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Geek Culture / If you ran a tech support bussiness?

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hatlawyer
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Posted: 25th Jan 2009 23:59 Edited at: 25th Jan 2009 23:59
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If you ran a tech support business would you employ people who only knew about microsoft software?

I got into this disscussion with my mate who thinks it would be acceptable as a general tech support or computer repair bussiness to employ poeple who had experiance of only one operating system brand.

Personally i think it would be quite silly cause if there was any change in the industry then a good deal of your staff will then not know enough to work with newer computers.

what does everyone else think?

Leonardo Dicaprio is so hawt!!!
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bitJericho
22
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Joined: 9th Oct 2002
Location: United States
Posted: 26th Jan 2009 00:08
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Quote: "what does everyone else think?"


It depends on the business requirements and the person's experience. Any company would probably be more apt to hire you if you have linux and windows experience, vs only windows experience.

"I acctually quite like this site. And noone will know because this is a secret..." - Anonymous
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flashing snall
19
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Joined: 8th Oct 2005
Location: Boston
Posted: 26th Jan 2009 04:00
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Quote: "any change in the industry"


Well, I think that any change that was big enough to knock out all your staff would also be big enough to come with a giant manual to read up on.

But yea, if you have a geeksquad like business, then hire people who know their stuff with windows. If you have to choose between a PC freak, and a PC freak who knows some linux and a bit of OSX, then hire the second guy.

PGDO. it consumes my every waking moment, that is not already being eaten by work / school / sleeping
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feiting shadow
18
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Joined: 12th Sep 2006
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Posted: 26th Jan 2009 09:25
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I used to work for "The squad"... and I run my own biz on the side as tech support.

The only real "extra" I've had to use is making batch files to refresh things on startup thanks to how vista "works".

Macintosh is a nice plus, and I "can" use/work on them, but I haven't for 6 years now.

As long as you know how the internals work, and how to read .hlp/.cfm, you're good enough to be a tech. Where I am anyway.

(google does the rest btw, heh)

Signed
------
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Van B
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22
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Joined: 8th Oct 2002
Location: Sunnyvale
Posted: 26th Jan 2009 09:28
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The chances are that the more someone knows about other OS's like Linux, the less they will know about Windows.

I'd choose the person with the most Windows server experience everytime, because that's where the problems arise that cost the most money to fix and can warrant the most money to fix. I've been in the IT industry for 13 years and only ever need the most basic knowledge of Linux, I've had to know how to do everything in Windows. DOS is actually more of a concearn than Linux for a lot of UK companies.

If you think I'm putting Linux down though then you got me wrong, my experience is that Windows systems require the most maintenance, and people who use Linux are usually more technically adept than the average Windows user, so less babysitting is needed.


Health, Ammo, and bacon and eggs!
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