[phantomdragonz]

My 75 year old grandma recently bought a 24" iMac, she has never used a computer before, so it's been a challenge. Also, she lives in California and I live in Colorado. Tech Support is an interesting endeavor to say the least.

However, this is not a rant post, but actually this whole process would be impossible without me being able to see her monitor and take control, which I use Logmein... I was thinking about used back to my mac, which would also work, but I liked the web interface of logmein.

I am not affiliated with logmein at all
I have having just gotten off the phone with her and helping her get access to her gmail account and explaining the login process and I was realizing that it would have been impossible without it.

so I guess my point is that if you have a family member that is computer challenged and you are the person who gets the phone call having the free logmein account is a godsend, check it out it works!

wow, this really sounds like spam, but I have read many posts complaining about helping inept family members with computers and thought this might help.

What crazy tech help stories do you have?

[imitchellg5]

I just use screen sharing with iChat.

[AKcrab]

Seconded. You can set ichat to launch at login, and with chax you can have it automatically accept the screen share request.

[subego]

I had a friend who made me get up at three in the morning, drive out to him, and...

Unstick his bike chain.

Seriously. It had only slid between a pair of sprockets. I fixed it in less than one second.

[nonhuman]

Originally Posted by subego 

I had a friend who made me get up at three in the morning, drive out to him, and...

Unstick his bike chain.

Seriously. It had only slid between a pair of sprockets. I fixed it in less than one second.

I assume that's the reason you used the past tense when talking about this 'friend'?

[Sealobo]

i made a booty call last week and failed.

[mattyb]

Logmein rulez. I do Tech support for my parents and out-laws using it. A long time ago (in a galaxy far, far away) somebody I know used to check on their torrents progression from work using it.

[brassplayersrock²]

Originally Posted by Sealobo 

i made a booty call last week and failed.

Did the silent alarm got tripped?

Here's a tip. When taking control of her screen, don't do it for her. Make her do it while you watch. Then explain what she did to fix the problem. Then the next time, she's more apt to remember how to do it herself.

[subego]

Originally Posted by nonhuman 

I assume that's the reason you used the past tense when talking about this 'friend'?

No, just sloppy grammar.

As you might imagine, he felt really stupid afterwards, so it wasn't too hard to forgive.

[ghporter]

Originally Posted by hayesk 

Here's a tip. When taking control of her screen, don't do it for her. Make her do it while you watch. Then explain what she did to fix the problem. Then the next time, she's more apt to remember how to do it herself.

Excellent advice. You can "point out" what she needs to click on, but have her do it. Explain what each step does, especially if/when she needs to provide an input.

Learning by doing is always superior to imitating what someone else did.

[Eug]

Originally Posted by hayesk 

Make her do it while you watch.

Quoted just because of the complex hilarity of out-of-context English language.

[turtle777]

-t

Originally Posted by Eug 

Quoted just because of the complex hilarity of out-of-context English language.

I LOL'ed. And I never LOL. Not by myself, anyway.

[ghporter]

And here I skipped right over such an obvious line...