That goes to prove, nothing in life is free.

That is the very reason my wife has her own computer

WOM agrees with you Essencay, my wife has her own also.

Sugaree also agrees.........That's the reason why I have my own, too

The problem is that now everyone in the neighborhood wants me to fix their computer. >

The problem is that now everyone in the neighborhood wants me to fix their computer

I hear ya, and of course does anybody offer anything to you other than use of your time? > Not in my neighborhood, and there is 10-15 computers around here that somone is needing "advice" on. you know how far that gets, if they can't figure it out on their own they surely won't understand your instructions. Only my best frind appreciates my services, the one I really enjoy helping won't let me do it for free.

So far I've got a dinner and two free movie tickets. Wow, what a business. Most of my neighbors seem to think that they are doing me a service by letting me fix their computers.

You are preaching to the Quior. I used to blow out folk's machines and do reinstalls and custom loading for people, and Setup thier machines Optimized and then do a Bootable Image to CD's and they would get miffed, for many different stupid reasons. I like to work on the machines here at the house. If I can get it brought here easily. (Just the Tower mind you.) I like to get as much information from the User as posible. (Most are clueless when it comes to their Information, till it's been deleted, then all kind of crap is gone, finding out the crap in the first place is like pulling teeth.) Now doing all this would can be reasonably done in about 4 or 5 hours (depending the speed of the machines.) Now comes the kicker, I usually don't charge for this to friends or renatives, but anyone else gets charged $100 US. I think this is a bargain. Considering the average recover time from an Image is about 15 minutes. You'd think I was asking for their First Born Child, as payment. Now with Spyware and Hijacking Software, Viri on the rise and all sort of other crap at the rise, Not to mention Callware and other crap. I guess these cheap folks think the knowledge, Manuals and experimentation grow on trees. I guess it all comes down to this... We all get a kick no matter how badly we get screwed over, Niggled, and El-cheap'oed. The kick being still considered a Demi-God amongst mere Mortals. This despite the fact that the Industry has fallen apart, Machines of Immeasurable Speed are Cheap and Computer Owners are now as common, as ticks on a Dog. Computers may be common place now, but riddle me this "how many people can Fix a toaster?" "Fix a TV?"

CygnusXII says sorry started rambling a bit there.

Funny thing is,I can build a pc,fix a TV...but probably NOT the toaster!

I saw a guy fit a P4 system in a toaster once...

Cygnus, I agree with you. Troubleshooting someone elses computer is a timely endeavor. First you might look at drivers, then programs, then viruses and then spyware. It took me 2 hours to look at the drivers and progams and then to download the spyware killer. Then, running the spyware programs, thoroughly "deleting" all the found spyware, installing virus protection and a firewall(3 hours). Most people never run defragmentation, and that can take hours. Especially, if they've never run it. Also, most people don't seem to realize how important virus protection and a firewall is when they surf the net. People still seem to think that the internet is free. On most sites, there is a cost. And, for most freeware there is a cost. The cost being your privacy, credit card information and plain maliciousness by bored juveniles. "My firewall has just blocked a trojan attempt to connect to my computer." No firewall? Oops.

I saw a guy fit a P4 system in a toaster once...

I turned a 2 day old P4 system INTO a toaster once.

I have a P4 chip I use as coaster...
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100? psh
i've seen machines with THOUSANDS of files from spyware.