Great DELL Support

[Guest]

Off topic --- I know ---

I read in one of these groups that, upon request, DELL
would send a new-computer owner a "recover and
restore" flash drive --- just to have in case of later need.
So I got live support in India or wherever. I asked
for the recovery thing and a guy with very pooor English
said he's send me one. No reasons were asked for.
Late the next afternoon, he called me at home! He asked
if I had the drive yet --I didn't --but he said it would be
to me by 6 p.m. It was! By FedEx overnight!
But alas it was 32bit so I called again and another tech
said she'd send the correct 64 bit material.
The next day the first guy called me again at home!
He apologized for sending the wrong one before and again
told me the new one would arrive by 6 p.m. It did --
again by overnight FedEx.
How's that for technical support!.

 

[philo]

Off topic --- I know ---

I read in one of these groups that, upon request, DELL
would send a new-computer owner a "recover and
restore" flash drive --- just to have in case of later need.
So I got live support in India or wherever. I asked
for the recovery thing and a guy with very pooor English
said he's send me one. No reasons were asked for.
Late the next afternoon, he called me at home! He asked
if I had the drive yet --I didn't --but he said it would be
to me by 6 p.m. It was! By FedEx overnight!
But alas it was 32bit so I called again and another tech
said she'd send the correct 64 bit material.
The next day the first guy called me again at home!
He apologized for sending the wrong one before and again
told me the new one would arrive by 6 p.m. It did --
again by overnight FedEx.
How's that for technical support!.

Yep.

A number of years ago, a friend of mine asked me to build a computer for
her. Knowing what a PITA she is, I told her to buy a Dell.
In the few times she's had questions or problems, they did a great job
of helping her out. I think I only had to go there once.
(It was simply to install a new printer)

 

[s|b]

Off topic --- I know ---

I read in one of these groups that, upon request, DELL
would send a new-computer owner a "recover and
restore" flash drive --- just to have in case of later need.
So I got live support in India or wherever. I

That's a nice story, but I'm still never going to buy a Dell computer...

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

Off topic --- I know ---

I read in one of these groups that, upon request, DELL
would send a new-computer owner a "recover and
restore" flash drive --- just to have in case of later need.
So I got live support in India or wherever. I asked
for the recovery thing and a guy with very pooor English
said he's send me one. No reasons were asked for.
Late the next afternoon, he called me at home! He asked
if I had the drive yet --I didn't --but he said it would be
to me by 6 p.m. It was! By FedEx overnight!
But alas it was 32bit so I called again and another tech
said she'd send the correct 64 bit material.
The next day the first guy called me again at home!
He apologized for sending the wrong one before and again
told me the new one would arrive by 6 p.m. It did --
again by overnight FedEx.
How's that for technical support!.

Very good - you successfully cross-posted this post.

 

[Guest]

That's a nice story, but I'm still never going to buy a Dell computer...

well that's your choice of course---I bought Dell this time because
nothing has XP anymore and very few had win 7 --Dell only
had two "corporate" (as opposed tp PCs (??) laptops with Win 7

 

[Guest]

So, I didn't do anything differently that I always have!!!
My guess is that it's a reader issue --in the past I've used Free Agent.
This post was from Outlook Express.


..

 

[Paul]

Very good - you successfully cross-posted this post.

Details, details.

And I wouldn't be caught dead buying a Dell either.
I want control over what I use, and how it's put
together. I don't want any copies of Angry Birds
on my new PC. Or having to remove McAfee or Norton
or whatever else is on there.

There is at least one PC company in town, that provides
"real" copies of Windows, and no cruft. And that's worth
a few extra bucks. The machines are pre-built, so this is
not a mom & pop assembly business. I bought one machine
from them, but it wasn't for me. It had a memory problem,
and when I went there, the staff had never heard of
memtest86+, so I had to bring them a copy

Paul

 

[charlie]

Details, details.

And I wouldn't be caught dead buying a Dell either.
I want control over what I use, and how it's put
together. I don't want any copies of Angry Birds
on my new PC. Or having to remove McAfee or Norton
or whatever else is on there.

There is at least one PC company in town, that provides
"real" copies of Windows, and no cruft. And that's worth
a few extra bucks. The machines are pre-built, so this is
not a mom & pop assembly business. I bought one machine
from them, but it wasn't for me. It had a memory problem,
and when I went there, the staff had never heard of
memtest86+, so I had to bring them a copy

Paul

Interesting!
A major facet of the small shop my son works for/with is
dealing with P/Cs (New, Old, whatever) that have hardware problems
and/or malware. They do have service contracts (usually businesses)
and refurb and resell older P/Cs that were sold on the surplus market
by lots.
It's surprising how many come in with data still on the hard drive(s).

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

So, I didn't do anything differently that I always have!!!
My guess is that it's a reader issue --in the past I've used Free Agent.
This post was from Outlook Express.

You said "I didn't do anything differently" and then described what you
did differently

Either Agent doesn't do cross-posting, or it uses a different method or
syntax than you tried. I'm surprised no one who uses it has offered
advice, but maybe no one uses it any more

I see at the bottom that Outlook Express doesn't deal properly with
signature delimiters, but we can probably live with that quite
comfortably!

 

[Paul]

You said "I didn't do anything differently" and then described what you
did differently

Either Agent doesn't do cross-posting, or it uses a different method or
syntax than you tried. I'm surprised no one who uses it has offered
advice, but maybe no one uses it any more

I see at the bottom that Outlook Express doesn't deal properly with
signature delimiters, but we can probably live with that quite
comfortably!

Free Agent uses comma separate syntax. As shown in a
potential reply here. The tool automatically copied the
groups, and gave me some choices.

http://imageshack.us/a/img827/8696/tj3.gif

That copy of Free Agent was obtained from archive.org some
time ago, and is supposed to be the last version of the
"Free" stream.

agentenu330-846
7,737,912 bytes

HTH,
Paul

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

Free Agent uses comma separate syntax. As shown in a
potential reply here. The tool automatically copied the
groups, and gave me some choices.

http://imageshack.us/a/img827/8696/tj3.gif

That copy of Free Agent was obtained from archive.org some
time ago, and is supposed to be the last version of the
"Free" stream.

agentenu330-846
7,737,912 bytes

HTH,
Paul

All I can say is that when I ctrl-click in my newsreader, it puts a
comma and a space between the groups *in the composition window*, unlike
what your picture shows and also unlike what I see in my own articles in
the article pane here. Maybe Pfsszxt did or didn't use a space, or maybe
he used a Cyrillic comma.

The "Cyrillic comma" is merely meant to lighten up the discussion.

I guess I could track down and install Agent (you gave a hint where to
look) and experiment, but don't anyone refrain from breathing...

 

[Nil]

That's a nice story, but I'm still never going to buy a Dell
computer...

Nor would I, probably, but I might recommend them to friends or family
who aren't very computer literate. Otherwise they might call me (not
that I mind that occasionally, but I don't want to hear from all of
them every time the computer burps.)

In a former job we bought tons of Dell laptops and desktops. It was a
different situation because we had a corporate service agreement, but I
must say that their support at that time was first class.

 

[Char Jackson]

Free Agent uses comma separate syntax.

As does the non-free Agent.

As shown in a
potential reply here. The tool automatically copied the
groups, and gave me some choices.

http://imageshack.us/a/img827/8696/tj3.gif

That copy of Free Agent was obtained from archive.org some
time ago, and is supposed to be the last version of the
"Free" stream.

agentenu330-846
7,737,912 bytes

You can also get it directly from the Forte home page:
<http://forteinc.com/agent/download-all.php>

 

[Char Jackson]

All I can say is that when I ctrl-click in my newsreader, it puts a
comma and a space between the groups *in the composition window*, unlike
what your picture shows and also unlike what I see in my own articles in
the article pane here. Maybe Pfsszxt did or didn't use a space, or maybe
he used a Cyrillic comma.

If a space is being inserted between comma-separated groups, it's only for
human readability. The spaces would be stripped prior to sending since they
are not allowed.

 

[Guest]

Nor would I, probably, but I might recommend them to friends or family
who aren't very computer literate. Otherwise they might call me (not
that I mind that occasionally, but I don't want to hear from all of
them every time the computer burps.)

Well, first, I'm not promoting DELL -- just a comment on the
unusually good support.
I've had DELL PCs over the years -- nothing recent until
this laptop --- but I've never heard from DELL unless I asked.

 

[Ken Blake]

Either Agent doesn't do cross-posting, or it uses a different method or
syntax than you tried. I'm surprised no one who uses it has offered
advice, but maybe no one uses it any more

I use Agent, and many others here also do. It does cross-posting just
fine.

 

[s|b]

I see at the bottom that Outlook Express doesn't deal properly with
signature delimiters, but we can probably live with that quite
comfortably!

OE has never dealt properly with sig delimiters. No big surprise
there...

 

[Guest]

I use Agent, and many others here also do. It does cross-posting just
fine.

Well I don'tb have an answer --- I'v posted the same way for at least
a decade --- with "to" simply a comma separated list.
Always folks tell me that's multi-posting.
But the postings from OE, written exactly the same, came out
cross-posted.
I'm still waiting for someone to tell me why my Agent posts
don't "cross post". All I get is moans and groans.

 

[Paul]

Well I don'tb have an answer --- I'v posted the same way for at least
a decade --- with "to" simply a comma separated list.
Always folks tell me that's multi-posting.
But the postings from OE, written exactly the same, came out
cross-posted.
I'm still waiting for someone to tell me why my Agent posts
don't "cross post". All I get is moans and groans.

It's pretty simple stuff, for a programmer.

Use a packet sniffer. Wireshark will do.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wireshark

Capture the packet(s) that send the message.
Set up your news client to use port 119. That
is so the entire transaction with the server, is
in plaintext format. AIOE supports port 119, so
no problemo.

Examine the formatting of the message, to see what
the news client did. I copied this from the view
in my news client, which isn't absolutely exactly
like it was sent, but, close enough.

You should see

Newsgroups: alt.windows-xp, alt.comp.os.windows-8, alt.windows7.general

in the message. And that, is crossposting. One message
travels to the server. Copies are made inside the
server and placed in three queues. Servers communicate with
one another, on a per group basis, to distribute the
messages. The header will still contain the original
"Newsgroups:" content.

Now, let's look at an archived version of your message.

http://al.howardknight.net/msgid.cgi?STYPE=msgid&A=0&MSGI=<[email protected]>

The excess spaces were removed from the Newsgroups line -

Newsgroups: alt.windows-xp,alt.comp.os.windows-8,alt.windows7.general

Your packet sniffer result, should be seeing that line.

Who needs moans and groans, when we know *exactly*
how it works. Read an RFC or two, if you're bored.
I'm not going to do the work for you.

Paul

 

[Guest]

It's pretty simple stuff, for a programmer.

Use a packet sniffer. Wireshark will do.

Examine the formatting of the message, to see what
the news client did. I copied this from the view
in my news client, which isn't absolutely exactly
like it was sent, but, close enough.

You should see

alt.windows-xp, alt.comp.os.windows-8, alt.windows7.general

That's exactly the way I've written addresses for more than a decade.
Two posts last week -- one from Agent (apparently came out as "multi".
Another from OE (apparently came out "cross". I did nothing differently
in posting the two.
But, I'll let you guys worry about it. Or, jsut ignore me!!