9801
Experience with Compaq technical support
We recently had a problem with the Compaq Presario 4808 we purchased a month ago. We're using Windows 95 as our operating system. Something went wrong with our Dial-Up Networking (DUN). The computer locked up hard while my daughter was using The Realm (Internet gaming/chat environment). When she cycled power, the DUN thought it was still connected to IQuest. (When it should have dialed, it instead said it was getting no response from the server. This happened with The Realm, Netscape Navigator, and Microsoft Internet Explorer - everything we tried.)
We were unable to fix this quickly ourselves, so my daughter turned to Compaq tech support, and got a clearly bogus response. ("Talk to your ISP." "But I haven't changed the setup, and it's not even dialling my ISP." "Talk to your ISP.") She handed off to me the task of fixing the computer.
I called Compaq tech support again, and got someone who was much more interested in intervening. She had me do various things, including, eventually, testing the modem hardware, even though we were using the telephone line the modem was connected to.
She had me go into a DOS session within Windows '95, and echo two different strings to the modem port. The first was supposed to take the modem off-hook. We heard a click, so she concluded that was working. The second was supposed to dial the telephone. We heard no dialing tones, so she concluded the modem was faulty.
She said she would arrange to have our modem replaced (on site). This was the Saturday before Christmas, so she wasn't sure we'd get a response as quickly as normal.
After hanging up, I tried again the modem strings she had had me try while we talked on the telephone. This time, the off-hook command produced a dial tone (as I had expected), and the dial command produced dialing tones, as it should have. So the modem was not faulty, and the woman in tech support had been wrong about the validity of her test.
The woman at Compaq tech support had warned me that if my modem was not at fault, she would ask me to reload our hard drive (destroying its previous contents). I wasn't too keen on that prospect, since we had files we hadn't backed up. (We didn't have any way to back up those files, either, without installing a SCSI card - something I wanted to avoid until we had more experience with the computer.)
So, rather than immediately calling Compaq tech support for a third time, I resumed my previously conducted search for some way to reset the software switch which seemed to be in the wrong state. This time, I found (in the "My Computer" folder on the desktop) a 'Dial-Up Networking' folder. In this folder was an 'Iquest' icon. After selecting the IQuest icon, I was able to select "Connect" from a 'Connection' menu. The modem dialed, and connected to IQuest. This apparently reset the mysterious software switch:
- I disconnected, and started The Realm. The modem dialed, and connected to IQuest. So the problem was fixed.
I called Compaq tech support (less than an hour after finishing the previous call), and told them we didn't need a new modem. The woman I talked to said she would try to get the order canceled.
The following Tuesday, we got a message on our answering machine, from someone who identified himself as doing service for Compaq. He wanted to make arrangements for installing our new modem. This was within Compaq's hoped-for response time. Of course, this also meant the third tech support woman didn't succeed in canceling the order, for some reason.
So, if we had been total neophytes, slavishly followed Compaq's instructions, we would have made a call to IQuest (fruitless unless they recognized the problem and told us how to fix it), then would have waited half a week to have our modem replaced, then reloaded our hard drive (losing its previous contents) and redone the IQuest setup, at which point we would have been able to connect to the Internet again.
But as members of the Kokomo IBM PC Users' Group, we have learned enough about our computers to sift out the good advice from the bad. As a result, we had our computer fixed after a few hours, and without losing any of our files.
Richard Smiley
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