[windows2000] Re: OT - Question about supporting Personal PC's
- From: Jennifer Booth <jennifer.booth@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "'windows2000@xxxxxxxxxxxxx'" <windows2000@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 9 Sep 2003 08:40:16 -0700
Or at least a bottle of good wine or a six pack of good beer! :D
However, in a lot of corporations, it's generally frowned upon to bring in
personal computers to the office even for repairs, because you never know
what might be on them that could bring in a
virus/trojan/kazaa/insertdeathbecomesthenetworkhere.
What I have done in the past is to empower the user. Fix it one time right,
then give them the tools and instructions they need to keep their machine
happy as long as they can. I locked down our VP's with Windows 2000 so his
daughter couldn't install nasty file sharing programs, installed Norton 2003
and secured the services with Admin level rights, and setup Windows Update
to auto-download and install his updates for him so he didn't have to think
about it. At least from then on, I got questions, not a PC dropped in my
cube with a presentation due tomorrow.
Supporting the people who support you without breaking policy is a good
idea. Policies do bend before they break tho! :)
Jennifer
-----Original Message-----
From: John Parker [mailto:jp@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx]
Sent: Tuesday, September 09, 2003 8:30 AM
To: windows2000@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [windows2000] Re: OT - Question about supporting Personal PC's
I get the same thing here, but...
The people who have me work on their personal machines, will generally
augment my income with a financial kickback.
There are others who do not, but what do you do? It is what it is.
The bosses seem to think that once you are in IT, you are their digital
whore.
Sorry, not cynical, just used to it.
John Parker, MCSE
IS Admin.
Senior Technical Specialist
Digital Display Systems.
"Be excellent to each other"
---End of Line---
-----Original Message-----
From: Greg Reese [mailto:GReese@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]
Sent: Tuesday, September 09, 2003 10:22 AM
To: windows2000@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [windows2000] Re: OT - Question about supporting Personal PC's
I have to do this too but on most occasions, it involves me actually
traveling to their house too.
I had the same thing happen here. His daughter had managed to install a
bunch of trojans etc. I explained to him the dangers of a Trojan logging
his keystrokes because he does a lot of online banking. He was pretty
pissed at here. I now have to go back out there and install a Watchguard
SOHO for him. But before I can do that I have to go to our President's
house and install a new video card for him so he can play Flight Simulator.
It's all part of the job even if its not in the description.
I just do it. They are the ones signing my paychecks. If they feel my time
is better spent doing crap for them rather than everyone else then that is
their problem. I get paid whether I am doing that or building a server.
Either way, it's their money.
I look at it as all part of the job. One thing I did for the rest of the
employees here is enroll us in the CDW Employee Purchase Program. It lets
all our employees buy computers with the same discount level we get. Which
really isn't very much. But, support becomes CDW's problem and not mine. I
have found that even if I recommend a computer for someone, it suddenly
becomes my support headache forever. Family and friends do this to me as
well as our users. I point all my users to CDW, and I tell all my family
and friends to get an iMac.
Who knows, that guy may get promoted or something and then remembers you as
the IT guy with the bad attitude who didn't want to help him. I would just
do it with a smile and be as helpful as possible so that he thinks you are a
genius in the end. Then he tells everyone how great you are and they should
double your pay. You never know when you may cross this guy's path again.
Greg
-----Original Message-----
From: Farrugia, Paul [mailto:pfarrugia@xxxxxxxxxxxx]
Sent: Tuesday, September 09, 2003 10:56 AM
To: windows2000@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [windows2000] OT - Question about supporting Personal PC's
Hello, sorry this is way off topic but I need to vent before I get myself
fired by beating someone with a keyboard,
I was wondering what others are doing or would do with situations similar to
this:
I work for a credit union. We have Board members who are given "perks" each
year (laptops, desktops, cell phones, etc.). When something goes wrong with
one of these devices (usually do to user's negligence) they expect our IT
department to fix them. Our upper management is too busy brown nosing the
board so they expect us to fix these problems as well.
Last Friday I was told by the VP of my department that on Monday (yesterday)
I would have to go to one of our branch locations to meet with one of the
board members because he cannot dial up to AOL on a desktop PC that we gave
him a year and a half ago and he was also having other problems. I had to
bite my tongue while my VP told me this. As soon as he left I went to my
manager told him that this was a load of horse crap and he agreed with me.
(By the way I am the only network admin here and I have 12 laptops, 4
desktops and a new server to set up). I made the suggestion of having the
board member overnight the PC to us or having someone in our branch send it
for him so he doesn't have to get his hands dirty. This would have been more
cost efficient as well. Well, my VP who I guess knows more then me said no.
Go figure. Anyway I go and get the PC and bring it back to my office.
Today I am told that the PC needs to be returned by Thursday the latest. (Oh
by the way I cannot fed ex it back to him as per my VP). My manager tells me
to work on that PC only, forget everything else and just do that. He doesn't
agree with what is going on as well. So I boot the PC up and of course every
program you can think of is installed on it, except for the anti- virus
program which I know at one point was on the machine because I installed it
myself. I can also tell that his teenage daughter uses the pc for things
that teens do these days. I run a virus scan and guess what the PC is
infected with 4 Trojan horses. Also windows update hasn't been done in the
longest of time.
Basically I am trying to find out if this is something that I should have to
do for the fear of losing my job or do I have any recourse in situations
like these. I think this is totally ridiculous that we can give someone a
"perk" and he can abuse it and expect us to fix it.
Thanks for listening,
Paul.
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