Last night I treated myself, and bought me the new Microsoft Ergonomic Keyboard and Laser mouse combination. Wireless version 7000. I was so thrilled too, as it is black and fits the black computer case and monitor. So now I am color co-ordinated.

At least that was the hope.

Encountered a small glitch that really got me steamed up.

To begin with, I like to save the package the stuff comes in, so its easy to return if there is a problem or for repairs. Like that was impossible the way this thing came boxed up, but hell, I didn’t expect any problems. After all, it cost over $100 for the two little items, and I already had similar products, so piece of cake, right?

WRONG!

Ripped the box to get at my new toy, put the CD in to install the software and there the nightmare began. It wouldn’t install, it said I didn’t have enough disk space. Like what, 18 gigs wasn’t enough?

The piss off for me, was trying to get help for this problem. Microsoft are HUGE so you would think they would know how to make it easy to get help. Mistake Number Two. They know shit about that, or if they do, they deliberately are attempting to make it hard for the customer to get support.

Automate this, read this and that. Now I don’t know but I call a keyboard just that. Not at Microsoft, it is a ‘desktop set‘ and so like no wonder I couldn’t find the blasted thing on their website. Silly me was looking for keyboard.

Downloaded the software, and hey, same damn issue. Then I got the bright idea that maybe it was my Kasperskly Anti Virus program, or one of the other programs like spyblaster that was preventing the software from loading. So ages later, still no luck, and we are now talking like 10pm. Got the notion to defrag the hdd and finally at 2am I had another go.

NO LUCK.

So back to Microsoft, and found the support area. Found out I could email support or call them. Naturally the hours for calling was long over, so okay tried to do an email, and like my luck was really holding true. Couldn’t send email due to an application error on their site, so it kept saying try later. 3am and no luck in sending email, so off to slumber land.

This morning, still no luck in getting the software to load. Called the store I bought it from, and I give the guys their credit. They said they hadn’t a clue, but thought it might have something to do with my computer. Like I really wanted to hear that, but it was logical.

Last ditch effort was to place a call to the Support Number. And then get through the rather short voice message system, answered bunch of questions, and then got me a trouble file number, then switched to a tech. I thought oh oh, as the voice on the other end had a thick accent. And yet, in the end, I got my new desktop set working.

Solution was to uninstall the old software, reboot, and give her a whack. It worked too, and the support tech stayed on the phone while I even added the batteries, and fired up the new keyboard and mouse. I love them by the way, but damn what a hassle.

Now why couldn’t Microsoft make finding those toll free help numbers easy to find? I could have had this thing working long before I did, and with a lot less aggravation.

Go Figure.

Posted on November 19th, 2007 by Gaystoryman
Filed under: Gadgets