Have you ever met someone who thinks they know everything about computers but really knows nothing?

[Muerto]

A guy at school always amuses (and sometimes erritates) me. First of all he is a 110% fanatical Intel zealot. I've shown him pages upon pages of benchmarks that clearly show AMD processors competing with and exceeding Intel ones. I don't care what type of CPU someone uses but he refuses to admit that AMD can compete with Intel. He always talks about how AMD CPUs are inferior to Intel ones.

Here's the other thing. He recently put together a new computer. It's a dual 1GHz PIII, 512MB PC133, huge HD, etc. He then starts bragging about howmuch better his system is than mine. After he read all the specs I asked him if he was running Win2K or NT. And he said "nope, Windows ME". I stood there trying not to laugh out loud. I said "uhm, you know that ME doesn't support SMP right?" He said "yeah it does".

We went on about this for a while but I didn't feel like an argument so I just walked away. I just don't know how some people can be so misinformed. So how about you guys?



EDIT: He also told me he was running a system with two AGP video cards. A Rage Fury and a Matrox G200. I haven't seen a dual AGP board. Have you?

 

[Renob]

All the time and most of them hang out in the forums

 

[TallBill]

lol, i have 4 agp cards btw

 

[MOgeeks]

Sounds like which is better...pepsi or coke...
No point arguing with that fellow, he can brag as much as he can,
but in the end, he will be the one who lose out since he refused enlightenment.

 

[mchammer187]

check out this thread
no one agrees with me

 

[Yo Ma Ma]

Muerto, have you considered assimilating him into RC5 as a means of "proving" his CPU?

 

[Maetryx]

My dad has a friend that works on his computers when I'm not available (and I live 2500 miles away, so it is quite often). This guy is in his fifties but he thinks that he acts like a l33t hax0r teenager. Only he's just weird, and not at all like a young person. So he does stuff for my dad and installs warez and other crap my dad doesn't need.
One time when I was there he was all showing me this cool Symantec program that was supposedly an unofficial release only available to him because he was the friend of some Symantec employee. It was Norton Desktop's File Manager for Windows 95. I tried to tell him that I bought that program in September 1995 on the same day that windows 95 came out, but he insisted that I did not because only he could get it. I finally agreed that I must have been mistaken (I wasn't) and ignored him as best I could.

 

[pillage2001]

Someone told me he put two VooDoo5500 AGP in a pc and get twice the performance??

 

[kduncan5]

I don't know nearly as much as I'd like to, and I plan to learn more as time progresses, but I truly dislike people who think they know everything, try to flaunt what knowledge they possess, but fail miserably in the process. It's hard to ignore ignorance.......-kd5-

 

[Muerto]

mchammer187

I remember that thread. Some people never learn that OEMs are bad.

Yo_Ma-Ma

I tried bringing that up and he didn't even know what distributed computing is. He though it would just slow his computer down even though I repeatedly said it wound't.

pillage2001

So he had the equivalent of a Voodoo 11 000?

 

[Windogg]

Yea I have this moron at the office. First he refuses to have a dynamic IP assigned to his PC because he thinks he can get a virus if the IP was used on an infected PC.

He told me that he split his hard drive into three partitions and he copies the Windows CD (yup, copy/paste)onto the other two. That way if the hard drive crashes the other two will automatically take over. His words, not mine.

 

[Muerto]

LOL!

That is funny. I havent' met anyone that dumb yet.

 

[mchammer187]

mchammer187

I remember that thread. Some people never learn that OEMs are bad.


at least someone in OT agrees with me

anyways i have a story

one of my friends is friends with this guy that one of these local shady computer dealerships where all the ppl that have worked there have gotten arrested and jailed and they sell 1 GB HD's for $60. Anyways my friend wants to get a computer i say get the parts online and I (me) will build it for you anyway his friend persuades him to get him to do it.

Though i wasnt that adamant about building it from newegg, and other merchants i figured he should know what he is doing but I am dead wrong. When my friend gets all the parts the guy (i will refer to him as the guy from now on) puts it together and it doesnt boot (this is a duron 800 and abit kt7a) so i take a look and try some stuff and i get it to post (cpu fan was not plugged into the right header)

so i get it to post so i figure that he knows what he is doing but he does something and no post anymore so my friend lets the guy take it home with him to try and fix it
a day later he calls him up and says the PSU overloaded "i tried not to laugh hehe" and he ends like 2 months later the guy gets a new mobo asus A7V and my friend orders a tbird 850 online

this time i put it together and it doesnt work i deduce that the power supply is not giving out enough power (250W for 850 tbird) but the guy refuses to believe this I even ask my other friend eric who is the guru of all that is computer who says we need a 300W the guy replies "i build tbirds all the time with this PSU" (it is funnier now since we use this to make fun of him by repeating it to our circle of friends)

anyways 2 weeks later he finally concedes when he comes over and we see that the PSU is only recommend by AMD for like 500 mhz or something.

Anyways he does not replace the PSU and just says i'm sorry and we get my roomates ex-GF's Dad to get us a 300W and i put it together and no problems whatsoever

needless no one asks him about computer stuff any more. what is ironic is that he offered to build one for my other friend's GF and when she told me i wuz ROFLMAO

 

[pillage2001]

Muerto......I really don't know what to say to him.

Here's another good one that I got from my friend's Forums.

"Another thing i want to share with people is if you r a heavy comp. gamers, and want some cheap VGA card, i tried that before. It's work really good but also can match to Geforce2. To use Two Voodoo3, u need to buy a Special wire to link to card and of cause u need a motherboard with TWO agp slot."

 

[Demosthenes]

Here's the thing.. I know, at least for me, there's gonna some day be a guy out there who is so much more knowledgeable then me about computers, if I go around blabbering my head off about specs and technical crap, I'll look like to him what all these morons look like to me. Which is why I keep my mouth shut... and only speak up when someone calls upon my help. Really seems to work.. I don't have to do any bragging about being the local know-all about computers, everyone else does it for me

 

[Deira]

Trust me... I know what you mean Muerto. I get people like that at work all the time. Especially at tech support. They refuse to listen...

I.e. (some) parents with kids who build their own systems. I understand that they think the world of them, but they refuse to believe that their kid would blow up a 1.4 GHz CPU, etc. or do something wrong. People who call in for a RMA or Tech Support think they know everything. Then when they find out that I am right and they are wrong, its like, "oh yeah, I knew that..." Then you get people who are knowledgable, but won't admit that they did something wrong. Not that I know everything there is know about computers, but gee...

Here's 2 scenarios: This guy buys all the hardware to build his new system from us. He calls in a few days later and says "all the components are faulty, I wan't a RMA, better yet, a refund." I run him through the basics, check the power supply, reset CMOS, make sure everything is properly installed, and most importantly that the power switch is on or that the computer is plugged into the wall. Well guess what, he argues with me and curses me out saying that he has built a ton of computers and this has never happened to him. Well... turns out, he didn't plug it into the wall...

Same set-up as the previous guys, buys most of the hardware from us, builds his system. Calls us up and says there is no post, power getting to his computer. He thinks he burned up his CPU or power supply since it was working earlier. We run him through tech support, he says he checked everything, etc. Minutes later during the tech discussion, "power" as in electricity comes into the conversation again and he says, "oh yeah, the power is out. There's a thunderstorm and there's no electricity, sorry 'bout that." Argh!!! Makes me wonder if these two were related... I swear, some people have no business even building computers...

 

[Elledan]

There's this guy at school who insists that he has a 1.4 TBird (upgraded from 800), 512 MB RAM, 23" monitor, a Voodoo 4 (I guess he has the prototype ), TV-card, an unbelievable amount of HD-space (according to him he upgrades the HD's reguarly) and a lot more of fantastic hardware.

The worst part is that he says that his father (who's a police-officer, the last time I talked to him) paid for everything. That guy is a loser who just needs attention. Even with my average knowledge of PC's, I need less than a minute to find some flaws in his story and explain them to him.

 

[Bowman795]

there was some kid from my shcool trying to impress some girls with some tottally dumb comments. he was like asking if they knew what "VCR" stood for..he said it was video cable receiver. i gladly corrected him. then he started bragging about how he could shut down anyone's compuyter over the net. i gave him my ip and told him to put up or shut up. he shut up.

damn i hate those kind of people.

 

[sohcrates]

as Deira said above, you HAVE to wonder how many calls a day these online hardware vendors get. i mean, i know SO many people that try to build their own system, and always end up coming to my support desk for help. (i work for residential computing at my college)

i mean, they have IDE cables plugged into sound cards, PSU's set to 220 instead of 115, cpu's put on w/out removing the plastic coating from the HSF goo. the list goes on. i would fear for my business knowing what kind of people i was selling hardware to!

 

[ViperMagic]

ok yes, I am only 15, and yes, I know i dont know half the stuff some of you know about whats ticking and whirring inside my computer, but some people are just plain dumb. For english class we had to do an interview with a classmate. OK all is well.. then I run across one from this moron called Dave. Went something like this:
Cody (the Interviewer): So Dave, what do you want to do when you grow up?
Dave: I want to work with computers
C: So what college do you want to go to?
D: Who says I want to go to college?
C: Do you have a computer at home?
D: Yeah, I just built a computer running 6 Athlons.
It went downhill from there. I asked him later and he says hes using a mobo he BUILT HIMSELF!.

I have a story form Netgear tech support, but it sounds like crap in print. Has to be done in person. Sorry

 

[MrCodeDude]

<< There's this guy at school who insists that he has a 1.4 TBird (upgraded from 800), 512 MB RAM, 23&quot; monitor, a Voodoo 4 (I guess he has the prototype ), TV-card, an unbelievable amount of HD-space (according to him he upgrades the HD's reguarly) and a lot more of fantastic hardware.

The worst part is that he says that his father (who's a police-officer, the last time I talked to him) paid for everything. That guy is a loser who just needs attention. Even with my average knowledge of PC's, I need less than a minute to find some flaws in his story and explain them to him. >>


Dude, around here in San Jose, Sheriff's get paid about $80,000 a year w/ GREAT benefits..
-- mrcodedude

 

[Deira]

Even with the disclaimer that all components are meant for Authorized Professional Installers, some hardware vendors still receive calls for tech support. Vendors can't be expected to offer a walk-through on installation or be responsible to damage associated with improper installation. People forget to read their instruction manuals before calling up and most of the answers lie there.

I am sorry but if you have to call the vendor to ask how to install a cooling fan onto your motherboard or which slot your memory goes into, you have no business what so ever building a system.

Sorry, now I think I'm ranting...

 

[Muerto]

I've never worked in tech support but I've heard that the most common problem is that either the computer isn't plugged in or turned on.

I've also noticed that the most common problem at LAN parties (I've hosted quite a few) is that people never remember to bring a power strip. Hello! Computers need electricity! :Q:Q

 

[Muerto]

No worries. I expected this thread to become full of rants.

 

[ElPool]

nobody ever know everything about anything.