[Asr]

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Originally Posted by ShaftedTwice About starting up a business of my own, I don't see any way to do it at 15, even if I was 21, I would think that it would be impossible to start a business from scratch, I mean, how would I even get my name out there and such?

Just advertise yourself as a "freelance consultant" in your local community. Put up flyers at local shops or the post office or anywhere you see a message board, hang up flyers on your neighbors' doors, etc. Pretty easy, I started when I was in college and it's a nice way to make some easy money.

 

[JaGWiRE]

The only thing that worries me about computer repair for others myself is:
1) If your repairing several computers a day, I'de say their is a high possibility you'de kill something eventually (i.e. your not grounded, static electricity, zap, spill something, not carefully handling a part, forgetting to plug in fans and giving computer back and computer overheats, etc.)
2) You can't always give them the answer they want to hear. If you tell them that their only option is new ram as an example (becuase their ram is dead), they may think that your lieing and because your 15 or whatever you have no experience and therefore they make take it to somebody else.
3) Sometimes their is no simple fix. A lot of brand name pc's are proprietary, and the power supplies are very weak.

PS, I am interested too, so I am looking for answers on these questions.

 

[ShaftedTwice]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Asr Just advertise yourself as a "freelance consultant" in your local community. Put up flyers at local shops or the post office or anywhere you see a message board, hang up flyers on your neighbors' doors, etc. Pretty easy, I started when I was in college and it's a nice way to make some easy money.

Hmm.. I could do that, easy to do and i can always back out if I need to, I think I'll give it a try tomarrow.

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Originally Posted by JaGWiRE The only thing that worries me about computer repair for others myself is: 1) If your repairing several computers a day, I'de say their is a high possibility you'de kill something eventually (i.e. your not grounded, static electricity, zap, spill something, not carefully handling a part, forgetting to plug in fans and giving computer back and computer overheats, etc.) 2) You can't always give them the answer they want to hear. If you tell them that their only option is new ram as an example (becuase their ram is dead), they may think that your lieing and because your 15 or whatever you have no experience and therefore they make take it to somebody else. 3) Sometimes their is no simple fix. A lot of brand name pc's are proprietary, and the power supplies are very weak. PS, I am interested too, so I am looking for answers on these questions.

1) I think that if you set yourself up a specific area to work where there is no danger of spills or carpet on your socks, maybe wear a grounding wristband and always test before you give it back and it should work just fine.
2) Yeah, thats something that you cannot avoid really. You can get technical with them to tell them why they need new ram, maybe have some spares of your own and show them yourself.
3)That's true as well, you can always put in a PSU though, just make sure that you can have spares around and tell them the cost it might be and you can put it in right there and then.

 

[JaGWiRE]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ShaftedTwice Hmm.. I could do that, easy to do and i can always back out if I need to, I think I'll give it a try tomarrow. 1) I think that if you set yourself up a specific area to work where there is no danger of spills or carpet on your socks, maybe wear a grounding wristband and always test before you give it back and it should work just fine. 2) Yeah, thats something that you cannot avoid really. You can get technical with them to tell them why they need new ram, maybe have some spares of your own and show them yourself. 3)That's true as well, you can always put in a PSU though, just make sure that you can have spares around and tell them the cost it might be and you can put it in right there and then.

For 1), I just don't really eblieve that you can avoid things 100% of the time, and eventually stuff will die, I think it's part of the job.
2) Yup, but they probably won't understand it. Also, a lot of boards are fussy about ram, i.e. my dfi nf4 ultra.
3) Not always, a lot of the dells for example (older ones) have proprietary psu connectors.

 

[ShaftedTwice]

Quote:

Originally Posted by JaGWiRE For 1), I just don't really eblieve that you can avoid things 100% of the time, and eventually stuff will die, I think it's part of the job. 2) Yup, but they probably won't understand it. Also, a lot of boards are fussy about ram, i.e. my dfi nf4 ultra. 3) Not always, a lot of the dells for example (older ones) have proprietary psu connectors.

Yeah, I see what you mean about stuff dieing, you can't really avoid it, but you can at least prevent it most of the time by just being very careful, the money lost by having very few parts dieing wouldn't be much at all in the big picture.

I have the same board and I know what you mean by it being fussy about the ram, but I doubt anybody would have a DFI NF4-U that they wouldn't know what to do, but yeah, I am sure there are more boards out there that will do that too.

Never really thought about the proprietary PSU connectors, that one you'd just have to try to explain it, but I know what you mean about them having a hard time believing it.
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Also, this could be a side job, because you do not really have a schedule or anything of that sort, working as a paper boy would take the morning for me and if I got an under-the-table pizza place job along with the computer side job and the paper route, that would be a nice full day, I would definately consider it, my days are long and boring

 

[JaGWiRE]

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Originally Posted by ShaftedTwice Yeah, I see what you mean about stuff dieing, you can't really avoid it, but you can at least prevent it most of the time by just being very careful, the money lost by having very few parts dieing wouldn't be much at all in the big picture. I have the same board and I know what you mean by it being fussy about the ram, but I doubt anybody would have a DFI NF4-U that they wouldn't know what to do, but yeah, I am sure there are more boards out there that will do that too. Never really thought about the proprietary PSU connectors, that one you'd just have to try to explain it, but I know what you mean about them having a hard time believing it. . . . Also, this could be a side job, because you do not really have a schedule or anything of that sort, working as a paper boy would take the morning for me and if I got an under-the-table pizza place job along with the computer side job and the paper route, that would be a nice full day, I would definately consider it, my days are long and boring

Heh, yeah, I'm 13, I'de do computer repair. A lot of morons have the dfi board, you'de be surprised. On a more serious note, although the guys working in a lot of computer stores might be morons, I don't like to think of myself as a genius either, becuase if you repair pcs every day all day, you get more farmiliar with hardware and software errors. Changing parts doesn't take any skill in reality, but troubleshooting does. Their are many things like BSODS that could be caused by a number of things. Once you begin swapping parts in and out to figure out what the problem is, is when I think you can begin making mistakes and destroying things. PC repair is no joke, it takes hours and hours, and I don't think you have that much time sometimes to run memtest for a full 10 hours as an example.

 

[ShaftedTwice]

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Originally Posted by JaGWiRE Heh, yeah, I'm 13, I'de do computer repair. A lot of morons have the dfi board, you'de be surprised. On a more serious note, although the guys working in a lot of computer stores might be morons, I don't like to think of myself as a genius either, becuase if you repair pcs every day all day, you get more farmiliar with hardware and software errors. Changing parts doesn't take any skill in reality, but troubleshooting does. Their are many things like BSODS that could be caused by a number of things. Once you begin swapping parts in and out to figure out what the problem is, is when I think you can begin making mistakes and destroying things. PC repair is no joke, it takes hours and hours, and I don't think you have that much time sometimes to run memtest for a full 10 hours as an example.

Yeah, you do have to know a lot of troubleshooting and overclocking has given my a lot of BSODs over the years along with a lot of other problems with my comp and all my friends, it just takes time to build up that experience to know whats wrong exactly. Thing is though, that usually when someone is not overclocking their ram or screwin around with it, memtest does not really need 10 hours, just like 20-30 mins.

 

[PYROphonez]

My cousin actually suggested this to me. Going around the neighborhood with a wifi locater and check if it is protected. If not, go up to the door, and tell them that it's unprotected, and you could do it for them if they want for a small fee. If they pay for that, you can then offer to download some extra software for virus protection or spy/adware, at an additional cost. Not only did you just make around $50 for the whole package, but you also know their WEP or WPA access code.

If they don't believe its unprotected, bring a laptop in and start loading up some online games and programs on their internet connection.

 

[ShaftedTwice]

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Originally Posted by PYROphonez My cousin actually suggested this to me. Going around the neighborhood with a wifi locater and check if it is protected. If not, go up to the door, and tell them that it's unprotected, and you could do it for them if they want for a small fee. If they pay for that, you can then offer to download some extra software for virus protection or spy/adware, at an additional cost. Not only did you just make around $50 for the whole package, but you also know their WEP or WPA access code. If they don't believe its unprotected, bring a laptop in and start loading up some online games and programs on their internet connection.

Haha, that's hilarious, pretty evil way of making money

 

[JaGWiRE]

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Originally Posted by ShaftedTwice Yeah, you do have to know a lot of troubleshooting and overclocking has given my a lot of BSODs over the years along with a lot of other problems with my comp and all my friends, it just takes time to build up that experience to know whats wrong exactly. Thing is though, that usually when someone is not overclocking their ram or screwin around with it, memtest does not really need 10 hours, just like 20-30 mins.

I would disagree there, I have seen ram that caused an ocassional bsod that took several hours to find one error.
Pyro, I don't really suggest messing with peoples routers even if your getting paid. Routers aren't fun from my experience, and giving encryption to morons who wouldn't have any idea of what it even is sounds like a bad idea. Plus, just because these people may think about you doing illegal things, I'de skip that idea.

 

[PYROphonez]

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Originally Posted by ShaftedTwice Haha, that's hilarious, pretty evil way of making money

I wouldn't go so far as calling it evil. It's just taking advantage of people who don't understand the concept of those types of things, and are too lazy to call their ISP's.

That's a 5 minute job and you could make an easy $20-$30 for adding a WEP/WPA password and instructing them how to change their settings. Then charge another $10-$20 to show them the free software that can easily fix their virus/ad/spyware problems. Get them Spywareguard, AVG if they don't have any virus protection, Adaware, Spybot, Windows Defender, SpywareBlaster, and thats it!

 

[ShaftedTwice]

I guess, still feels kinda awkward taking advantage of people that way.. Ah well, I am really set on asking about being a paper boy and maybe try to get a job at a computer repair store tomarrow. I'll also be looking into little pizza shops and the such along with making some flyers for a freelance computer repair/building thing.

 

[ATAT]

Meh, at 15 years, you've got not much of a selection..

ask your friends, family .etc see if they can hire you for some cash.. I luckily landed a job, saturdays only, $25 / hour at a japanese school. Ask everyone.. parents, parents' friends, friends' parents (if you have any, that is.)

its surprising how easy it is to get people who know you to give you jobs =p.

 

[PYROphonez]

Over the summer I'm working at my dads office. He's a dentist, and I pretty much put files/folders away, take files/folders out, and do some x-rays.

 

[hekoman]

If there are any Chick-fil-A's in your area you could try there. I know for a fact that they will hire 15 year olds. I know whever I go into the one near my house, all I see is a bunch of young high school kids working there.