I got a new CPU and in order to get it in, I had to flash my bios first, and I have no idea how to do that, so I decided to just bring it into the computer store and pay the 30 dollars for them to do it, and my computer had no problems at all, and now 3 days later I'm frustrated at how long it's taking so I call them, and they say "We can't turn on the computer because the Motherboard is broken."
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Pretty sure the computer shop broke my computer and wont admit it
I agree that it sounds like they fucked it up during the process. Flashing your motherboard BIOS is kind of a shitty task that takes more steps than than it should, usually (even the most recent flash I did required a fucking floppy disk -- wtf?). It's not a complex process, though, and each manufacturer gives a walk-through on how to do it with their particular tools (though it's not any fun, at all) and there's no excuse for a "professional" to have fucked things up unless there truly was some sort of an obscure fault with the motherboard or their firmware or something that took the system out . . . but that seems really unlikely.
@CL60 said:
@SLUSHiNaToR said:
why did you have to flash your bios? but yeah, sounds the flashing of the bios was the factor.
Because I had to update the bios for the CPU to work.
Ahh, okay. I was going to say, it must of been pretty important.. Otherwise you should NEVER mess with BIOS flashing if you don't need to :P.
@Soap said:
Ask them to replace the parts they broke or take them to court, simple.
Exactly. They didn't make note of the motherboard breaking before they tried to fix it, so that would mean that they know it worked. I'd put the lean on them to replace the motherboard or threaten to take them to small claims.
Sounds like they had a bad flash of the CMOS doing the update which is a pretty spectacular effort considering how easy it is to update a modern bios. Most manufacturers include a utility onboard as part of the firmware, it's just a matter of downloading the new bin file and dropping it onto a usb key then selecting it inside the utility on bootup, the whole process takes about 5 mins or less. It's also worth noting that a large number of vendors have a "dual bios" option which allows for a recovery if a flash should go bad, you can fire up the board in CMOS recovery mode and the board will dump it's original firmware from the secondary CMOS back to the primary,
Essentially I think they're trying to pull a fast one over on you to get you to buy replacement parts through them, or jack up the service costs. If the thing really is unrecoverable I'd be very surprised.
Sounds like they're claiming they didn't break it though.Ask them to replace the parts they broke or take them to court, simple.
@9cupsoftea said:
@Soap said:Sounds like they're claiming they didn't break it though.Ask them to replace the parts they broke or take them to court, simple.
They might change their mind when threatened with a lawsuit though.
@Korwin said:
Essentially I think they're trying to pull a fast one over on you to get you to buy replacement parts through them, or jack up the service costs. If the thing really is unrecoverable I'd be very surprised.
I think this is exactly what they're doing. They just called me and told me it works now and they had to do a bunch of stuff to get it to work >.>
You probably should have just done it yourself. It's as easy as plugging a USB thumbdrive, going into the BIOS and clicking 'Go'.
@Branthog said:
I agree that it sounds like they fucked it up during the process. Flashing your motherboard BIOS is kind of a shitty task that takes more steps than than it should, usually (even the most recent flash I did required a fucking floppy disk -- wtf?).
That sounds odd. How old is your motherboard? I mean not only did my 2006 965P board support flashing with a USB stick, it even gave you the option of automatically doing the whole process effortlessly through software in Windows (it basically downloaded the updated BIOS file, backed up the old one and flashed the new one with one click). Of course, doing it through that many layers of software probably introduced multiple extra points of failure, but it never gave me any issues when I used it.
Goddamn nonsense.@Korwin said:
Essentially I think they're trying to pull a fast one over on you to get you to buy replacement parts through them, or jack up the service costs. If the thing really is unrecoverable I'd be very surprised.
I think this is exactly what they're doing. They just called me and told me it works now and they had to do a bunch of stuff to get it to work >.>
If you'd have the pc right here and now, I bet my tits that thing will work properly, not a single pc store doesn't try to jack up costs through this shit, its getting annoying to see it happen everywhere.
Go over there and get it back, they were told to flash the bios and that's all they're gonna do, if they did more then shake their hand, thank them and walk away (with your pc).
I can recommend looking around local advertisements for computer savvy wonder kids.
We got one of those around here and for 10 bucks he'll turn your pc into a spaceshuttle AND flash your bios.
@Korwin said:
Sounds like they had a bad flash of the CMOS doing the update which is a pretty spectacular effort considering how easy it is to update a modern bios. Most manufacturers include a utility onboard as part of the firmware, it's just a matter of downloading the new bin file and dropping it onto a usb key then selecting it inside the utility on bootup, the whole process takes about 5 mins or less. It's also worth noting that a large number of vendors have a "dual bios" option which allows for a recovery if a flash should go bad, you can fire up the board in CMOS recovery mode and the board will dump it's original firmware from the secondary CMOS back to the primary,
Essentially I think they're trying to pull a fast one over on you to get you to buy replacement parts through them, or jack up the service costs. If the thing really is unrecoverable I'd be very surprised.
This.
@Branthog said:
Flashing your motherboard BIOS is kind of a shitty task that takes more steps than than it should, usually (even the most recent flash I did required a fucking floppy disk -- wtf?).
Dude what? I haven't used a floppy disk to update a bios since 2004.
Demand to ask what they did to your computer. Call them on it if it's gibberish. Regardless, tell them you never authorized them to do anything else, nor agreed to any payments previously, and refuse to pay.@Korwin said:
Essentially I think they're trying to pull a fast one over on you to get you to buy replacement parts through them, or jack up the service costs. If the thing really is unrecoverable I'd be very surprised.
I think this is exactly what they're doing. They just called me and told me it works now and they had to do a bunch of stuff to get it to work >.>
As a guy who used to be the CTO of a honest computer shop, I can say for sure that yes, they do indeed inflate the shit out of their prices in order to stay afloat.
I didn't do anything sneaky, but I would charge $40 for Diagnostics, which was just me taking the time to determine what was wrong with your machine. My prices were crazy because economics forced them to be crazy, the market for PC repair shops is dwindling more and more. The majority were repeat customers, mostly elderly couples and some guys who kept porning their laptops into submission.
You don't even want to know what a simple reformat had cost them.
Really? I imagine the lawyer fees and hassle would make the price of a motherboard seem silly in comparison.@9cupsoftea said:
@Soap said:Sounds like they're claiming they didn't break it though.Ask them to replace the parts they broke or take them to court, simple.
They might change their mind when threatened with a lawsuit though.
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