Holy mother of Bored at Work, I’m doing 2 posts in one week!
So the other night, a few friends and I went fishing down at the harbor. Upon our arrival we saw three young college kids (three guys- no wait, two guys and a girl, I think- yeah it was a girl, it had to have been) standing on the dock just chatting. We said “what’s up” and started towards the end of the pier where we would begin fishing.
I’ll get back to that though.
A personal pet peeve of mine is the ignorance of computer-users these days. I don’t mind the ones who acknowledge their ignorance, it’s the ones that think they know a lot about computers and software, but really don’t know anything, they don’t even recognize their ignorance- so I guess you could call them ignorant ignorant computer users. One of the things I can’t stand is when someone is talking about their computer or some new game or piece of software they just got as if they really knew what they were talking about, and then I ask them “what kind of computer do you have?” “a Dell” or “a Gateway” or my favorite “an Alienware!”
Upon hearing these self-induced ass remarks, I have to keep my hands in my pockets- for if I don’t, they will backhand the subject without having made any communication with my spine/brain at all. I mean, it’s like they have a mind of their own- its that bad.
When you get a computer, it’s not like buying a certain brand television, they all have the same or different brand internals, Intel, AMD, Nvidia, ATI, generic… the list goes on forever. You can have a Dell the exact same as an Alienware or a better Dell than an Alienware, or you can build your own damn one with the same Koolance case that Alienware uses that everyone thinks is exclusive to Alienware or something…
Anyways, before I go off too much, back to the original story.
So after about 30 minutes of catching sharks and drinking beer, these kids walk up to us and start talking to us. College, where they’re from, how they like Savannah, all the normal bullshit you would talk about to try and get beer from random people. This one guy said something that will be burned into my memory forever- in the dorkiest voice you can possibly imagine- almost like a white Steve Urkel, (and I almost broke out in laughter) “If I’d of known this was a social event, I’d of brought my six-pack.” Okay so that really doesn’t follow my story very well, but it was so funny to me, I had to bring it up. Back on track now. The subject of computers came up (one of the guys was a MIT and Georgia Tech fan) and the girl started talking about computers. I asked her what kind of computer she had. Actual quote: “A Pee-Four 3.04 with a hyperthreaded FSB and 256 megabytes of ram.” Okay, so this girl is trying to sound smart. She’s trying to prove her assumption that she knows more than me, just because I talk like a normal person and don’t try to display my nerd-ness around everyone trying to prove something. Her statement was so flawed in computer lingo that it’s obvious she just picked a few keywords written on the notes that came with it and threw them in there.
First off, front-side buses (”FSB”) aren’t hyperthreaded. Hyperthreading is a function of new-generation processors, not an actual physical part of the front-side bus. Second off, she didn’t even say what kind of memory she had. She “knows” so much about her processor but she cant even say “PC3200 memory” when memory is one of the most important components in the system. Third of all, she never even mentioned her freaking motherboard which IS the most important aspect of your computer.
Next question: “What kind of video card do you have?”
“It’s a Geforce FOUR”
“MX or Ti?”
… (pause) um, MX
AHAHAHAHA! MX are the bottom of the bottom line of Nvidia products. They are very cheap. They are made soley so people can think they got a good deal and they still have a “Geforce 4,” even though their capabilities and performance is far inferior. I mean, there’s a reason the MX is $40 and the Ti series are $120-$200.
Before we even got into the video card question though, the girl finished off her statement with “It’s an Alienware.” This is where I had to throw my hands into my pockets. After all that, she bought her computer for a “fuck ignorant people out of their money” company. I mean, she probably spent $2000 on that computer, and I could have built THE EXACT same thing for under $1000- same case and everything (believe me, if you can read, use google, and put legos together, you can build your own computer, its that easy)- and this girl is sitting here with this grin on her face like “aHA, I RULE!”
Of course I could have crushed her hopes and dreams by telling her everything I’ve said in this post, but I didn’t say a damn word. I just asked the questions and nodded to her replies.
After making their final attemp to get us to give them beer by asking “what kind of beer is that you got?” the kids finally left. I must have mocked the White Urkel quote about nine or ten times that night. I’ve nearly perfected my impression of his voice.
So anyways, Tim, the “works with me on this site but hasn’t really done a damn thing yet” guy is coming into town from Atlanta tomorrow. We always have a damn fun time hanging out, and I’m looking forward to it. I’ll be sure to (in an attempt to get him into gear on this site) beat the crap out of him before he goes home.
Until next time,
- Jethro
