STARTING TO SMELL LIKE HORSE MANURE

If I could afford to, I'd beat my Compaq Pressario, with it's fancy-smancy Vista operating system, with a sledgehammer. And the same goes for Windows Live OneCare.

I bought a new computer a month ago from Circuit City. I'm beginning to really hate that town. The salesman installed Windows Live OneCare for me.
Three days after I bought the computer I started having problems with the hibernate function. Computer would wake itself up, the screen flickered, and my icons disappeared. I was told my computer was screwing up because it was never personalized. The salesman skipped that part when he turned it on for the first time to install virus protection and the prompt didn't come up again when I hooked this piece of garbage up when I got home. I ended up taking the computer back for a replacement. That was a battle in itself, but I prevailed.

This time I personalized the computer and installed One Care myself. The product key code was not accepted and I notified Windows support. They responded to email and gave me a phone number to call. Today is day four and I'm still unable to install.

I've mentioned this before, but companies in this country should consider hiring people who speak english. I spent half the phone conversation asking tech to repeat information. It took five minutes to get my email address right. I'd say j, he'd repeat k. I'd say b, he'd repeat z.

One tech discovered I was attempting to sign in with the wrong email address and password. He asked a security question-where was mother born-and my answer didn't jive. I was becoming more then a little confused and was starting to wonder if Spike was in the room. And then I had an epiphany. The salesman who initially setup OneCare on first computer must have created a hotmail account for me, and the dumb son-of-a-you-know-what didn't tell me.

So I let the tech in on my discovery and he says, "No problem, I'll transfer you to someone to reset password and you can activate OneCare".

I'm transferred. I wait. I'm disconnected.

Now I'm getting ticked. I email a nasty-gram. Five minutes later the phone rings. I accept the apology, wait while my call is transferred, and get disconnected. Again.

My next nasty-gram contains a request for full refund. This prompts another call. Another apology. Tech tells me someone will call back in thirty minutes to resolve my complaint.

I'm still waiting. With a sledgehammer.