dont work!" Oh god...

[Brainchild]

the worst thing is you are expected to provide LIFETIME technical support afterwards--

Yup everytime

Sometimes you get lucky and they become a geek too

You can always tell them about TechIMO while you build the PC, then set it as the homepage