Forget logic, use your computersititon!

I used to believe that technology jobs were best done by logical people. After a decade of experience I laugh at that supposition now.

When a computer breaks there are some general troubleshooting rules:

1. Reboot.
2. Wiggle the cables.
3. Try another account.
4. Reboot again.
5. Google the problem.
6. Read the manual.
7. Throw out the computer.

The main exceptions are:
- Broken Cupholders
- Missing Any keys
- PEOPLE WHO CAN'T FIND THEIR capslock BUTTON

After 10 years of fixing computers, I have added a few items to the list. It now reads:

1. Reboot.
2. Wiggle the cables.
3. Try another account.
4. Shake a stick over the computer.
5. Reboot again.
6. Google the problem.
7. Throw a dog at the computer.
8. Read the manual.
9. Chant the filesystem path backwards.
10. Reboot holding my breath.
11. Throw out the computer.

It turns out there are certain times that fixing a computer has little to do with logic, and a lot to do with dumb luck.

This happened a few years ago when I fixed a soundcard on a computer. Sound was coming out of the speakers, but so faint you needed to jam your ears against them. I did the above list, including updating drivers, swapping out the soundcard, trying the soundcard in another machine, changing speakers. Nothing worked.

My last thought was to daisy chain amplified speakers to get more volume. I then slowly thought that "I am adding more power to the sound...".

I changed the power supply. It fixed the problem.

This was a coup d'etat. I baffled my geek buddies with this solution. I still don't know why the computer didn't fail outright, it shouldn't have worked at all if underpowered.

This happened the week that changing the watch battery on a computer fixed it's inability to boot at all. I had just recommended buying a new computer when lo and behold, the $10 part fixed it. I still don't know why.

These fixes are great when they happen to me. What is really superstitious luck can be passed of as insightful genius.

Yesterday we were troubleshooting a server at work. It's running slower than it should by a factor of 3. We did testing and determined that the problem was the hard drive read speed.

One co-worker wanted to start pulling the spare hard drives from the server. While it was running. To me this seemed like something I would have suggested 9 years ago. We ignored him all morning because, well, that's just crazy talk. It's in the category of "Rain Man" suggestions.

In the afternoon we were getting frustrated. He then changed his suggestions from pulling the data to turning off the processors.

"RIGHT." (Grin and nod). "How about after that we go get a dog and throw it at the server. But make sure it's not a chihuahua, they only work on Mac's."

My other co-worker had become desperate either to fix the problem or shut the other guy up, so he turned off a processor. With 4 on the server there was a relatively low risk.

No improvement. So another was turned off. Still nothing. They turned off the 3rd. The server ran fine again.

?

So making the server slower at doing things made the hard drives read faster?

!?!

I still can't wrap my head around HOW this is even possible. The now gloating co-worker said that we didn't have a multi-processor machine before, so that must have been what changed. We gently reminded him we DID have a dual-processor server before.

The moral of the story: If your computer doesn't work, try immersing it in yogurt, or taping feathers to the cables, or sing to it in Swahili. Let me know if any of that works, because clearly logic and sensible approach are no longer the way to do my job.