Itâs a fair question.
I wish I could.
Honestly, I truly wish I could give everyone a simple, step-by-step, hereâs-how-to-fix-your-problem answer. When possible, I try. Unfortunately, itâs rarely possible to be that specific.
Thereâs a reason my most common answer is âIt depends.â
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The information I get
I donât want to sound like Iâm trying to shift the blame, but the reality of the situation is that I rarely get enough information to determine the exact cause of a specific problem. Iâm often not told of the symptoms at all beyond the ever-popular âit doesnât work.â
Without detailed information about the problem, thereâs little hope for getting detailed information about an answer.
I get that itâs not always possible to know what information to provide. Thatâs why I wrote an article on the topic: What Information Should I Provide When Asking for Help? Itâs a great place to start.
Step-by-step answers often require step-by-step instructions to reproduce whatever problem is at hand. And while not all problems are of the âstep by stepâ variety, I can say this for sure: itâs better to provide too much information than too little.
Consider symptoms
The symptoms are not the problem; symptoms are clues to the problem.
What does it mean if your leg hurts? Most commonly, itâs a simple muscle strain, but it might also be an insect bite, an infection, a blood clot, cancer, or a variety of other things I canât begin to think of. We need more information. As TV doctors might say, âWe need to do more tests.â
The same is true of computer problems. When you report symptoms, youâre reporting clues I use to diagnose the cause of the problem. Sometimes, the clues are enough. More often, though, they are not. The same symptom might have hundreds, if not thousands, of different causes.
Asking questions
Since I canât sit at your computer and diagnose your specific problem, IÂ canât ârun more testsâ.
Like a doctor, I might ask you more questions about the symptoms youâre experiencing in the hope of clarifying what is happening.
I might also give you suggestions to further diagnose or repair the problem yourself.
Much like that leg pain, resolving your computerâs problem often involves understanding more about what was happening prior to the symptoms appearing. Sometimes a lot of people experience similar symptoms, while at other times, there might be a situation Iâve never encountered before.
In understanding more about whatâs happening, Iâll probably have suggestions of things to try or look at.
No two computers are alike
Computers, like people, are incredibly complex. No two are exactly alike, no matter how you configure them.
Different hardware, operating systems (and versions thereof), applications, customizations, ways of connecting to the internet, and methods of using the computer make each individual computer as unique as the individual user.
As a result, blanket cookbook solutions to specific problems are rare. Obviously, I try to find them when I can, but quite often what works for one machine will not for another, and certainly not for all.
What to try and how to go about further diagnosing the problem yourself, however, does work, as evidenced by the many people who take that guidance and resolve their issues.
Unfortunately, computers are not yet like toasters: they donât âjust workâ. That means at some point, each of us will be faced with the responsibility of some diagnostic detective work.
There are lots of folks like me available to help, but ultimately, itâll take someone at your keyboard to collect the information we need to perform the final diagnosis and repairâŠ
âŠand that someone is you.
Do this
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I'll see you there!
I support some complex software at work and our department leader always encourages us to walk over to the personâs desk to see it happen first hand to see the details that are just too long to explain.. Leo cannot do that.
I have found that when I need to go to the maker of the software to get help, making a video of how I get to the problem is faster for me and helps the support person because it includes little things that I might have not written down in the service request or just missed. That happened last week when there was a small message in the bottom left corner of the screen that explained the issue. I am still not used to error messages that hide in that corner instead of popping up near the item being worked on but the support person saw it immediately.
I recall a while back a friend of mine was having massive problems with his new computer and was extremely frustrated. He had spent four hours on the phone with the âHelp Deskâ and was still absolutely nowhere. I (a computer programmer) offered to look at it and he reluctantly agreed. Within minutes I realized that enough stuff was weird / wrong and that I needed to talk to the Help Desk. He had a smile on his face when I stated this. Once I contacted the Help Desk, I explained what I saw, what I thought was wrong and gave them a âstream of consciousnessâ type of chatter. They were able to visualize what I saw and fixed the four problems within 15-20 minutes. They also realized that this computer was one of those which had been inadvertently sent out with a bad patch applied to the Operating System and we fixed that as well.
The point to this is not that Iâm a âsuper-fixerâ, itâs that the average person doesnât know what to look for. Many things are either completely hidden or just not obvious. To be a problem solver with technology, one needs to be able to: 1) Give a good visual; and 2) Discern Oddities or Things which donât seem right.
One difficulty I have with internet fixes is the instructions will say go here, do that, click on X, and I do not have X where they say it should be.
Things change so fast⊠Instructions canât keep up.
Great write up. Iâll be using this!
All systems are different. SO TRUE!
Earlier in my career, working in technical support I received a call from a customer that was frustrated by our software not working on SOME of his new identical computers. â His business had purchased 30 computers with identical specifications from the same vendor. All of the computers worked flawlessly, EXCEPT that seven of them regularly crashed when running our memory intensive software product (Paradox). The customer insisted we find out what was wrong with our software and fix it. As the problem had to be our softwareâŠ.
It turned out that those seven systems had an older BIOS version. Once updated everything worked.
Even supposedly identical hardware may not be so in the PC world, unlike the Apple world where hardware is more tightly controlledâŠ
Your use of medical analogies is apt. A veterinarian taught me the term âdifferential-diagnosisâ which is applicable to computer problem solving.
â what are the possible causes of this dis-order
â what is the most likely cause
â what is EASIEST to test for?
Work through whatâs easiest to test and triageâŠ
I can understand the frustration of PC users who have never accumulated a really good understanding of how their PC can deliver the exactness and the amazing data/results that it usually doesâŠuntil it doesnât.
Adding to the frustration is the anxious moments/minutes/hours spent on the phone with âtech assistanceâ from far away countries that ends up with the assistant finally (in exasperation) telling the caller itâs a machine issue or instead, itâll be necessary to reinstall the operating system ORâŠ.
Iâve been thereâŠfor years and know the feeling I felt that âIâll never, ever get this,â meaning understanding this computer stuff.
I entered into PC confusion 22 years ago with the purchase of a new DEFECTIVE Packard Bell PC that caused me much anguish. Upon learning how bad it was, I immediately upgraded to a better PC and began learning by doing month after month, year after year. Along the way, I discovered Ask Leo, and my PC experiences began to get better and better; thanks Leo.
Today Iâm proficient enough to be able to go on Team Viewer and remotely connect to friends and relatives computers who are having issues with their computer. It took me about 12 years to get to this point. I havenât needed outside tech support/help in 12 years. WHAT IâVE LEARNED ABOUT USER FRUSTATON is that when Iâm into a Team Viewer remote hookup session and moving around in someoneâs PC is that they become irate that Iâm moving too fast and not explaining what theyâre seeing and what Iâm doing, and why. Gee Whiz, isnât that what all PC newbies feel when they try to learn from seeing a techie moving around in their PC? I know that I did so many years ago.
What I learned is that with an open phone connection and a Team Viewer remote connection to someoneâs PC I slow down my moves and patiently try to explain in as simple terms as possible what Iâm doing and why. All to often, those of us who have a good degree of proficiency fail to remember our beginning PC experiences when remote access tech support drove us crazy. All to often, when the session was over, it left us in even greater confusion.
WHY CANâT YOU GIVE A STRAIGHT ANSWER?
More often than not, as I have personally experienced and observed while helping PC users is that some users will never acquire the rudiments of PC use and so will unlikely cross that certain threshold to understanding whatâs being conveyed and/or explained, no matter how elementary. I know how confusing it can be because I remember those early days. Iâm 80 now.
One thing Iâve used when I had a problem is the Windows Steps Recorder, found under Windows Accessories in Windows 10. Itâs easy to use and shows exactly what Iâm doing and what is seen on the screen. It has saved me from having to type out what Iâm doing and trying to describe what Iâm seeing on the screen. It will save to a file that can then be attached to an e-mail. (Sorry, Leo, for letting this cat out of the bag.)
No, itâs great. I should be recommending it to more people. :-)
The âstraight answer gripeâ isnât quite limited computer support. My dad fixes printing presses and he has run into the same problem. Unlike us, he at least gets to respond with: âLet me check my crystal ball.â
Iâve tried really hard to educate my users on which information to provide, but many are simply not interested. One of the worst is Outlook users who simply claim that âit just says âerrorâ on my screenâ even though the send/receive status box is right in front of them with the error. The other one is users who will literally say something along the lines of âSending reported error blah blah blahâ as if thatâs supposed to mean anything.
Written queries are the worst because you can only do a few cursory checks before responding. Iâve had to get into habit of forcing clients to clarify in point form. Often, I simply get poor replies.
Also: âWhat does it mean if your leg hurts?â Well⊠It also helps to know which leg hurts. ;)
I keep hearing about something called âThe Dark Webâ. How is the Dark Web any different from the ordinary web. I understand the Dark Web contains sensitive information, i.e. account numbers, email addresses, SSNâs, etc. Why can Yahoo, AT&T and others delete Dark Web traffic?
Wikipedia has an article which explains what it is and what it isnât.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_web
âWhy can Yahoo, AT&T and others delete Dark Web traffic?â
Because if the traffic were deleted, you would not be able to access your own accounts on the internet.
Technically, ISPs have the capability to ban websites they determine to be unacceptable. This wouldnât affect access to any other sites. I donât know if thatâs blocked by net neutrality laws or not. Maybe a lawyer can help clarify that.
A lot of this controversy come because of the decision of Google, Facebook and others to block hate speech. They are not legally bound to adhere to free speech protection but being so big, at a near monopolistic level, people are worried that they are becoming bigger than governments in this area.
Hi Leo, I have been an exclusive Mac user since 1988. I prefer desktop Proâs because you can âseeâ and hear video accurately piped through a sound system whereby getting the real feel of the performance. As an aside, I do not even use cell pones at all. I always ask people that do- how do you enjoy a video on a 2âł by 3âł screen and your audio must stink, yes? Plus, when I drive, or use a restroom that is what I am doing- not talking with people as I feel they can wait. Okay, to my issue:
I purchased a 2019 HP PC, I am assuming PC is the acronym for âpiece of c***â. Seems the most simple task requires reading litanyâs of information so you can understand who created whatever it is you are trying to do. Presently, the most basic task I am attempting is receiving a basic email FROM a yahoo account directly to the assigned outlook.com account I was pleaded with to open. After being redirected 100 times to everywhere but where I want, I am beginning to infer that this so-called outlook email account is nothing more than like hiring a middleman to intercept my mail that could have been opened up directly by just going to yahoo as I have always done. Am I correct? My process was: send an email FROM YAHOO, then, in windows 10, open this so-called email address I chose, and there is NO email that I sent. I took the time to even borrow a friends cell phone as they demanded a cell number to just activate the stinking account. So I endured. Now, no matter how many emails I send from either AOL, Juno, or Yahoo, I cannot see even one in my outlook.com account that they assigned me. And no, I did not link anything to this account as I believe that leads me to understand that HP is saying: see how easy we made this? Now you can view ALL YOUR OTHER PRIVATE EMAIL ACCOUNTS that you took the painstaking time to create pseudonymously and have them all listed with our blatantly nosy system that strives to know every character input to attempt on this new machine. Please, am I in the ballpark? I really am getting that these PCâs are the most invasive computers. My Mac never questions anything. I do not have to read volumes of information just to find out where to control anything. Add to this, HP keeps emailing me daily, that if I donât buy their virus protection I can kiss this $700 investment out the door. No wonder so many people bad mouth Microsoft so viciously online. Sorry for the rant. From what I read in your column you are a very intelligent man with many answers. I really am this frustrated with this new machine. As a closing, when I tried to register my warranty info they kindly told me my brand new 2019 computerâs warranty expired back in September 2018. I asked them how did this happen if it was not even assembled yet. No answer. Take care Leo.
If you want to use Outlook.com to access your Yahoo emails, you have to give them your login information, otherwise, Yahoo wonât give them access. Thereâs no reason not to continue to get your email as before using the Yahoomail website. Alternatively, you can use the built-in Windows Mail App or get Thunderbird. The phone number is only for recovering your account when traveling. In any case, I generally steer people away from Hotmail/Outlook.com as they can be troublesome. I have a Microsoft account, but I only use it for logging on to Windows and for my Onedrive. You can even use Windows without a Windows account and lose a few features which may or may not interest you/
First, that email is not appearing in your outlook.com account has nothing do to with the PC. Youâre more than welcome to open outlook.com in Safari on your Mac in order to get it working. Itâs JUST a web-based email account, nothing more.
First Iâd check the junk folder for missing email. Iâd make sure to click on the inbox folder listed on the left to ensure that youâre looking at the inbox (outlook.com has gone through several iterations and they may not default to showing you the inbox.) Finally, Iâd make absolutely certain the email address is what you think it is. I donât mean to insult, but this is a surprisingly common problem that would have exactly the results you experience.
Since youâre frustrated with the PC, Iâd strongly recommend getting the outlook.com email issues resolved using a system youâre more comfortable with, and then moving on to the issues specifically related to the PC.
I ask some very simple yes or no type of questions and google gives a paragraph that ends up still not answering the qguestion⊠why can it not answer?? Maybe they are not as good as they think they are.
If you donât get what youâre looking for when you run a search, you can try different key words till you get what you need.
Hereâs an excerpt from an Ask Leo! Tip of the Day:
âTry synonyms, different combinations, lengthier descriptions, and shorter descriptions. Change it up. You may find that what you think of as âXâ is more commonly referred to as âYâ. Once armed with that tidbit of information, you can refine your search appropriately.
For example, this afternoon I was looking for a way to connect one type of electrical plug to a different type of socket. I searched for a âconverterâ for my various plug types, but didnât really find what I was looking for. One of the close hits caused me to think of the word âadapterâ instead, and all of a sudden, I had a long list of results I could narrow down further.â