Do I have time for this?

Having just replaced a dead hard disk, and re-installed XP Pro, I've once again had to spend a frustrating hour downloading over 170 megabytes worth of updates & fixes. More, in fact, if you count the ones that go in after the first round forces a reboot.

Microsoft's original release date for Windows XP Service Pack 3 was H1 2007. A quick look at their service pack road map reveals a rather nonchalant "SP3 for Windows XP Professional is currently planned for 1H CY2008. This date is preliminary."

The cynical amongst you will think Microsoft is being deliberately tardy in order to push a few more frustrated users on to the Vista upgrade path.

Now I've been on the Vista bandwagon, and like fast food it looks good on the outside but carries a few dark secrets on the inside. So after six months I concluded that, like fast food, Vista can be hard to stomach, and went back to my usual diet of XP Professional.

So come on Microsoft, get the finger out. We've all got better things to be doing than hogging the Windows update web site. Let's have Windows XP Service Pack 3 please, because I'm not going to Vista-land any time soon, and somehow I don't think I'm the only one.

An unusually quiet morning in BitSmith towers is rudely interrupted by a summons to the top floor. A prestigious private school has just been on the phone. Their Internet connection is dead, and they have a big ceremony in two days at which they propose to wow some VIP's with the technological prowess of their newly refurbished school. The schools ICT service provider blames the ISP. The ISP denies all responsibility. I point out that we didn't provide any IT input previously, but the school principal is a friend of our esteemed leader, so would I like to go along and have a look? Up here on the top floor, it's not what you know, it's who you know.

Some time later I find St. Precocious at the end of a long leafy avenue lined with the sort of houses you'd swap yours for. I lower the tone of the establishment simply by parking the bitmobile out front. I meet the deputy head who ushers me to a newly built computer lab.

Within minutes, it's clear all is well on the LAN side. I learn they lost connectivity yesterday while the builders were taking down the scaffolding. Clue #1. Next stop is the router, which plaintively complains that is has no DSL signal. Clue #2. We rapidly locate the fixed wireless access dish bearing the name of a provider with a reputation for appalling customer service. Worse, there's about 8 feet of cable dangling from the base of the pole. Doubt we'll need Columbo for this one.

I rack my brains, but cannot think of anyone I know who's even vaguely connected with the ISP in question. With some trepidation, I call the ISP's help desk, and immediately get through to somewhere on the Indian sub-continent. After a brief proof-of-credentials exchange, I'm put on hold. Less than a minute later I'm through to a technician who asks me to explain the problem which, obviously, doesn't take long. Then, just when it was all going so well...

Tech Support - "Are you at your PC now?"
BitSmith - "No, I'm standing on a flat roof looking at your wireless dish"
TS - "OK, I need you to go to the PC"
BS - "Err... Why?"
TS - "We need to run some tests to establish what's wrong"
BS - "But I've just explained to you that the cable from the dish has been cut"
TS - "Yes Sir, I understand that, but first we have to do some tests"
BS - "But there's no point, the cable has been cut, and we need to get someone out to repair it"
TS - "I'm sorry sir, but if you could just go to the PC..."

It takes several attempts, but eventually I manage to to convince the sceptical techie that no amount of testing is going to fix this one...

TS - "OK Sir, in this case you need to contact Customer Services, not Technical Support.
BS - "I see, so can you transfer me please?"
TS - "No Sir, I can't do it from here, I'm afraid you'll have to call them directly"

Suffice to say that after several fruitless calls to the ISP's laughably titled "Customer Service" line, we're still no closer to having one of their installers out to repair the cable.

I give up and start calling some contacts, who in turn called some other people. Some time later I get a call back from from a pleasant chap who works for the ISP in question. I explain the problem, and he's got it in one. He passes me on to his colleague who dispatches an installation crew to repair the cable by close of business.

Out here in the world of cut-throat outsourcing, it's not what you know, it's who you know.

There's a saying they have in the used car trade - "There's someone for every car". It's usually reserved for the sort of slack jawed individual who'll turn up on spec & buy a ten year old Mondeo with an expired MOT for at least twice what it's worth. In hard cash.

A similar creature infests the world of IT. You'll recognise them easily enough. Early signs - such as your co-workers 6 year old Windows 9x home computer suddenly "appearing" on your desk without the slightest hint of what might be wrong with it (not like you can't guess) - are easily spotted.

Adopting the demeanour of the village idiot in this situation sometimes helps, but more often than not the donor, desperate enough to have brought in their pet dinosaur in the first place, will not be so easily dissuaded.

I find keeping a selection of whacking & bodging tools to hand is a good second line of defence. A village idiot with a large rubber mallet is always best avoided.

If the donor persists past this point, then further resistance is futile. You will have to deal with the issue. You already know what'll be in there of course - an eclectic brew made from every common variant of spyware garnished with a sprinkling of javascript viruses, and served on a bed of unpatched software with a side dish of Not-on System Crippler 2001.

You already know that - even if you could muster sufficient enthusiasm - it'd take nothing short of a full format & re-install to fix it, that the necessary drivers would have to be hand crafted from pure unobtanium, and that - even in reaching for the power switch - your time expended would be far in excess of what the relic itself might be worth.

You'll patiently explain all this in layman's terms to the perennially disappointed penny pincher in front of you, and then there'll be a selection of whining noises increasing in pitch as the realisation dawns on the dino-keeper that the machine is in fact too far gone to resuscitate, and the only viable option is to buy a new one.

You'll suggest a reasonable spec/price/vendor combination, and the owner of the now defunct box will grudgingly accept you're right.

Once this concept takes root, the usual reaction of the victim is to immediately hunt down the cheapest, nastiest, most underspecified, ill-assembled box they can find for less than 200 beer vouchers at the local "Computa-4-U". It'll come pre-installed with last years CPU, half the RAM necessary to run, and, just to make absolutely sure, a not-quite-free copy of Not-on System Crippler 2007.

Within six months, you'll find this box sitting on your desk, and before you sit down you'll know there are precisely two things wrong with it, namely the vendor & the user.

Unfortunately, there really is someone for every computer. Now where did I put that mallet?