Top 3 DIY Tech Support Resources

So, it's the home stretch of the session. It's 4am, you're on the last take...and instead of "That's a wrap," you see "DAE Error..." or "Blah Blah has unexpectedly quit..." The last one cracks me up; "unexpectedly quit..." Yea, no $#^& it's unexpected! Unless you're using Vista...

Anyway kidding aside, the last thing you want to be doing at 4am is teching your rig and using your brain to figure out why the hell it's not working.  Thankfully the internet is open 24 hrs a day and is happy to give you the information you need to get back up, get in that last take, and finally get the damn thing finished.

So, here they are, Dek's top 3 resources for getting the info you need:

1. R.T.F.M - Read The Fucking Manual! You know that book-like thing that usually comes with the product? Sometimes it has information about how it works! Wow, how 'bout that? Nowadays they're .pdf docs on a CD, but the best place to get them is the net. Some companies only offer paper versions of the manual, (like eMagic back in the day) and it was a dead give-away when you asked for it in a forum.  If you have a product like that...well, you don't get what you don't pay for!

2. Google -  When the name of the search engine is also a verb...chances are that there's alot of people using this thing.  I usually google the key parts of the error message, like the error number, or the reason for crashing. You can also add words like "Logic Troubleshooting" or related words like "freezes," or "freezing."  Try to start broad and narrow your search. For Mac's don't ignore the crash window.  Get the details by looking at the crash report. For Windows it's the same thing! You can opt to view the report before sending so make sure you get details and google them!

3. Manufacturer's Websites - Lots of companies have support sections, knowledge bases and/or forums that might have the info you're looking for.  Digidesign for example has the DUC or Digidesign User Conference that lots of times has more updated info on the error, and the moderators are techs that often chime in to the posts.  The Apple site has a wealth of info about hardware specs, and has a forum as well.

Learning to scour the net is a skill. Maximize your results by doing smarter searches, and searching with other engines than google. (Yes, remember yahoo, msn and ask.com? They still exist.) 

So If you can find that obscure video of some socialite lit in green night-vision, or the files for the lost recordings of some famous band, you can definitely find out why your session keeps crashing!

till next time,

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