Absolutely Nothing To Do With Nav's

As the topic says this is in no way Nav related just a small piece of advice for all PC users.

Nearly every day some bugger asks me why their computer isn't working, of course most of the time it's not their fault it's not working because they didn't do anything but thats a different story. For those people who aren't tech savvy, before your next call to tech support is required download a copy of Everest Downloads | Lavalys.com (for a one off run to get the info the evaluation version should be sufficient but obviously follow the rules after the first run if you plan on keeping it).

With the details this program generates (in a text or html file) about your PC, your tech support guru should be able to see at a glance exactly what is in your machine and any possible conflicts as well as what's inside the box. It wont fix the problem and but it will assist in the repair and maybe even save you a few bucks if your paying hourly repair rates. It's also a handy tool for those people who've brought new machines to make sure they get exactly what they ordered.

Of course for those doing tech support they might already have come across this or something similar but if they haven't it's something that should definitely get stuck on the USB drive on your keyring.

Ok back to Nav'ing I've done my community service for today.

That program sounds like Belarc advisor, which is a freeware program but not being a techead I cant comfirm that

Wow on a 4wd forum I actually got a response to a computer techie post.

I haven't used Belarc but I used to use PC Wizard, which was freeware, until I found Everest. Like most things in life you get what you pay for and nearly all freeware has it's limitations, however that doesn't mean it's not suitable for most people. I have found at times the free ones do make some errors with what they find inside the box, so far with the current roll out of workstations sitting in my office they are 100% correct with everything.

Everest is damn cheap for all that it does and as a tax write off it's even more value to someone like me. In my case it's also cheap insurance which I can use to make sure clients aren't installing crap onto the networks that they aren't suppose to and that everything is legal. I don't often need to know what parts are inside the box because if I built them I have that info already but for new clients or the general fix it jobs that comes through the doors it makes quick work of figuring out exactly what's in a box.

My work computer is so locked down I'm surprised that I can actually access this forum! We can't install software, cant change the desktop picture, cant access the device manager for when your thumb drive has the same drive letter as your F, I, M, P, S, T or Z drives. When we boot up the desktop image is a blue screen with all the IP, MAC and other info which I have NO IDEA what it means.

Rant over.

It all means that your company thinks they have something important enough they don't want users to ruin, of course in most cases this is only an opinion shared by the management as the general public and most staff probably couldn't give a rats about the information thats stored there.

I've had a number of clients who think their data is the most important thing on the planet and that the rest of the world would shut down if their data got into the public eye, and while this is true in a very limited number of cases the only place I've ever worked in which had data that important was whilst I was handling the network at DSS regional offices in Vic. Sure companies like to keep their own dirty little secrets from their competitors but lets face it the staff they have working on the pcs that hold the data probably know most of those secrets anyway so it's not like they are hiding much.

Then again who am I to argue a boss who is paranoid about security when it comes to their computers is the sort of person who's helping me get closer to early retirement.