PC Repair People - Show us your work spaces

[Tesla]

Hi guys,

I am planning on kitting out the garage as a dedicated area for my PC repairing as it's starting to become the majority of work I am doing (less and less AV stuff).

Just interested to see how you have set your areas up, I recall seeing a nicely kitted out shed here the other week.

I know there are some self-employed PC repair people here so hopefully will get a few replies.

Cheers,

Chris

[alsenior]

Here's where i do most of my work . There are two areas named software bench and hardware bench. The only reason for this is that i have to use as little space as possible. The software bench has a kvm, network and power.The hardware bench has screws and screw drivers power, monitor and a keyboard.

This is the software bench


This is the hardware bench


note i don't do this as a job. although im setting up the framework in the summer

A few tip if you are setting up though. Have tons of space ready you will need it

[arbitor]

in my workplace i think we have a good area that you should try and replicate if your garage ois big enough il get pics up when i get home

[Sinizter]

On my room floor mainly. Its too messy to be put on the internet.

[Nick Smith]

On my room floor mainly. Its too messy to be put on the internet.

same here i find it easier than sitting at a table for some reason

[Zak33]

although I only fix (and break) friends and family PC's I'd suggest the following.

An area with deep carpet for kneeling on. Not all of the room, but a part of it. Carpet is actually good for stopping jumpers, clips, screws etc bouncing off too, when you drop them.

Go to a DIY shop and get strip lights, and put them around the skirting boards of the room, low down. Good car workshops have this too and it makes low level lighting superb, when you're knelt down.

Obviously lots of power plugs.

KVM switches are good, for fixing and working on seperate PC's.

[Sinizter]

although I only fix (and break) friends and family PC's I'd suggest the following.

An area with deep carpet for kneeling on. Not all of the room, but a part of it. Carpet is actually good for stopping jumpers, clips, screws etc bouncing off too, when you drop them.

Go to a DIY shop and get strip lights, and put them around the skirting boards of the room, low down. Good car workshops have this too and it makes low level lighting superb, when you're knelt down.

Obviously lots of power plugs.

KVM switches are good, for fixing and working on seperate PC's.

I used to have a Win2003 server with that remote install thingy to install windows over the network. Been a little while since I got rid off it, so I cant remember the exact setup.

Since then I have been using WinXP discs with slipstreamed SPs as well as applications. These discs are updated once in a while and I used to maintain XP Home & XP Pro discs.

Did this as I found the easiest way to fix most PC problems is to copy off their documents over the network, scan with AV, reinstall windows, restore documents, install common applications. All of this except copying the documents was automated with the above mentioned discs. Contact time with the PCs was kept to a minimum.

[g8ina]

Dining room table with a thick rug to protect the top Lots of flying leads, mains, CAT5 etc. Angry wife....

[mikerr]

Best thing I ever did was make a cd with a ghost image of a win98 install.

A total fresh windows install inc office and nero etc from a ghost image would take 3 minutes
Backing up their documents to a spare drive took longer.

Not sure if you can still do that with XP, as it would just bluescreen when it found a different ide/sata controller wouldn't it?

Being able to leave one pc running while doing another is essential, and a KVM works well for this.

[kidzer]

Being able to leave one pc running while doing another is essential, and a KVM works well for this.

Very true, I just returned a PC I was fixing and it got real annoying switching monitors!

After I got windows running on it again though, I installed VNC server so I could control it form here, far less effor, a bit irritating though.

As for my workspace, my room..PCs im working on but are off stay under my bed, PCs im working on go behind the door to be plugged into a power lead extension that runs behind my desk, I've also got a Cat5 cable going down to there to save me having to look for one each time I need to get a PC online!

[this_is_gav]

Not sure if you can still do that with XP, as it would just bluescreen when it found a different ide/sata controller wouldn't it?

Yup. You need to create an install base image with all the used programs, and critically drivers, installed before hand. I use a VMWare image.

Once you've build that and fine-tuned it to your heart's content, get it sysprep'd and create an image of the sysprep'd PC. I've found 1 PC at work which won't work with this image so far, but other than that, it's a real time saver.

Unfortunately, there are still a few things that need tweaked at the other end after deployment - removing a few icons that sysprep recreates (IE and WMP on the desktop for instance), but it's 10mins for a build to get done rather than the normal day or so (you won't believe how many crappy programs are used in education!).

When I'm back at work I'll grab a pic of my work area there.

[Sinizter]

Someone point me in the direction of a a guide to ghost imaging and restoring to dissimilar hardware and sysprepping.

[this_is_gav]

Without having access to my bookmarks at work: a quick google turned up this sort of thing: Kilian's Guide: Sysprep

[Whiternoise]

More pics, less wordage

[this_is_gav]

More pics, less wordage

Go on then