The Boston Diaries

The ongoing saga of a programmer who doesn't live in Boston, nor does he even like Boston, but yet named his weblog/journal “The Boston Diaries.”

Go figure.

Sunday, February 17, 2002

Connectivity II

Since Rob called last time, this time it was my turn to listen to light jazz over the phone.

I call. I'm informed that for quality assurance this call might be monitored. I'm also informed that I'll be listening to the light jazz for twenty minutes while Technical Support busily ignores my call. So I wait.

Maybe fifteen minutes later I get Tech Rep #1. After getting the appropriate contact information Tech Rep #1 finally asks what the problem is.

“Yes, I just bought a new network card for my computer,” I said. “I think you setup is storing the MAC address of the old network card so I need for you to remove it and let me renew the DHCP lease with the new network card.”

“Okay, could you please repeat that again?”

Fifteen minutes and a dozen repeats of what I want done later, he gives me a case number and informs me that I'll be passed up the Tech Food Chain to Tech Rep #2. A few minutes of light jazz later, Tech Rep #2 picks up the phone. “What is your case number?”

I give Tech Rep #2 the case number and repeat the request. Twice. Then Tech Rep #2 has me rattle off the old MAC address. At this point, I'm pretending to be Rob, since his name is on the account, and I'm yelling at Rob to rattle off MAC addresses since the computers in question are in his room, and the phone is in my room. If Tech Rep #2 clued in to what was happening, Tech Rep #2 didn't say anything, which is a Good Thing. Then I have to rattle off the new MAC address. Reset the cable modem, grab a new IP address using DHCP and we're good to go.

Unfortunately, I think this means I'll be making the tech support calls from now on.

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