Ah Beng decided last month to buy a new computer. Ah Beng's current computer was still okay, and Ah Beng didn't need another new one, but Ah Beng loves getting new toys and upgrades. So Ah Beng spent some time researching prices and got half of his parts at IT Estate (North Rocks) and Umart (Enfield).
Building computers from scratch isn't a difficult task. Whilst Ah Beng thinks it's because he's so smart, in reality pc manufacturers have really improved the quality of their products and you really can't put the right things in the wrong holes.
Ah Beng has built many computers in the past and have had no issues whatsoever. However, his latest one was problem plagued. Firstly, Ah Beng's brand new hard disk didn't work, probably because Ah Beng dropped it accidentally. Ah Beng placed the hard disk on top of his new case, then saw something interesting on the case and tilted it over to get a better look. The hard drive slipped right off. Unsurprisingly, everything else Ah Beng had there that was cheaper in value stayed in place.
Ah Beng's papa volunteered to get the hard drive exchanged since Ah Beng had to work, but had to make two trips as IT Estate didn't have the replacement hard disk to begin with.
Anyway, in the middle of last week, Ah Beng began to build his new computer. Ah Beng bought only quality parts, and got everything put in place in no time. Ah Beng then installed Windows, and experienced all sorts of weird errors while installing. Ah Beng was able to get a clean version of Windows installed, but got weird blue-screen-of-death messages and errors popping up all over the place. After spending a lot of time trying different things, Ah Beng realised it was one of the RAM sticks that was causing the problem.
Last Saturday, Ah Beng drove back to Umart (Enfield) and got the ram exchanged, then went home and reinstalled everything. All was fine on the weekend. Ah Beng ran a couple of stress and burn-in tests and things were looking good.
On Sunday, Ah Beng had an awesome badminton session. Kian Lee, Kelvin & Brian decided braving the rain at the Hunter Valley was more important than badminton and cancelled at the last minute, but Stephen, Scuba, Clinton and Ah Beng still went. Everyone played well and Ah Beng won every game except when he teamed up with Clinton.
On Monday, Ah Beng spent the day getting his computer configured just the way he liked it. At night, Ah Beng watched "The Breakup" with Miranda and it was a pretty good show. Ah Beng rushed home to watch the World Cup match between Japan and Australia and he had just missed the first controversial goal.
Ah Beng decided to check his email during the game and fired up his new computer and got the same problems as before. Ah Beng tried a couple of things and finally realised it was the motherboard that was damaging the ram, which was strange as the motherboard was an actual Intel brand board, best known for its stability as well as its exorbitant prices.
While Ah Beng was doing this, Australia scored 3 goals, all of which Ah Beng didn’t watch live as his back was turned. Ah Beng missed all 4 goals of the game.
By this stage, Ah Beng was extremely pissed off and had a hard time sleeping. The next morning, Ah Beng decided to haul the whole thing back to Umart to ask for a new replacement board and new ram. Ah Beng sent his boss a message thinking he would get everything done and be at work by 11am.
The motherboard and ram were both bought from Umart, and when Ah Beng got there, there was another family already there in need of support. They were a country chow ang moh westie family, and whilst the support staff at Umart was at the back testing, Ah Beng had a chat with them. Ah Beng found out they had the same motherboard, and that their problem was they couldn't get it started.
Ah Beng asked what other parts the chow ang moh got and he said he reused a lot of things from his old computer. Ah Beng then realised he needed a new power cable that came with new power supplies which the chow ang moh did not have. The chow ang moh then told the support staff that the part was missing and I offered mine to help them test. True enough, that was all they needed. The chow ang mohs then started making unreasonable demands, asking for compensation and full refunds but the support guy just apologised and offered to chase the supplier up for the part and have it couriered.
While this was happening, Ah Beng was waiting silently in the background for his turn. When the chow ang mohs were done, the support guy then told Ah Beng he had no boards to exchange and would have to return it to the supplier and wait for them to replace it.
Of course, that wasn't what Ah Beng wanted and Ah Beng asked to have the board returned and he would buy another brand entirely. The support staff was reluctant, but then said he would do it for a restocking fee of 10%. Ah Beng then said "Look my Cantonese isn't that great but... (in Canto) The part those guai los were after doesn't come with the board. I got mine because it came with the new power supply. Intel does not bundle the cable in with the board. That guai lo is just reusing an old power supply. I didn't want to say anythng while he was next to me as I didn't want him to think we were ganging up against him but yeah just thought you should know." Ah Beng's Cantonese was absolutely flawless and of course, Ah Beng substituted English for the technical terms but still, even Ah Beng was surpised at himself.
The guy then thanked Ah Beng for the info and Ah Beng continue to negogiate having the 10% restocking fee waived. Finally, the guy relented and Ah Beng then tried to get the ram exchanged too but it was a bit too much. The support guy also said "For someone who doesn't said his Cantonese was crap, you could've fooled me. You sounded like you were from Hong Kong". Ah Beng then replied that he always dates hongkies.
Ah Beng left Umart with the result he wanted and was happy, but by then it was 12:15pm and Ah Beng had to rush home to put everything away then go to work.
Last night, Ah Beng put his new computer with even newer parts together and all seems well so far.
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