So, you want to be a pc repair technician?

Well, lets start off by examining

some of the roles and responsiblilites of the different types of pc technicians.

PC support technician: These IT professionals mostly work on site, closely

interacting with users and are responsible for maintaining computer systems
primarily before they have problems. Some job titles that fall into this category
include Enterprise technician, IT administrator, PC technician, Support
technician, and PC support specialist.

PC service technician: A pc service technician is the one that generally goes to

a customer's site in response to a service call and attempts to repair the system
on site. Service technicians usually are not responsible for maintaining systems
before they malfunction. They may also have interaction with users, but not as
much as the support technician would. Some job titles that fall into this category
include Field technician or Field service technician.

Bench technician (also known as a depot technician): I know you may be thinking
that this tech might work on benches, but the answer is no (my attempt at
humor...,hey don't hate the player, hate the game ok). A bench technician works in
a lab environment, might or might not interact with users of the systems being
repaired and they are never permanently responsible for the systems. They usually
do not go to the customer's site and may or may not get to interview a customer
concerning what the problem is.

Help desk technician: These techs provide telephone or online support. They
interact with customers over the phone or online so they never actually get to see
or examine the system (which makes it a bit tougher). They must rely strictly on
what the user is telling them to figure out what the problems is and attempt to
guide the user through the steps to fix the problem. Some of the job titles might
include Remote support technician and Call center technician.

Now that we have discussed the four types of technicians, have you deceided
which one you want to be when you grow up? if so, then great let us continue on
with some of the things you need to be or do on a personal level before we get
deeper into our discussion.
As you might consider yourself a worthy candidate for entering the Professional
class, there are some traits you as an individual must have. These could mean the
difference between a great technician or finding a rewarding career as the local
dog catcher. I am going to lable the next section of our little pow- wow as TRAITS
because your customers are going to expect that you exibit these as a
Professional.

TRAITS OF THE TRADE

#1. Be honest: It has been my experience that honsesty is expected and appreciated
by customers and employers. If you do not know what the problem is, then be up
front and honest with the customer and explain to them that you have done the best
you can at determining what the problem is, but you are unable to find and fix it
(in other words " I am sorry, I just do not know what the problem is"). Your
customers know that not everyone is perfect and will respect you more if you are
totally honest with them, because if you lie and feed them a line of crap the
customer will probably not be coming back to you nor will they suggest to friends,
family, and co-workers to use your services.

#2 Have a positive and helpful attitude: I do not know how many times I have
called for different services and talked to someone over the phone that was rude,
indifferent, or just plain ignorant. If you do not want to be bothered with
helping people with problems or answer questions, then do not go into the IT
business (or any customer related business for that matter) because helping and
answering questions from customers is a big portiong of the job. No one likes
talking to people that acts like you are bothering or hasseling them, even though
this is part of their job.

#3 Be dependable: This is really important to your employer, because he/she wants

someone that will be at work on time, do their jobs, help customers, fix systems,
etc.
Your customers also want to be able to depend on you to help them with their
problems and questions. If you promise a customer or your employer that you will
do something, then by gosh do it. Back in the day, a man's word was their bond and
if you are the type of person that does not keep their word, then I would suggest
you choose another career field, because customers are quick to jump down your
throat because you basically lied to them.

#4 Be customer focused: What does being customer focused mean? hmmmm let us ponder
this thought for a moment shall we? I can tell you this, it does not mean starring
down a young ladies loose fitting shirt. It means this, every customer that walks
through your doors or calls your support line wants and needs to feel like they
are the only customer in the world that you have. They expect to be treated with
respect, greeted upon entering or calling the establishment, they want fast and
reliable service, and they want a technician that is competent and acts
professional. You as a professional need to act accordingly to your title and that
means you need to be as helpful to the customer as possible.

#5 Be curtious and repectful: There will be times in your career that you may
experience a very dissatisfied customer which will not be very happy with the
service, customer relations, and above all the bill. They may shout, cuss, point,
and in extreme cases fall onto the floor into the fetal position while kicking and
screaming. What should I do in this sitituation you may be asking yourself? Well,
the first and most important thing is to never engage in an arguement with a
customer, this will only add fuel to the fire. The responsible thing is to remain
calm, speak respectfully to the customer, offer an explination as to who, what,
when, why, and how to the questions they may have been shouting at you. If all
else fails offer the customer to speak with your supervisor or manager to help
them better resolve their problem.

TOOLS, TOOLS, AND MORE TOOLS

Now that we have all that out of the way, we can continue onto answering some
questions as to what kind of tools should every good IT Professional have at their
disposal. Without the proper tools how can you expect to do your work properly?
When I was in the military we had what we called the 6 P's which goes like this:
Prior Planning Prevents Pee (had to clean that up a bit, but you get what I am
saying) Poor Performance. What that basically means is that if you do not plan and
take the proper equipement with you on a service call, then you are basically
dooming yourself to failure. Think about how embarrasing it would be to go to a
customer's establishment to work on their system and you forgot your screw driver
or multi-meter and can not work on the system properly. The following is a list of
tools every Professional technician should always have at their disposal.

1. Ground bracelet, ground mat, or ground gloves to use when working inside the
computer case.
2. A set of screw drivers both phillip and flat head of various sizes.
3. Torx screwdriver set, particularly size T15.
4. Tweezers that are insulated, for picking out small debris in printers and
system cases.
5. An extractor ( a spring loaded device that when you push the top, three wire
prongs extend and can be used to pick up small objects that may have fallen where
they can not be reached by other means, like screws.
6 Recovery cd, dvd, or floppy disk for any operating system you might work on.
7. AC outlet tester (this is good when determining if a power problem is in the
outlet or surge protector).
8. Loop back plugs for testing ports.
9. Cans of compressed air or a small anti static vacuum cleaner.
10. Cleaning fluids and pads.
11. Needle nose pliers.
12. Multi-meter for testing voltages, amperage, resistance, etc.
13. A small but good flashlight.
14. Network cable tester.
15. Diagnostic cards (expensive, but will save you time and headaches) these you
can plug directly into slots and they run diagnostics and determine what the
problem is and give you a readout in a code format.
16. Antistatic bags so if you must remove a component you can place it in the bag
without fear of it being damaged by ESD.
17. Utility software like virus detection and diagnostic software on a floppy or
cd.
18. Pen and a note book because it is important for you as a technician to write
everything you did to the system down and maintain good records.

TROUBLESHOOTING STEPS

Ahhhhh troubleshooting sweet troubleshooting. This is one of those areas that I

believe scares the daylights out of new technicians because it makes them feel
like they are not prepared or that they do not know what they are doing. The
reality of troubleshooting is that no one ever stops learning, because even techs
that have been doing it for 20 years still run across the occasional problem that
is very difficult to solve. Do not let troubleshooting scare you, there is an easy
and systematic way to approach this issue that will help even the most
unexperienced tech see the light of day. The following are logical steps that will
help you solve a problem.

1. Define the problem: This is where having good people skills come into play
because you will need to ask the user or customer several questions to help you
define what the problem may be.

Can you show me the problem? This is probably one of the most important
questions you can ever ask because it allows the user to show you exactly where
and when they experienced the problem.

How often does this happen? This can help determine if the problem is a one time
deal or an ongoing situation. It can also help you determine if a possible reboot
can solve it or if you may need something more dramatic like a software
intallation or hardware component replacement.

Has any new hardware or software been recently installed? If the answer is yes,
this can give you a good starting point in your troubleshooting steps. Usually if
a user installs something new they more than likely did not install or configure
it properly.

Has any other changes been made to the system lately? If the answer is yes, ask
approximatly when this happened and if the problem started around the same time
then again you have a good idea where to start looking.

2. Check the simple stuff first: This is the basis for any troubleshooting
situation because you should always start with the simple stuff and work your way
up. It may sound stupid, but if a customer for examle has a problem with the
monitor and states it will not turn on and you check to see if it is plugged in,
you would be surprised at how many times this happens. So you should check if it
is plugged in, is it turned on, is the system ready, and check to see that all
cards and modules are seated properly.

3. Check to see if it is user error: A common problem is that you will have a
customer complain that their computer will not let them do something or they can't
run this or that. A very basic question to ask after these types of statements
would be to ask if they ever could do this or that. Again, you will be surprised
at how many might say "no" which indicates that they do not know how to do this or
that. So when you hear key words like "I can't" you might want to consider user
error first. If they answer yes, then you can move onto the next step.

4. Reboot the computer: Reboot the computer? why? A simple rebooting of the
computer system can solve a lot of problems and can also be used as a tool in your
diagnosis. When you reboot the system it clears memory and starts with a clean
slate, not to mention that it can tell you valuable information like error codes,
messages, or beeps which indicates specific problems.

5. Determine if the problem may be software or hardware: You can help determine
this again by talking to the user and ask questions. For example if the user tells
you that he/she was trying to load a disc in the drive but it will not open, you
pretty much know that something may be wrong with the cd drive.

6. If the problem is hardware related, determine which component is failing:

Agian, it is important to ask questions and do inspections. Here is where sight,
sound, smell come into play. When you turn the system on, do you hear any strange
sounds? Do you smell anything like something is burning or is burnt? Doing a
visual inspection inside the case is also very important, you need to be looking
to see if fans are working properly, is there any burnt places on the motherboard
or melted wires, does it look like anything has been spilt inside the case, is
everything plugged in, are the cards and modules seated properly, on the
motherboard is the led (if applicable) on to indicate the motherboard is getting
power, do you hear the hard drive spin up, etc.

7. If the problem is software related, boot clean: This means starting the
computer with a bootable diskette that uses a CONFIG.SYS and AUTOEXEC.BAT with no
third party drivers.
If the software that's experiencing the problem is incompatible with something in
these clean (config.sys and autoexec.bat) files, this will indicate the problem.
Rebooting in safe mode can function in a similar manner for windows 9x and 2000 as
minimal drivers are loaded.

8. Check service information sources: Reading the service manuals can be a

tremendous help to any pc technician. Do not get a big head and think you know it,
when you don't and do not be affraid to consult these documents because they can
save you valuable time.

9. One step at a time: When troubleshooting make one change at a time, if the
change does not solve the problem, restore the system back to it's orginal state
before making another change. It is also a great help if you document everything
you do to the system, what happened when you did it, and what you did when it did
or did not work.

10. Ask for help: If at long last you can not figure out what the problem is, ask
for help from someone with more experience. Do not be stubborn and keep on banging
your head against a brick wall, stop and ask someone for a new perspective on the
matter.
 TEACH YOUR CUSTOMERS THE WAYS OF THE FORCE, LUKE

Ok, another part of your job is to help educate your customers about their
systems and what they can do to help prevent future problems. You need to explain
to the customers how to use the scan disk utilities, defrag their systems, advise
them about antivirus, spyware, firewalls and security measures and why they are
important to have. You need to show them how to do preventative maintenance on
their systems to keep them working properly, how to clean and keep their systems
free from dust and dirt, explain how to keep their printers clean and working
properly, etc. Your customer will respect you more and give you repeat business if
you take the time to teach them how to take care of their systems and prevent
potential problems from happening. A happy customer equals a happy and well paid
technician.

created by bobby1234 2/11/08