Any of you who try to help others with their computers will sympathize, I'm sure!
My colleague Bob (not his real name!) has a class in Wyoming next week, and they rented 4 laptop computers for him to bring along. Since he's leaving Sunday night, he's loading the software today. He started them all up, and since loading the different software on each one takes a while, he left them running while he went to lunch. When he came back, three of them had went into sleep mode, so he wiggled the mouse to get them going again, but nothing happened. He tried the power button, on each one, still they didn't wake up. I happened to walk by just then, and he asked me if I was familiar with these computers, and if I knew any other things to try to get them going again. I tried all the things I knew - the little indicator light on the front of the machine would flash, but that was it. We unplugged them, plugged them back in, nothing. We even tried taking the battery out, to try to force it to turn all the way off so we could turn it back on again - nothing! Our techy girl at the front desk, Daksha, looked up some info on what to do when you can't get a computer out of sleep mode, but none of that helped either.
Finally Bob called the guy we rented them from, and while he was talking to him I just happened
to glance at the mess of cables and I couldn't quite see the light on the power strip. Hmmmm... So I went over and flipped it up - wouldn't you know, the switch was off! I said, "Hey, the power strip is off!" and uproarious laughter erupted from the other side of the cubicle walls.I think we were set up!
There had been just enough juice in those computers' batteries for them to run for an hour or so, and then no one was there when the 'low battery' warning sounded.
The laughter has continued all afternoon...it makes for a nice atmosphere.
The moral of the story - when trouble-shooting computers, first make sure the power is on!
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