Hey Everybody in Portland Computer Repair Land,
Something we harp on frequently a security method is picking strong passwords.  The security of your password is more important that your choice of anti-virus program!
Anyways, this new article sums it all up pretty neatly, so go give it a read. Most impressive to me is the chart showing exactly how long it would take to crack your current password -

Lifehacker article – how I would hack your password

Thanks!

-Zac

Owner

Happy Hamster Portland Computer Repair

Hey Everybody in Portland Computer Repair Land,
Since we posted the “about us” section of our website, more people have visited that page than any other page on the site. It beats out its nearest competitor (price) by almost 2 page views to 1! People really care more about who we are, then what it costs, which I think is pretty neat.
So, now that I know there is a bit of biographical interest in my employees, I think I’m going to do a little series on them on the blog.

I’m going to start with my Vice President and Junior Partner, Jay Sigler. Jay, interestingly enough, was not going to working at Happy Hamster. He originally came in to apply as a technician, and I found his skills to be  rusty, and out of date. However, while interviewing, it came to light that Jay previously owned a roofing company with 65 employees for which he did all of the sales and marketing work. At that point, about 4 months ago, Happy Hamster outgrew my ability to do everything in it, so I was thinking about hiring on a marketing guy.

I gave Jay a shot on a 3 month contract to see what he could do for the company from a marketing perspective. It was an interesting experiment for the company, as he was my first non-technician hire.  Things worked out pretty well (hey, he still works here!) as he found adverting opportunities for us that I never knew existed, and in many cases got us free advertising from sources from which I normally would have paid. He also reworked many of our existing advertising contracts, and achieved substantial savings on all of them.  Our traffic increased even more than usual once he started working for us, running nearly 20% a month for those 3 months, compared to about 10% a month before he started.

Additionally as a side effect of his sitting in the back of the room, out of the mainstream flow of the shop, he has a good opportunity to observe the shop in action. This removed position lets him see long term trends in how the shop runs that I don’t notice, focused as I am on the day to day operations.  Really, he has in many ways slipped in to fill the gaps in our coverage of a host of issues, and he has helped me out a great deal by taking over tasks I simply no longer have time to do properly. He is also soon going to be starting to post on this blog about subjects relevant to business computer repair and marketing.
So, if you have any sales or marketing inquiries, you’ll find yourself in Jay’s inbox, and I’m glad to know that he’s more then up to that task.

Thanks!

Zac

Owner

Happy Hamster Portland Computer Repair

Hey Everybody in Portland Computer Repair Land,

It’s about midnight, and I just rode home on my bike from the shop. I had a late night because Happy Hamster had to demonstrate how far above and beyond it will go for its business computer repair customers. You see, one of our customers is Alu wine bar, a popular bar near our store. As I began to close up shop at 6:30 PM tonight, one of the owners came running up to our shop. He told me that their primary computer for processing credit cards had crashed.

So, me and my technician, Matt Culp, ran to the bar to being investigating the situation. We tested the computer as well as we could, then took it back to the shop for further analysis. We quickly realized, when investigation with a powerful overhead light, that the computer had overheated and popped some of its capacitors. Unfortunately, because the computer was a specialized small form factor machine, there would be no way to repair it without ordering parts.

Waiting a few days to process credit cards is unacceptable to a business, so we jumped into action on plan B. We have all the parts in our shop to build new computers, so, on a dime, we turned around and built one for Alu.  We transfered all the data from their old system, and we installed their brand new computer at about 10:30 PM. After a bit of set up, they were back in business and processing credit cards like normal.

Businesses don’t have time to wait, thats why the smart business choice is to rely on Happy Hamster Computer Repair.
Now, after a 15 hour day, I’m going to bed….

-Zac

Hey Everything in Portland Computer Repair Land,

When you see a computer advertised, it will often say it has an intel processor, or crucial RAM, but what about the internal components that they don’t advertise?

There are two very important parts in every computer that nobody ever advertises on the outside. One is the motherboard. The motherboard is the most expensive and most important part of your computer. It is the computer’s spinal column, responsible for transmitting all of the signals between the various components inside the computer. When you save a document, the command goes from the keyboard, to the motherboard, and from the motherboard to the processor. The processor processes the command, then sends it back to the motherboard which sends it over to the hard drive.

And yet, nobody ever advertises the motherboard! And believe me, there are substantial qualitative differences between motherboards. For example, consider the question of expandability. Different motherboards have different options for how they can be expanded to make your computer run faster, and live longer down the line.  For example, ask how many RAM slots your motherboard contains. The number of available RAM slots will directly affect your ability to upgrade your computer down the line, and the cost of the upgrades.

A computer with 2 RAM slots will be much more expensive to upgrade than a computer with 4 RAM slots, a computer with two upgrade slots for extra cards (for example, to add wireless capability to your computer, or to add firewire support) has more room to upgrade than many new computers that come with zero expansion slots.

Then, beyond speed and upgrade cost, there is raw quality to consider. If your motherboard says, “Foxconn” on it, it will fail in 12-18 months, because Foxconn builds the cheapest piece of crap boards in the world (and supplies every motherboard for the Gateway corporation). If your motherboard says “MSI” on it, don’t expect more than 24 months out of it, because you probably won’t get it.  And when a motherboard fails, you’ll be out of pocket serious cash. The average motherboard replacement, parts and labor, costs $300-400!

Finally, lets consider the power supply, a part few people know exists. You see, your computer can’t use the power that comes out of the wall, so inside the computer there is a box that converts the power from the wall into power your computer can actually use. This box is called the power supply, and its the single most important thing you will buy.

The power supply matters most because of the damage it can do if/when it fails. Often times when a power supply fails, it will surge with power, or provide insufficient power before it stops working. When it surges, it frequently overpowers and destroys many valuable components inside your computer. A failing power supply can take out your hard drive, motherboard, and processor, and by itself become the cause of buying a new computer. This means, for want of a high quality power supply (price of $60 or so) you can lose all your data, and almost everything else in your computer.

Finally, wattage matters a great deal. Power supplies are rated in watts, and if your computer draws more than 80% of the wattage rating of the supply, the odds of failure skyrocket.

So, the next time you go to the store, ask a few questions -

1) Who manufacturers my motherboard, and what kind of warranty do they provide beyond the included 1 year warranty for the computer?

2) How much expansion is available on my motherboard so I can grow with my computer in the future?

3) Who manufacturers my power supply, and what kind of warranty do they provide beyond the included 1 year warranty for the computer?

4) What is the maximum load of my power supply as a percentage? How much wattage does it produce?

5) Does my power supply have extra wattage available for upgrades in the future that may draw additional power?

If your sales rep can’t answer those questions, don’t buy it.

Thanks,

-Zac

Hey Everybody in Portland Computer Repair Land,
One big thing to think about that nobody ever advertises is the quality of the wiring job done inside a computer. Inside your little 2 foot square box there may be 5-15 feet of wiring, depending on how many components your computer has. You may wonder why the wiring matters, but the answer is simple – heat.

Computer components get a rated life from the manufacturer for various temperatures. For example, an Asus motherboard is rated for 500,000 hours at 60 degrees Celsius, which is 140 degrees. That may sound hot, but it’s actually fairly normal for a high end computer.

Now, as the temperature rises, the lifetime of components will rapidly decrease. This means your cost will also rapidly increase. A great example of this is HP’s laptops, the DV2000, 6000 and 9000. HP’s faulty design means most of these computers overheat and fail within 2 years, instead of the 5 years that a previous generation HP lasted.

So now that we know heat matters, we can get to why wiring matters.

As you may or may not know, that noise you hear from your computer is the fans running. Your computer has 2-5 fans inside blowing 24/7 when the computer is turned on to move heat out of the computer. That cooling action, though, only works as well as air can move through the case. If your case is wired poorly, air can’t move through the case, and that will stop heat from leaving the case.

So next time you buy a computer, ask them to open the side, and look at the fans. Check and see -

1) Does any wiring obstruct the fans? Can air move smoothly through the case?

2) Are there any wire “bundles” hidden and tied up in the case that might create dangerous heat pockets?

3) Are any areas of the case out of the range of the fans? Is there only one fan at the bottom of the case, but lots of items up at the top of the case?

The way your computer is wired can be the difference between a machine that lasts 18 months and one that lasts 4 years, even with identical components.

Thanks!

-Zac