If you are having a technical issue with your computer, and you need
assistance, your best bet is to call your manufacturers technical
support line. In most cases, technical support is part of the package
when you first purchased your computer. If, for some reason, you are
unable to use your computer manufacturers help desk services, here are
a few free help desk sites on the Internet.
Tech Support Guy claims to be the #1 tech support site on the web and
can be found at http://www.helponthe.net. Tech Support Guy help desk
site offers free assistance to users of Microsoft Windows 95, 98, NT,
ME, 2000, XP and Linux.
This site is free because it is run completely by volunteers and is
paid for by donations. Donations are requested but not required to use
this site. The way this site works is that first you must search the
topic of you problem. If you can’t find it, then you can post your
technical issue on one of Tech Support Guy’s forum pages where other
users of the site will try and assist you.
One positive aspect of this site is that it has an extensive forum of
questions from previous users so you will most likely receive the
answer to your technical issue pretty quickly. One negative aspect of
this site is that it is up to you to find the answer to your technical
issue. There isn’t a customer service support representative to walk
you through your technical issue at this help desk.
5 S tar Support technical services can be found on the web at
http://www.5starsupport.com. This help desk provides support to users
of Windows, Linux, Internet Explorer, Outlook Express, Netscape,
Windows Messenger, AOL, Networking troubleshooting, Microsoft Office
Products.
Simply enter your technical issue in a web form that will be emailed to
several volunteer technical support representatives and then wait to
receive your reply back. You may receive several replies from several
different representatives and each solution may be different. You may
email the representative back if you are unable to satisfactorily fix
your technical issue.
For people who want a solution faster, there is a method available
where you can phone a computer support specialist and they can talk you
through a solution to your technical issue. There is a small fee for
this service however and can be purchased in annual, monthly or per
incident increments.
Another service the 5 star offers is free PC help tutorials on topics
such as Clean Installation of Windows XP, Install a Home Network,
Configuring a Network Card and Partition a Hard Drive.
Suggest A Fix can be found at http://www.suggestafix.com. This site
also is run by volunteers but is a free service. It is forum based as
well and you need to take the time to scroll through the posting to
find something that matches your particular issue. However, in the
toolbar virus information and tutorials are also available as quick
options.
The best thing about the forums is that you will usually receive good
quality answers to your technical or general computing questions. There
are a few dedicated people that seem to field a majority of the
questions, so depending on the time and day; your answers may vary
greatly.
