I need a rant...

Is hardware becoming more complicated, users becoming more clueless,
or both.

I get a panic call from a customer announcing that her HP Envy ink jet
printer refuses to print from her iPad 1 via Airprint. She's
desperate to print her Groupon discount coupons (obviously a major
emergency). She had followed my previous instructions to power cycle
and reboot everything involved if something appears to be hung, but
without any success. I rush over, expecting a hardware or
configuration problem. Instead, all that was wrong was that she
hadn't turned on the power on the printer, or as she put it, I had
forgotten to tell her to turn on the power, making this my fault.

However, upon closer inspection, I noticed that the only different
between the HP Envy printer front panel in the power off condition,
and in the power on but standby condition, was one dim white LED lamp
which was very easy to miss. To insure that it's never seen, the
viewing angle is rather narrow. I didn't even notice this LED until
shoved my face into the printer trying to clear a printer jam. The
reason for the small dim LED is that many such printers end up in
bedrooms and it would do to have the printer light up the whole room
at night.

So, which is it? Is computah hardware becoming more complicated, or
does exposure to computers cause the brain to turn into mush?


--
Jeff Liebermann
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558