Another day another issue...

This morning started early with a phone call from a client who's house had recently been hit by lightening. This lightening strike blew the clients television, and cable boxes as well as the garage door opener, and the modem for their computer. In addition the router was also taken out by the lightening strike.

Bright House, our local cable and high speed Internet provider, sent a technician out to her house to look at the problems. She was told her modem was dead. This was replaced by the technician who at that time told her her router could also be dead. NOW this is the part that always drives me nuts -

We at Simply Seniors Computer Tutor started this business because of examples just like this one - the client an elderly woman who knows only how to turn the laptop on, use the mouse to check and email, write and email and send it was left to figure out how to get her own computer back on the Internet. The Bright House technician told her "he didn't know anything about computers".

I implore you Bright House - why on earth are you sending technicians out that "don't know anything about computers?"

This client has no idea how to get herself back on to the Internet - the fix is simple enough for someone with a little bit of knowledge - but extremely intimidating when you 86 years old and sure 'you've' done something wrong.

This clients issue which could have been easily fixed by the Bright House employee if he'd simply moved a cable - that's all just move one little cable. Why on earth is he being sent out to people's homes to install their modems if he doesn't know how to check the computer to determine if it is on the Internet or not?

Simply Seniors Computer Tutor will be making a house call to this client tomorrow to fix her issue.

please check below for photos of a modem going into a router - you will see that the modem has a cord or cable much like a telephone cable but larger - this connects from the modem into the router - there is a very specific hole on the back of the router - often high lighted in a different color than the other hole (also known as PORTS) - in this clients case she needed to remove the cable from the router, leaving the cable's other end connected to the modem. Take the end which was disconnected and plug this into the port or hole on the computer - the hole may currently have the end of a similar cable plugged into it - if you follow it back it probably leads to the router, and is now unnecessary and can be disconnected from the computer.

Now the computer is connected directly to the modem and you should have Internet connectivity shortly.

A reboot of the modem may be needed - this means unplug and leave it unplugged for about 10-30 seconds and then replug it back in - give it a minute and it's lights will all come back on then go over to the computer and check for Internet connectivity once again.

Remember your friends from Simply Seniors Computer Tutor are always here to help. You can reach us at 321-431-3866 or you can visit our web site at http://www.sscomputertutor.com/

Thanks again for reading and be sure to share our blog with your friends.

Happy Computing!

Be sure to check out the videos at the end of our blogg, these are often helpful "how to" videos scene on Utube.