obediah

I was having an argument with the fiancee the other day, and wanted to throw up a non-poll poll to see what consensus is on two subjects (and how they are related)

1) How much time do you spend searching for a solution to a computer problem before asking for volunteer help? I'm not talking a paid call to tech support, but a question to this board, usenet, a mailing list, etc...

2) How skilled would you say you are at searching? Do you usually find what you want right away?

I will usually search an hour or so, and only ask questions if I have a complex or seemingly unique problem while my fiancee prefers to just ask in an appropriate forum or list, mainly because she has trouble finding answers to her questions through search tools.

Now I'll wait for someone to pull out a buried thread on the same topic and lambast me.

oblar

hmm, as for me, I would say I would ask a friend if I think they might know the answer off the top of their head. Otherwise, I would then search and scour and if I still cannot come up with a suitable answer then I will goto a newsgroup.

However, I try to search as much as I can before I goto newsgroups or the like for help, just because usually my questions have already been answered somewhere..

but I am also a nerd who routinely reads technical newsgroups just to see the problems and solutions other people are encountering

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TwistedFate

I don't search too long. Maybe a half hour. I'm usually pretty good at searching the net. I always seem to find things in a fraction of the time that most of my friends and associates can. Most of my friends will call me to find answers to their problems cause it is faster than searching for themselves. My problem is I have a tendancy to continue to search after I ask and many times I find the answer immediately after asking.

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mrquackers

Really depends on the problem for me. Not too long ago, I'd immediately call a friend of mine who's a developer and knows computers inside and out. We had a falling out, though, and I don't have any interest in talking with him these days. My brother-in-law is real good at figuring out what's wrong, but he's 900 miles away - and I risk the wrath of my sister if I call when the kids are screaming, 'cause he then has an excuse to get away from that.

So, lately, I've been taking it upon myself and letting my stubborn streak take over - so the search can last several hours.

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Silvy

My search could last a long time depending on the urgency of the problem...

I can usually fix the problems by searching ('cause most anything has been answered before).

If the problem is urgent my searches last longer, my experience is that getting questions answered through a forum is generally slower than finding it yourself. But that could just be my stubbornness or lack of knowing good forums

I'm pretty new to TFP, I'll try here next time

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chainsawred

I tend to search for quite a while, myself. But some of these folks on the TFP will help you out with a quickness. I got valuable advice in the middle of the night one time, in like under 30 minutes.

Jolt

On my own, I take as long as I need and don't ever ask, unless it's about some piece of software I know nothing about. My time is better invested learning the how and the why.

At work (I build swervers), when something unusual comes up, I work on it for ten minutes, ask co-workers, then if need be, within another ten minutes, one of us is on the phone to vendor support. Time=money when production deadlines are looming.

The_Dude

i usually ask for help right away cuz it usually takes days to get a reply (if asking tech support) and i have all that time to search.

i search extensively for a problem and usually find the solution.

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Pragma

Now, my answer may not be entirely accurate, as I work in the IT field professionally:

If I'm having some minor issue, be it one that's an inconvenience or else one that's not stopping me from doing major work, I'll figure it out on my own by randomly trying things, hit up Google for 10 minutes or less to see if I can turn up anything, and failing that, I'll ask coworkers or other friends.

If I don't have any luck with that, I may think about firing off a few e-mails to newsgroups, but at that point in time, it'd be one hell of a problem, so I probably won't get a reply for a while.

As for advising other people, I'd say to first copy and paste the error message into Google, see if you get any hits. If you do, read what other people have to say, see if anything looks like it would work.

If you can't find anything helpful, go ask friends who are technically minded for advice. Most of them won't mind helping out a little bit, (compensation, folks. You won't ask a friend to change your oil for you without splitting a six-pack of beer with them, why should fixing your computer be any different?).

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curveedv8

Usually I'll browse until I find something, today's post was the first "help" I've sent out into the big blue yonder but I figured that my problem was a pretty common one and someone would be able to help without too much trouble much quicker than I'd be able to search it because I didn't know what it was I was looking for.

irieemon

I get paid by the hour to solve problems, and usually will spend a maximum of 2 hours finding a solution to a technical problem if it's critical before I call Microsoft.

Otherwise, I research it for a long time (unpaid) till I find the solution. It's a point of pride and I learn better that way.