Route Builder Burnout

[gisa]

Hi All,


Wow so many insightful replies! I guess for me, the thing that was bogging me down was going back to a section I thought I had finished and having to some extra work and touch up. I want to finish something I'm proud of but I'm not at the *fun part* of the route I'm building. I still like the area though and I think taking a break for a week or so helped as well as driving about and finding mistakes.

I also found that looking at old pictures of my route in development helped give me a sense of confidence, pride and encouragement. Maybe that's why we all have one thread on here about our routes.

Thanks for the positive feedback and encouragement everyone! ^^

:wave:

Gisa ^^
p.s. for those of you with newborn children, do you still find time to run amok in trains? My wife and I will start trying around Christmas and I wonder if I'll have enough time to do anything once a baby comes.

 

[andrev]

Gisa.

Buy a laptop and you'll be able to do Trainz just beside your baby and wife.

Andre.

 

[Dinorius_Redundicus]

Hi Gisa

I find at times like this that other computer games are my friends. They change the scene for you mentally, but after a while you begin to miss whatever it was that first attracted you to Trainz and you slip back into it.

In my case, the other computer "game" happens to be Gmax, which while it is still associated with Trainz, is so very different in terms of how you have to think, that it has provided the necessary change of scene for me. I haven't done anything on my layout for 2 months now...but I can feel the thing drawing me back.

 

[gisa]

Hehe Andrev, where I'm living, we don't have a lot of space. The same is true for anyone here...so when I'm in my apartment, I don't have to go far to get to my computer.

I do have a laptop but it's by no means a gaming laptop. My wife will probably sell her old desktop computer and take the laptop for herself.

I do play other games and yeah, I do find myself coming back to trainz. That's great advice DR. I guess you can't miss something if you are with it all the time right?

:wave:

Gisa ^^

 

[lewisner]

If you suffer from Route Builder Burnout, simply do what I did - buy a Packard Bell computer from PC World. Every six months it will crash and you will lose all your work and have to start again.When you phone PC World they will deny you have a Cover Plan, even though you are paying them £10 a month for it.Finally, tell them to stick their Cover Plan where the sun doesn't shine and spend the £10 on something more useful, i.e booze...:mop:

 

[gisa]

:| If you are paying for a cover program and getting nothing out of it, what is the point? Sounds like a possible lawsuit to me. Take out your receipt and the contract (if they gave you one) and raise hell and high water. See what happens...

:wave:

Gisa ^^

 

[lewisner]

Gisa , if only it were that easy! It would have been me against a multi million pound conglomerate who own most of the electrical stores in the UK.Heres another one - I bought my PC (a Packard Bell 6810 SLI ) ex display for £700 as against its current list price of £1700 because of its Graphics capability.Immediately the salesman sold me a Cover Plan titled "Whatever Happens After You Buy".The next day I was setting the PC up and it packed in! I phoned PC World and they said "bring it in and we'll have a look".I did and the 15 year old kid serving said "the hard drive has gone - we'll give you your money back".Me - "Er, no you won't you'll repair to as new condition as it says in the CP".PCW - "We might not be able to repair it". Me- "In that case you will give me a new one". PCW - "We can't do that, you got it half price". Me - "Thats your problem.You shouldn't be selling faulty goods." PCW - "Well, what if it breaks again?" Me- "Then you'll repair it again!". The net result was that this bunch of shysters had to put in a new hard drive. If you want , I will tell you the story of the monitor I bought from them, which is even funnier.

 

[gisa]

Man that sucks...I guess it had something to do with the deal you got? what happened to your monitor?

:wave:

Gisa ^^

 

[lewisner]

I bought the Monitor seperately from the PC - its a 19 inch Xerox TFT which just looks like a black pane of glass - very smart.A few months after I bought it , it would take like an hour to "warm up".This got worse, so I phoned PC World and got through to one of their guys I had spoken to before - he was very knowledgable.He told me "ah, its a known problem with those monitors - bring it in and we'll fix it".But that would leave me with no monitor, so I struggled on for a few weeks, and the monitor got so bad that I had to leave it powered up all all day.I got sick, and phoned PCW to arrange collection.I got through to a young woman who said I was "not covered" for repairs to the monitor.I argued but she was adamant.I argued more till she eventually said she would check with someone else.Eventually I had a phone call from another PCW woman who said the "good news" was that my Monitor was covered by a "Business Cover Plan" for FIVE YEARS and I could have it collected and repaired at "no cost"!!!
She then added that her colleague had been "practically in tears" because I "would not take NO for an answer".I gently pointed out that if I had taken no for an answer I would have had to pay to have THEIR faulty goods repaired or shell out £100 for a new monitor? She rather tartly replied "Well its up to YOU to know what cover you have!" I said if PC Worlds own staff, who have all my details on a computer screen in front of them "don't know" how could I? Thus ended about 2 hours worth of phone calls. As a final irony, I was left with no monitor for a week and a half, so I went to a local junk shop and bought an old 11 inch CRT monitor for £10....the makers label on the back says "1987".....it works perfectly with no problems whatsoever. Wanna know the final instalment?

 

[gisa]

Hmm...I guess tact is still underrated. I always thought that businesses that are large should err on the side of the customer but if you had a plan, it should be on their computer.

Might as well go ahead and tell us the rest of the story.

:wave:

Gisa ^^

 

[scorpio48]

Hi
I also had trouble with PC-World and their cover plan.
I took my computer in for a new graphic card and a check-up. I could have done it myself but as I was paying for the service I thought I might as well use it.
They told me it would be ready in two hours.
Three hours later I turned up for my computer. Believe it or not, they couldn't find it. I was asked 'Are you sure you used this branch'.
Anyway;- cutting a long story short, I finally got my computer back two days later. It was put in their storeroom by mistake, and forgotten about.

Cheers
Pete

 

[lewisner]

"Are you sure you took it to this branch?" LOL..

OK, so I now had my "new" computer and an old CRT monitor which dates before the days of "Plug And Play" so it wouldn't work.I phone PCW and after battling to convince them I owned one of their computers and that I had a Cover Plan, the guy gives me a set of baffling instructions and the CRT monitor works perfectly.A week and a half later the new monitor comes back and it works fine, so the CRT monitor goes in a cupboard.
However, I bought my original PC (a Packard Bell 6052) from Dixons and luckily I kept it when I got my new PC, as the 6052 has never given any trouble in the 5 years I have had it.But it had no monitor so after a few months I thought I would set it up with the CRT monitor.......I phone PCW. ..."You have no cover Plan"..Arguments ensue...Apparently I am no longer covered for the 6052. Thinkling quickly, I said "in that case tell me how to configure the monitor for my new PC".PCW "You have no cover plan for that either." I get the receipt for the cover plan, I quote the date, receipt number, time , and the name of the salesman (Ken) who sold me it.They won't budge.So, when I got my bank statement a few days later, I told them where to take their Cover Plan and what to do with it when they got there.I cancelled it immediately
As a further bitter twist, I got a letter from PCW "Customer Care" pointing out that if I cancelled my CP, they "wouldn't be able to help me".
I swear every word of this is the truth.
P.S I later found that configuring the CRT monitor simply involved tapping "F5" repeatedly when I powered the PC up, and clicking "Select VGA Mode" from the options.That was all they had to tell me, for £10 a month.

 

[bl4882]

Hello Lewisner,

Please believe me when I say this is not schadenfreude, but it is a bit of a comfort to know that crummy customer service is not confined to the USA.:wave:

Bernie

 

[lewisner]

Ha ha bl4882, I'm sure its not.Most companies in the UK who call themselves "British" seem to interpret this loosely as meaning "the former British Empire" so their call centres are always in India.I could start a whole website with hilarious conversations I have had with Singh, Pradeep and Raj in which their entry level English did battle with my strong Geordie dialect.One of the best ones was a half hour call to Norton Internet Security in which I tried to renew my subscription.The lady I spoke to had little or no grasp of the English langauge and insisted on spelling my address in the Phonetic alphabet BUT not the proper one - her own "made up" one.Having told her I lived in York, there was a long pause pause................"errr which country is York in?" Finally we got to the price "50 US Dollars"........I came close to losing my temper and said "Why on earth would I want the price in US Dollars when I live in England?" She replied "I will put you on hold while I get it converted to Pounds." Naturally I slammed the phone down and never renewed...Felt good.....

 

[scorpio48]

Hi Geordie,
Talk about parallel universes, we must live in a parallel world.
Try communicating with a Welsh accent :hehe:

Cheers
Taff

 

[lewisner]

Hey Scorpio, I now use Post Office Broadband after using BT (Indian Call Centre) and AOL (Indian Call Centre).The Post Offices call centre is in Ireland....well dammit, its as near as you can get....BTW all the guys who work there have names beginning with a "G"...