Yup, time for another Completely Random And Pointless poll!

So, imagine the following scenario: You're in the middle of playing an
exciting match of "Call of Duty 99.5 Part II" and suddenly something
went wrong! The game crashed, your keyboard stopped responding, the
sound went all flakey; it doesn't matter what exactly. What is
important is what's going through your head.

What's the first thing you think when some unexpected catastrophe hits
your PC (you know, after the usual expletives). Something's gone
wrong and it had to be caused by something; what's your go-to
explanation for the problem, the one that your mind immediately jumps
to. I'm not talking about the actual fault; I'm not saying what you
think of after you give the problem some rational thought. I'm saying
the instant cause you assign to an issue the moment it happens.

1) It's the network. Everything is connected to the
web, so some online glitch must be at fault.

2) Drivers! It's always a flakey driver, isn't it?

3) Hardware fault. I knew that LED on the mouse was
looking a bit dim; that probably crashed the PC.

4) That damn update I just installed. Everything seemed
to go okay, but obviously it messed something up.

5) Hackers (and/or viruses). They're always out to
ruin my fun.

6) Bad Programming. Because people just don't know
how to code like they used to in the Good Old Days

7) User error. I knew I shouldn't have pushed the
space-bar that hard. Oh, why am I such a dummy
with computers?

8) Those damn kids. I told them not to mess with my PC,
but they did and now everything is messed up

9) Power fluctuations. A sudden surge in voltage caused an
overload in the framovax, discombobulating the
retro-encabulator. It happens all the time, you know.
10) Something else (give examples ;-)

11) Not applicable, as I am such a computer genius that
my first assumption is always correct

Me, I tend to vacillitate between hardware failure and viruses. It
almost never is either of those two, but if something goes screwy with
my PC, that's immediately where my brain jumps to. Did that dodgy
website I visited yesterday infect me somehow? Is my CPU overheating?
It's gotta be something like that, right?

Then I calm down, inspect the problem and discover - for the millionth
time - no, it was neither of those. It's almost never either of those
two. But the next time a program crashes or my mouse doesn't scroll
smoothly? Hackers, almost certainly this time.

So that's today's CRAP poll: tell us all what is your instant, usually
illogical and inaccurate go-to boogeyman for computer problems?

On 13/05/2023 15:22, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:
>
> Yup, time for another Completely Random And Pointless poll!
>
> [snipped]
> 10) Something else (give examples ;-)
> [snipped]

The very first thought is "can I reproduce that" as I am a developer.

If I can replicate then I think:
1 - Bad programming and
2 - Why didn't testing find it.

If I cannot replicate the problem then I ignore the issue and carry on.

Cheers

Geoff

On Saturday, May 13, 2023 at 7:22:13 AM UTC-7, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:
> Yup, time for another Completely Random And Pointless poll!
>
> So, imagine the following scenario: You're in the middle of playing an
> exciting match of "Call of Duty 99.5 Part II" and suddenly something
> went wrong! The game crashed, your keyboard stopped responding, the
> sound went all flakey; it doesn't matter what exactly. What is
> important is what's going through your head.
>
> What's the first thing you think when some unexpected catastrophe hits
> your PC (you know, after the usual expletives). Something's gone
> wrong and it had to be caused by something; what's your go-to
> explanation for the problem, the one that your mind immediately jumps
> to. I'm not talking about the actual fault; I'm not saying what you
> think of after you give the problem some rational thought. I'm saying
> the instant cause you assign to an issue the moment it happens.
>
> 1) It's the network. Everything is connected to the
> web, so some online glitch must be at fault.
>
> 2) Drivers! It's always a flakey driver, isn't it?
>
> 3) Hardware fault. I knew that LED on the mouse was
> looking a bit dim; that probably crashed the PC.
>
> 4) That damn update I just installed. Everything seemed
> to go okay, but obviously it messed something up.
>
> 5) Hackers (and/or viruses). They're always out to
> ruin my fun.
>
> 6) Bad Programming. Because people just don't know
> how to code like they used to in the Good Old Days
>
> 7) User error. I knew I shouldn't have pushed the
> space-bar that hard. Oh, why am I such a dummy
> with computers?
>
> 8) Those damn kids. I told them not to mess with my PC,
> but they did and now everything is messed up
>
> 9) Power fluctuations. A sudden surge in voltage caused an
> overload in the framovax, discombobulating the
> retro-encabulator. It happens all the time, you know.
>
> 10) Something else (give examples ;-)
>
> 11) Not applicable, as I am such a computer genius that
> my first assumption is always correct
>
> Me, I tend to vacillitate between hardware failure and viruses. It
> almost never is either of those two, but if something goes screwy with
> my PC, that's immediately where my brain jumps to. Did that dodgy
> website I visited yesterday infect me somehow? Is my CPU overheating?
> It's gotta be something like that, right?
>
> Then I calm down, inspect the problem and discover - for the millionth
> time - no, it was neither of those. It's almost never either of those
> two. But the next time a program crashes or my mouse doesn't scroll
> smoothly? Hackers, almost certainly this time.
>
>
> So that's today's CRAP poll: tell us all what is your instant, usually
> illogical and inaccurate go-to boogeyman for computer problems?

My knee-jerk is

#1 Oh no, my HW decided to give up the ghost! Almost never actually
the issue though.

#2 it's overstressing my poor old HW and I need to upgrade, but maybe
I can change some settings and get it working. This used to be the
actual cause most of the time. But a rarity, my HW is decent at the
moment.

#3 the game is poorly made, but ties in to #2, search for settings to
fix it.

Everyone online's first thing is always to check your driver versions,
reinstall the game, etc. I've literally never had upgrading drivers or
reinstalling the game do anything for game issues.

- Justisaur

On 5/13/2023 7:22 AM, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:
>
> Yup, time for another Completely Random And Pointless poll!
>
<snippage to save space which is infinite.>

> So that's today's CRAP poll: tell us all what is your instant, usually
> illogical and inaccurate go-to boogeyman for computer problems?
>
4) That damn update I just installed. Everything seemed to go okay, but
obviously it messed something up.

Because that is almost always what the problem is, some incomplete, not
sufficiently tested if it was tested at all, "update" intended to add
some feature I don't want and won't use or to "fix" some feature that I
rely on that the developers don't want customers to be able to use anymore.

And I don't care that it is logical and accurate, it is still my answer.

--
I've done good in this world. Now I'm tired and just want to be a cranky
dirty old man.

On Sat, 13 May 2023 10:22:03 -0400, Spalls Hurgenson
<spallshurgenson@gmail.com> wrote:

>So that's today's CRAP poll: tell us all what is your instant, usually
>illogical and inaccurate go-to boogeyman for computer problems?

Depends on the problem that occurred and what I'm doing when it
occurred. In terms of gaming, if something goes wrong like the game
just freezes, blue screens, etc I first tend to suspect heat issues.
My current PC is air cooled and when things are tweaked to run as fast
as they should, the video card can deliver heat to the box faster than
it can vent (at least with the current placement of it). I solved it
once and for all by just putting a $15 Honeywell floor fan next to it
to move the hot air leaving it in the desired direction and it made
all the difference in the world.

Most of my previous PCs didn't generate as much heat or for whatever
reason internal airflow was better, so this was the first PC I've had
to take any sort of steps to remedy.

Temperature fluctuations probably enter my mind first because one of
my other hobbies... and the impact of temperature changes on analog
synthesizers.. Hot/cold fluctuactions make them go wonky and out of
tune, and if you have a lot of them it's kind of a pain in the ass to
constantly retune them so you become kind of an expert at various
solutions to stabilize room temperatures and coordinate airflow by
necessity.

On Sat, 13 May 2023 10:22:03 -0400, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action,
Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

>Drivers! It's always a flakey driver, isn't it?

Yeah. Roll back to the previous Nvidia driver. Makes me #11 because it
almost always work.

I have gigs of Nvidia drivers in storage.

--
Zag

No one ever said on their deathbed, 'Gee, I wish I had
spent more time alone with my computer.' ~Dan(i) Bunten

I'll go for a bug or at least an interaction with my particular system
that exhibits as a bug.