As I recounted in Part 1, last Thursday I spent an hour and a half on the phone with HP Tech Support in an effort to get a video card with a defective fan replaced under the on-site service plan for which we paid $169 when we bought the computer a couple of months ago.  The tech was scheduled to come yesterday (Monday, July 20th) between 1300 and 1700. The box with the new video card arrived in the morning. To make it easier for the tech, we lugged the computer, monitor, and input devices into the kitchen and set them up on the big counter. I postponed the errands that I needed to take care of, to stay home and wait for the tech. And wait. And wait.

Nobody ever showed up. Nobody called to reschedule. When it was obvious, three hours past the scheduled timeframe, that no one was coming, I gave in. Okay, I’d put the card in myself.

Or maybe not. Opening the case was easy. Taking out the old video card was easy. Then I opened up the box that had been delivered that morning and took out the new video card. Umm, there’s a slight discrepancy here. The new card was about twice as large as the old one.

I had read the model number from my original invoice to the tech support person on the phone: Radeon HD 4350. That was the model of the card that I took out of the computer. The new card they sent was a 4850. As is obvious from the photo, it’s not only bigger; it’s a better card. It has a gig of video memory, whereas the original had only 512 MB. I looked both up on the web and the new one costs about $100 more. I would have thought that it was really nice of them to send an upgraded card. Except … it won’t fit in the case.

Believe me, I tried. I unbundled the cables to try to move them to make room. I maneuvered it this way and that, trying to coax it into the allotted space. It just wasn’t going to happen. The case isn’t all that small, but the inside is plenty crowded, as you can see in the photo on the right.

So … we have a better video card, but no way to use it in this computer. We did come up with a solution: take one of the (smaller sized) Radeons out of the Dell XPS and put it in the HP, and put this new card in the XPS. Overall, I guess we come out ahead – or at least the Dell does. I’ve already spent at least $400 worth of my time on this (not counting the annoyance of being stuck here waiting for half a day) and I’m not inclined to go through the whole telephone dance all over again.

I can’t fault HP’s basic warranty service. They replaced the part – with something better (albeit something better that doesn’t work for the purpose for which it was sent). But after this fiasco, I certainly can’t recommend buying their on-site service plan. Save $169, because apparently you’re going to end up installing the parts yourself anyway.

Oh, and another thing: the box in which the new card arrived was battered and squashed. The card itself was damaged – the edge of the bracket was bent (see the photo on the left). This shouldn’t have any effect on its operation and is easily bent back with a pair of pliers, but it’s just one more example of carelessness and lack of customer service, this time probably on the part of the delivery service. 

Since Part 1 of this post was published, I’ve gotten a number of messages from readers who told me about their (mostly bad, but some good) experiences with HP tech support. I won’t say my experience was typical, but based on that mail, it certainly wasn’t unique. We still love the systems, but we aren’t very impressed with HP’s customer service. For us, this was an aggravation, though not a huge big deal. For someone else, who only had the one computer and who didn’t know how to install the components and didn’t have another computer sitting around to swap parts with, it would have been much worse.

deb@shinder.net   www.debshinder.com

Some folks are eagerly awaiting the day when we can do all computer input by simply talking to our computers. I’m not so enthusiastic. I can see where voice input would be handy in certain circumstances (for example, for hands-free computing while driving) but for everyday tasks, I don’t see it being workable. For one thing, the world would be an even noiser place than it already is, if we were all talking to our computers all the time. Whenever I fly, I look around and see half the people in the plane quietly tap, tap, tapping on their laptop keyboards. Can you imagine what a nightmare it would be if they were all talking to their systems? And how do I keep my computer from responding to the voice commands that the guy seated next to me is giving to his computer?

Besides, I like keyboards. I like the feel of the keys under my fingers. I like the different sounds made by different ones, from near silence to hearty clacking. I like to “think with my fingers” – content that I compose by dictation isn’t nearly as good. It helps that I’m a fast touch typist – around 90 wpm – so I don’t have to think about the typing itself; I can just let the words flow.

But I am always in search of the perfect keyboard. I remember when I got my first ergonomic keyboard back in 1995. I thought I’d died and gone to heaven. The wrist and thumb pains I’d been experiencing went away, and I found that after a few days of practice, I could type faster on the “funny looking” keyboard than on a conventional straight one. I’ve been using ergo keyboards ever since.

Back in January of this year, I blogged about my latest keyboard find, the Microsoft Laser 6000 wireless.

I’ve been using it on my Dell XPS and I like it a lot, although it has since been superseded by the Laser 7000. As far as I can tell, the main selling point for the latter is the 2.4 GHz frequency with a 30 foot range.

I had a nice little inexpensive Microsoft USB keyboard that I was using on the new Core i7. A Comfort Curve 2000, it only cost $20 and has a similar low profile and a good feel, but it had a problem: the colon/semicolon key didn’t work. That was an annoyance (especially when I wanted to send a smiley) but I could live with it. Then the “r” key stopped working. Okay, I might be able to live without a : but not without an r. It was time to order a new keyboard. I thought about getting a new Cpmfort Curve, but was afraid that the old “you get what you pay for” adage would mean that keys would stop working on that one shortly, too. I also thought about getting another Laser 6000, but I wanted to check out some other options.

I’ve always wanted one of those completely split keyboards, the kind that allow you to arrange the two sides at whatever angle you want. I’d never bought one because they usually cost around $200 or more. On Amazon, though, I found a Kinesis Freestyle that got good reviews and was only $89. I decided to give it a try, and it arrived a few days ago.

It’s far funnier looking than that first ergo keyboard, but so far, I like it pretty well. It’s nice to be able to adjust the angle of one hand differently from that of the other. It’s larger than I expected, and the keys are a little “clackier” than I prefer but overall it’s a good fit. It took a couple of days of getting used to. At first I kept hitting the Function key instead of the CTRL key, which then changed the UIOJKLM keys into number keys. This is a handy setting because, like a laptop, it doesn’t have a separate number pad. At first I wasn’t sure if that would be a problem, but I’m beginning to miss having the real number pad. Luckily, there are dozens out there for laptops, so I plan to buy a separate USB number pad to go with it.

I also somewhat miss a few of the special keys on the Microsoft keyboards that let me open my email program or browser from the keyboard. However, that’s not a big deal. There is a nice little “right click” key that lets you bring up the context menu without using the mouse, as well as Cut, Copy and Paste keys and a Search key that brings up the Windows search box. There are a few browser specific keys, too: Home, Back and Forward. And of course it has the usual Home, End, Page Up, Page Down and arrow keys. Something I like a lot is that there are two Delete keys, one on each side of the keyboard.

Which do I like better, then: the Laser 6000 or the Kinesis? That’s hard to say. Since the Kinesis is USB, I don’t have to worry about batteries, and I like that. On the other hand, I can take the Laser 6000 off the desk and put it on my lap, if I want, unconstrained by wires. They’re both good keyboards – but neither one is perfect. So I’ll still be on the lookout for that Perfect Keyboard … and when I do find it, you can be sure I’ll be blogging about it.

deb@shinder.net    www.debshinder.com

Since we got the pair of new Core i7 computers at the end of May, we’ve been quite happy with them. Then yesterday, I walked into the room where Tom’s lives (not his office; he remotes into it … don’t ask) and wondered “what’s that awful noise?” It sounded like a 747 taking off – or rather, trying to take off and not quite making it. One of the nicest things about these computers was that they were so quiet, so what in the world was going on? I got down close and listened and it was pretty obviously a fan making the noise.

I would normally just open up the case and start troubleshooting – but we had bought an on-site repair service plan with these machines and I wasn’t sure whether opening the case would void the warranty, so I got out the paperwork to start the support process. I also figured it would be a good opportunity to assess HP’s support service. We’ve purchased five HPs over the last couple of years but we’ve never needed to use their support service so I was curious as to how it compared to Dell’s (which we had used a couple of times over the years).

The documentation advised to start the process by going to the support web site. Well, I quickly found that there was nothing there for me. There were numerous forums and such but they dealt mainly with software problems. I don’t need help with software problems; I can fix software. This was obviously a hardware problem. So I reluctantly turned to the second step, the support phone number. Reluctantly because I have difficulty hearing over the phone anyway, and I figured first level support was going to be someone with a thick accent, which would make it that much more difficult for me to understand.

Of course I had to go through voicemail hell before I could talk to a real person. And this was the especially annoying type, where you have to talk to the damn machine instead of keying in your choices. I always feel like an idiot doing that, especially when the stupid thing can’t understand me. But we got past that and I got a support tech. Yes, he had an accent but (thank goodness) it wasn’t bad and I could understand him pretty well. I only had to ask “Pardon? Could you repeat that?” about five times during the call. Given the length of the call, that really wasn’t as bad as it sounds. And he was very polite, even when I got impatient.

We spent about ten minutes with the preliminaries – my name and information, the serial number and product number, the machine’s specs, etc. etc. I explained the problem and offered to turn the machine on so he could hear it over the phone, which I did. He then had me open the case (I have to give kudos to HP here – this was one of the easiest to open cases I’ve encountered in a long time) and identify each of the fans. It was obvious that the sound wasn’t coming from the power supply fan, but the other two fans – main case fan and video card fan – were close together so it was hard to tell which was making the noise. He had me do a pencil test of the video card fan (stopping it) and the sound ceased. Let it go and it spun back up and the sound started again. Yep, that was the culprit.

Okay, you’d think from here it should be pretty simple, no? We have a defective video card fan that needs to be replaced. Unfortunately, he then insisted that I turn the computer on and run the system diagnostics to see if there was anything wrong with anything else. So we go through that, and by the time it’s finished (everything passed with flying colors) we’ve been on the phone for an hour. I thought at this point we could wrap it up, but I was mistaken. Now he had to “document all this.” So he stops talking and I’m sitting there on the phone, waiting. After ten minutes or so of silence, I asked “are you still there?” He assures me he is. I ask for a ticket number; my big fear at this point is that we’ll get cut off and I’ll have to go through all this all over again. I feel a little better with a number to reference if that happens.

However, the phone systems on both ends prove to be reliable, although every five minutes or so I feel compelled to check and make sure we’re still connected. He always come back with “I’m so sorry it’s taking so long; thank you for your patience.” After we’d been on the phone for an hour and twenty minutes, that patience was wearing thin. He had a problem “finding” the record for my on-site service plan. The Service Plan Certificate they sent has several different numbers on it; we try all of them before finally hitting the right one. At last he tells me he has the documentation done – but he “doesn’t have the authority” to order the new part so now he has to talk to his supervisor. Grrrrr. He goes away again, for about ten minutes. Then a lady comes on the phone, with a thicker accent than the man’s. Oh joy. She goes over everything that the guy told her, apparently, confirming what he had me do. Then she wants me to power up the computer again – huh? What for? I’m starting to get a tiny bit hostile at that point. She tells me she needs to do that to find out what model the video card is. Well, hell, I have that right here on the invoice; I don’t have to power up the computer for that. We get that out of the way and she says okay, they will give me a replacement video card, and “You feel comfortable putting that in yourself, right?”

Well, yeah, I’ve put in heaven knows how many video cards in my time, I’ve built entire computers, but my comfort level is not the issue. We paid for an on-site service plan whereby a technician comes and does that for you. I remind her of that. Oh, okay. I guess she forgot. But to her credit, she doesn’t argue, but schedules it for Monday (this happened on Thursday). Dell always came out the same or next day – but I’m not going to quibble. The Plan does say 3 business days. Total time spent on the phone: an hour and thirty-eight minutes. Based on my usual billable rates, it would have been cheaper for me to just order a new video card from NewEgg and install it myself. But it’s the principle of the thing.

I’m not bashing HP here. It could have been a lot worse. Everyone was polite and apologetic and they ended up agreeing to give me what I wanted and what we had paid for. They didn’t talk down to me like some phone techs do. They were thorough – way thorough – and made sure to double check every fact, every number that they gave me or I gave them, etc. The process wasn’t as painful as some phone support experiences I’ve had; it was just way too long.  If their service wasn’t as prompt as Dell’s, well, we paid hundreds of dollars less than for the same system configuration from Dell, too. Do I still enthusiastically recommend that you buy from HP? I’ll withhold judgment on that, pending the outcome of the service tech’s call on Monday. Stay tuned for Part 2.

P.S. Today I got an emailed shipment notification showing that the video card they’re sending has 1 GB of memory. The original card has 512 MB. The model number is the same. Okay, that’s sort of nice; we get double the RAM for our trouble. Er, my trouble. Hmm. I did all the work on this, and Tom gets the new, better video card. Doesn’t seem fair somehow.

deb@shinder.net    www.debshinder.com

The Technical Preview for Office 2010 was officially released today, and I installed it as soon as I got the invitation. This was the fastest and smoothest installation of Microsoft Office that I’ve ever experienced. Installing in a Windows 7 VM on Virtual PC, the initial setup took only a few minutes (as in “less than five”).

Here’s the trick: the programs apparently aren’t really completely installed just because they appear in your Start menu. When I opened Word, a balloon pop-up informed me that the program may appear to be unresponsive while it gets the files it needs. In fact, the virtual application manager will indicate that programs are downloading in the background.

Nonetheless, Word was ready to go in only a minute or two. Having spent many a day waiting half an hour to an hour for some previous versions of Office to install, I found this nothing short of amazing.

The best thing about Office 2010, in my opinion, is the new Outlook. Now it has the Ribbon interface, too. I know some folks hate the Ribbon, but I’m a big fan of it. Here’s the Outlook 2010 virtual app:

I especially love the Quick Steps feature which lets me create one click buttons to perform my most common multi-step tasks. For instance, I can click the “To Tom” button to forward the email message I’m in to Tom.

But if you don’t like the Ribbon, you can get rid of it with a quick click of the little “up” arrow in the right top corner.

A handy feature is the Ignore button on the Home tab. This will move both current and future messages in the selected conversation to the Delete folder. So if you really, really don’t care to see any more of that particular thread that’s gotten nasty on one of your email discussion lists, it’s easy to zap it away.

Ribbon tabs

Here are screenshots of the various Ribbon tabs (click to enlarge):

But here’s the really cool part: now you can customize the Ribbon the way you want it. You can even create your own tabs. Just right click on the Ribbon and select Customize the Ribbon.

This is true for the Ribbon in all the Office applications.

You may also notice that the old big round Office Logo button has been replaced by a new, rectangular one (in the same location). Clicking it gets you a redesigned interface for selecting options for the Office application you’re in:

There’s lots more, and I’ll be looking at each of the other Office 2010 applications here in more detail in the days to come, but this should give you a little taste of some of the changes in the new and improved Office.

deb@shinder.net    www.debshinder.com

In my blog post over on Amazon’s End User Blog, I related some of my experiences with the new version of Virtual PC that supports Windows 7 XP Mode (XPM), and how it compares to VMware Workstation with Unity view. Something that I forgot to mention is that although you can simultaneously run applications from multiple VPC VMs, you can’t start VMware Workstation while a VPC VM is running.  If you try, you get the following error message:

 
Click to enlarge

And in fact, if you already have a VMware VM running and you click on a VPC application in the Start menu, the VMware VM shuts down and you get that same error message. The VPC virtual application then starts up. So apparently VPC takes precedence over VMware in these scenarios. I guess maybe it has to do with both virtualization technologies not being able to utilize the hardware virtualization components (in this case, Intel VT) at the same time – but I’ll have to check further to verify that.

If you simply hibernate the VPC VM(s) – which is what the XPM VM is set to do by default when you click Close – you won’t be able to use VMware. If you set it to prompt you for an action on close and choose Turn Off, then you will be able to open your VMware virtual machines. I learned all this through trial and error, figured it might be useful information for those who have both VMware Workstation and VPC XPM installed.

deb@shinder.net    www.debshinder.com