Virus

Trev drops his computer into a repair center in Pantip.

...
Trev: There's a virus. Autorun-DR I think it's called.

Woody: Let's take a look.

Trev: I've tried getting rid of it with AVG but it keeps coming back.

Woody: Come back in 20 minutes.

(30 minutes later...)

Trev: Done?

Woody: We found dozens. Have to reformat.

Trev: AVG only found one virus.

Woody: Can we keep it overnight? It's a long job.
...

An Apple a day keeps work away

Ziortza is recounting to Bernice her problems with yet another American Designed Device (as in Attention Deficit Disorder).

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Bernice: Problems?

Ziortza: Multiples. It’d got to the stage where I was using this brand new computer to sit on my desk and just display the time.

Bernice: A computer with a 2.4 Ghz processor, 3 gigabytes of memory and a 320 gigabyte hard drive and a 20 inch screen being used as a CLOCK?

Ziortza That’s all it could do. Installed the latest system called Leopard, ha that was a joke. It couldn’t even scare any applications into starting after installing it three times.

Bernice: Except the clock.

Ziortza: It could do the clock.

Bernice: So what did you do?

Ziortza: I called up the helpdesk. Spent four hours on there. Actually THAT bit was quite pleasant, chatting with these slightly robotic businesslike vocal avatars. Techie, intelligent, polite.

Bernice: What more could you wish for?

Ziortza: Er, a working computer? An Apple man is coming to pick it up on Thursday. That’s why they advise you to sign up for AppleCare. It’s not “if it can go wrong, it will go wrong”. More like “when it goes wrong on the first day out of warranty…”

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Cutting edge

Hu asks Ng, both computer science grads, about a job advertised.

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Hu: What do you think?

Ng: No.

Hu: No? It’s good pay.

Ng: I applied there last year. Don’t even go for an interview.

Hu: But their ad says they’re on the cutting edge of the computer industry.

Ng: Sure. They buy in old computers and you have to disassemble them. Cut them up.

Hu: All those toxic components?

Ng: Exactly. Cutting edge.

...