A Week of Computer Torture

In my last brief entry, I noted that I had a problem with my computer and would provide more detail later. It is now later - over a week later - and the experience I had has been tortuous. I am still trying to get a refund from the company in question, so I won't trash them yet ... If they do give me a refund, I will have something much nicer to say about them than if they don't.

My computer has been running so dang slow. That proved so frustrating, that I finally decided I had to fix it. First I ran Adaware, Spybot, and Windows Defender thinking that I must have some malware hosing up my system. But almost nothing turned up - four or five suspicious things that did not turn out to be anything bad. I did notice that I had been getting some error messages, though, so I looked the error messages up on the net. That led me to "Registry Errors," which led me to registry fixing software. I looked at several and read a review site, then picked the "best" one and purchased it. It cost $37, which is a lot, but if it fixed my problems, money well spent.

Did it fix my problems? No. It crashed my system. It took me a whole day just to get back up and limping, not running. I worked with my system for a week. I rebooted it from my installation CD. I had numerous email conversations with the software manufacturer. I did everything they told me to do and everything I could think of or research to do. No good. Finally, on Thursday, I called the Geek Squad. They could not schedule an agent for me until Monday!!!

Monday, a nice young man named Stacy came to my house to get things going. I had, by Sunday, actually gotten my system functional - as opposed to non-functional - so Stacy did not have to completely restore it, but he fixed the problems that the registry fix program had caused and got me running semi-fast. At least, faster than I had before this whole debacle started.

And, most importantly, he identified my underlying problem: I need more memory for background processes. I only have 128 mb, apparently the equivalent of a tricycle. He recommended I go for a 1 gig memory board, which I am getting.

Meanwhile, back to the registry program, I asked them for a refund. They hedged for a week, asking me to let them try to fix it. Well, I did, but they did not. Finally, Monday, after paying the Geek Squad their well-deserved $159 fee, I told the software company to pay me the refund and forget helping me. (Their idea of help when my system wouldn't boot was to tell me to go to the Start menu and run the restore program!!) And I haven't heard from them since. I did put a dispute on my credit card account and I will pursue this. I cannot stand paying for something that not only did not work, but actually harmed my computer.

That is all I'm going to say unless they refuse to give me a refund. If I do not get my refund, I will curse their name all over my blog and my website and anywhere else I can think of ...

Ciao!