What Can I Do For a PC Job? (Prefferably Tech)

[Chazell29]

Well, as some of you know from my other posts, I was trying to become a Firedog at Circuit City. Well, I talked to my manager, and he primarily wants people who are in college for computers. He said he'd think about it though, but the chances are pretty darn slim. I'm still in high school, so i obviously can't take classes in college for computers.

Are there any outside classes I could take? such as maybe A+ prep classes? I'm currently reading a shortened A+ Cert. book of about 700 pages, then I have an other A+ Complete Cert. Book, which is like a text book of over 1200+ pages. I'm about 1/2 through the smaller one. After I finish the smaller one, if i do well on the practice tests provided with the book, I'm goign to go get A+ certafied. Are there any other certifications i can get?

Where could I get a job working with PC's? Obviously Firedog at Circuit City won't work (unless he changes his mind if/after I get A+ certafied). I could try Best Buys geek sqaud, PC Club requires all techs to be A+ certafied, but you also are required to have 1+ years of tech experience, which I don't have. I don't think building/reparing PC's in home at 17 would work out. Any ideas?

[Cricket]

I don't think building/reparing PC's in home at 17 would work out. Any ideas?Actually, for someone in your position that might be the best thing to do. I know I wouldn't want to do computer tech work full time but I don't mind building, upgrading, troubleshooting and repairing computers for my co-workers, friends and family members. It's not a business for me since I don't charge anything, it just keeps me busy in a subject I'm interested in.

But there are a few members here who either do this as their primary source of income or as a side business and if you develop a really good reputation you could make some pretty decent money at it...and you get to be your own boss!

Think about it.

:) Cricket

[Chazell29]

Actually, for someone in your position that might be the best thing to do. I know I wouldn't want to do computer tech work full time but I don't mind building, upgrading, troubleshooting and repairing computers for my co-workers, friends and family members. It's not a business for me since I don't charge anything, it just keeps me busy in a subject I'm interested in.

But there are a few members here who either do this as their primary source of income or as a side business and if you develop a really good reputation you could make some pretty decent money at it...and you get to be your own boss!

Think about it.

:) Cricket

Hahah yess, if i would work out, that would deff. be good. 2 of my buddies saw my pc i built, and now want to build their own. I said I'll help them, that could be a start. Like you, helping family, friends, coworkers, you don't chage, I'm not planning on charging my friends.

I gave a little thought to it, the only problem I thought, was how could I get my name out there? I could make a small website for info (i'm somewhat decent at computer graphics and web design) and I could tell family/friends/coworkers...any other ideas as far as advertisment goes?

[Cricket]

I gave a little thought to it, the only problem I thought, was how could I get my name out there? I could make a small website for info (i'm somewhat decent at computer graphics and web design) and I could tell family/friends/coworkers...any other ideas as far as advertisment goes?Where I live, some businesses are sooo good that they don't even have to advertise...they get all their business through word-of-mouth.

:) Cricket

[Chazell29]

Where I live, some businesses are sooo good that they don't even have to advertise...they get all their business through word-of-mouth.

:) Cricket
I see, but at 17, people are goign to be going around my city and be like hey have your pc fixed by this 17 year old, unless of course im the 17 year old that hacked the iPhone to work with other companies :D

[Cricket]

I see, but at 17, people are goign to be going around my city and be like hey have your pc fixed by this 17 year old, unless of course im the 17 year old that hacked the iPhone to work with other companies :DI was just offering a suggestion of what could be possible. You'll have to decide if you want to do that or not...but I do know of a few people who do computer work in their spare time as a side business and they do pretty well for themselves. All their new customers are referred to them only by word of mouth, nothing more. They even turn away customers when they get too busy.

If you'd rather work for an established company then you'll have to do your homework and find out what available in your area.

:) Cricket

[Chazell29]

I was just offering a suggestion of what could be possible. You'll have to decide if you want to do that or not...but I do know of a few people who do computer work in their spare time as a side business and they do pretty well for themselves. All their new customers are referred to them only by word of mouth, nothing more. They even turn away customers when they get too busy.

If you'd rather work for an established company then you'll have to do your homework and find out what available in your area.

:) Cricket
Well, having my own inhome buisness, would be cool because I have my own schedule, no taxes, i get payed 100% of profits, etc.

I would however go work for an established company over my own, just becasue of ease, however, at the moment, i cannot work for a company as a tech. becasue I'm not A+ certafied. So, I'm starting plans for my own buisness, such as services at such. I have a few friends that don't know much about pc's that i could train, and then a few that know alot about PC's that I could have help me out as well. Thanks cricket.

I'm tying up some stuff for it, just anything and everything, do you mind if i PM it to you and you could look it over?

[HAL9000]

No offense, but you're TOTALLY wrong. I help a friend start a store front when he was only 15.. so sure, you could at 17. A lot of people realize that it's the younger generation that really has their heads wrapped around the ins and outs of computers. Just don't make the same mistake my friend did.. I took him from 200K gross income for his first 6 months to over 2 million in the last six months of that year and well, he mismanaged the money and a year later was broke and shutting down.

[Chazell29]

No offense, but you're TOTALLY wrong. I help a friend start a store front when he was only 15.. so sure, you could at 17. A lot of people realize that it's the younger generation that really has their heads wrapped around the ins and outs of computers. Just don't make the same mistake my friend did.. I took him from 200K gross income for his first 6 months to over 2 million in the last six months of that year and well, he mismanaged the money and a year later was broke and shutting down.
dangggg 2 million.

OK well now im set on this. You guys really think its possible so im trusting you. I'm working on details with my friend, and currently buying webhosting, and starting on a website, but I want to ask you guys a favor to help me out; I want to charge so I can make some money, but not as much as like circiut city, so people will come to mee. for example, for data transfers for up to 10GB's, Circuit city charges $200. I wouldn't charge nearly that much, but I'll PM my prices for services, and then tell me if they are reasonable for customers, and me of course, if you dont' mind. You guys are always a great help, no matter what it is, pc problems or life problems/goals. :D

[HAL9000]

Keep in mind, $2 million was gross sales for a store front, there are a lot of expenses to take out of that... but it was still one heck of a start. Whatever you do, DON'T undersell your work. Phone a few computer shops in town and find out what their hourly rates are and stay competitive. You can undercut a little bit, but don't be ridiculous about it. I used to charge $75 per hour in house, $100 per hour on site, $150-$200 per hour emergency on site and after hours.

[Chazell29]

Keep in mind, $2 million was gross sales for a store front, there are a lot of expenses to take out of that... but it was still one heck of a start. Whatever you do, DON'T undersell your work. Phone a few computer shops in town and find out what their hourly rates are and stay competitive. You can undercut a little bit, but don't be ridiculous about it. I used to charge $75 per hour in house, $100 per hour on site, $150-$200 per hour emergency on site and after hours.
dang. I was thinking id have a set price for a certain task, but i guess for clean up and virus removal stuff i could charge per hour. good idea, thanks.

maybe one day i could actually open up a small pc store after I get a steady job and I'm older?

what would be a good name for my business. I mainly need it for the domain name for my website..

[HAL9000]

If task pricing is common where you are, there's nothing wrong with that. Just remember with task pricing... if you say $xx.xx to remove virus and spyware, one job may take you 10 minutes.. great.. the next may take you several hours. Even with hourly pricing, you may not actually charge your actual number of hours on it. The PC may have been sitting there grinding away doing something and provided that it's not tying up your ability to do work elsewhere, I usually never charged for that time.

[Chazell29]

If task pricing is common where you are, there's nothing wrong with that. Just remember with task pricing... if you say $xx.xx to remove virus and spyware, one job may take you 10 minutes.. great.. the next may take you several hours. Even with hourly pricing, you may not actually charge your actual number of hours on it. The PC may have been sitting there grinding away doing something and provided that it's not tying up your ability to do work elsewhere, I usually never charged for that time.
makes sence. any more tips are great, i appreciate it.

edit: went with these 3 url's (my hosting package for the website came with 3 urls...idk)
www.rsmpcrepair.com
www.occomprepair.com
www.calpctechs.com

[glc]

Be careful if you try to run a cash business - the tax man WILL find you eventually.

[Chazell29]

Be careful if you try to run a cash business - the tax man WILL find you eventually.
hahaha...yeaa...well if its on services you still have to turn in taxes?

[Cricket]

hahaha...yeaa...well if its on services you still have to turn in taxes?I think you need to do some research on small business owners and tax responsibilities.

:) Cricket

[thefultonhow]

I do computer work on the side -- in fact, that's all I've been doing all summer. All of my business is through word of mouth (people are more trusting and pressure is lower if you're a friend of a friend of a friend rather than just some random guy). Most of the word of mouth is referrals from my high school or from e-lists my family is on, but because I do a decent job, there has been some branching out from those contacts. I have gotten some free business cards printed up, but I printed them two years ago and have yet to hand any out. I am kind of lazy about promoting myself, and could probably have a lot more business if I was a bit more aggressive, even still through word-of-mouth.

I charge $30 per hour (although I have heard you should charge in multiples of $20 so people can pay you with cash straight from the ATM), and have made about $1700 this summer. A full-time job would pay more despite the lower wages, and I will make more than half that during the first two weeks up at college, but this has been a nice relaxed summer.

[rwest]

A part time job untill you've built up a clientell is a good way to start. My wife did this when she started babysitting professionally.

And a real good place to start a clientell...church. If you or anybody in your family goes to church let'em know you want their business. Two good referalls at gosip corner USA and it's off to the races you go. Good luck!

[Chazell29]

If you want, check out www.occomprepair.com i put a little splash holder, tell me what you think. I think it loks cool

[glc]

You don't want it to look "cool" - you want it to look businesslike.

[Cricket]

If you want, check out www.occomprepair.com i put a little splash holder, tell me what you think. I think it loks coolI think it loks kinda small...only takes up about a 12th of my screen.

And glc is right...it should more business-like. The font you're using makes me think you'd actually damage my computer if I took it there. And the picture of the...whatever case that is...makes me think you only work on gaming computers. Just my input.

Oh, when you put up more text on the site make sure you triple check for spelling and grammer errors...nothing makes me avoid a business more than spelling and grammer errors in their ads.

:) Cricket

[piasabird]

If you just do it on the side, then maybe you can use that to buy equipment and claim that as a business expense. You have to make money to have a deduction.

If you have 3 URL's then make one URL for Game Systems, one URL for home or consumer systems, and make the other URL for Server or business systems. If you know some computer graphic students they might be able to put together some graphics or animation stuff for you. Often they will work on the cheap.

Some other side businesses I have seen are installing Wireless Routers in Homes or Apartments where people dont want to have wires. Home networking for the public. You could sell CABLE Modems and or Routers on the side, along with cables.

Another side business might be a service where you copy data from old computer to new computer.

[Chazell29]

I think it loks kinda small...only takes up about a 12th of my screen.

And glc is right...it should more business-like. The font you're using makes me think you'd actually damage my computer if I took it there. And the picture of the...whatever case that is...makes me think you only work on gaming computers. Just my input.

Oh, when you put up more text on the site make sure you triple check for spelling and grammer errors...nothing makes me avoid a business more than spelling and grammer errors in their ads.

:) Cricket

Yeah for sure.

[EzyStvy]

Don’t forget little things like INSURANCE…

John Doe brings in his pc for virus removal. You fix it and send him home. He calls back wanting to know what you did with the Novel he’s been writing for the past ten years. You say you never saw it. His attorney starts a lawsuit claiming 8 million in damages. You have a heart attack and find another line of business.

Then there are the people that think you are so good with computers that they call you 63 times a day for assistance…

Last but not least…If having your own pc repair business is easy and fun and makes tons of money – Everyone would do it.

[kstatefan40]

Raise your hand if he sounds like I did four years ago....

Alright man, I'm going to give you the typical speech I give every person that brings up the A word. It simply does not matter. You could be 90 or 10, if you do a good, professional job, your customers will be happy. Listen, you can do it and people will trust you. Research ALOT. But above that, experience is what counts. Do your job, learn from your mistakes, and move on. You will learn alot from working for yourself. I have customers calling me daily, weekly. I do no advertising other than the good old business card. My customers are happy and return frequently to do more business with me. http://www.derbydigital.com is my personal business. I charge $25 per hour, and I am in a similar position as you, except experience. I've been doing this kind of work for three years. I take on only the customers I want to have.

I started writing for this site when I was younger than you, my friend. My first article has been one of my most popular published works of the approximately 50 articles that have been published since. It definitely helped my credibility.

Just before reading this post, I published this work on what to do in situations like yours: http://www.pcmech.com/article/computer-guys-keep-business-cards-with-you/

Give that a read, it is a starting point. If you have any further questions, I'd be more than happy to help you out, as would everyone else here. Don't be afraid to ask questions - that is how you learn.

[Chazell29]

Don’t forget little things like INSURANCE…
Last but not least…If having your own pc repair business is easy and fun and makes tons of money – Everyone would do it.

Yeah, and I guess thats why I was skeptical to try and start. I need to find more people to help me that know about computers, but most of my friends don't really know anything.

[Chazell29]

Raise your hand if he sounds like I did four years ago....

Alright man, I'm going to give you the typical speech I give every person that brings up the A word. It simply does not matter. You could be 90 or 10, if you do a good, professional job, your customers will be happy. Listen, you can do it and people will trust you. Research ALOT. But above that, experience is what counts. Do your job, learn from your mistakes, and move on. You will learn alot from working for yourself. I have customers calling me daily, weekly. I do no advertising other than the good old business card. My customers are happy and return frequently to do more business with me. http://www.derbydigital.com is my personal business. I charge $25 per hour, and I am in a similar position as you, except experience. I've been doing this kind of work for three years. I take on only the customers I want to have.

I started writing for this site when I was younger than you, my friend. My first article has been one of my most popular published works of the approximately 50 articles that have been published since. It definitely helped my credibility.

Just before reading this post, I published this work on what to do in situations like yours: http://www.pcmech.com/article/computer-guys-keep-business-cards-with-you/

Give that a read, it is a starting point. If you have any further questions, I'd be more than happy to help you out, as would everyone else here. Don't be afraid to ask questions - that is how you learn.
Thanks man, i appreciate it.

[thefultonhow]

You won't make TONS of money doing computer repair, but it is a good side job, and also a good job for younger people who haven't gotten through college yet. As for insurance, that's one of the reasons why word-of-mouth business is the best kind to have -- people are more trusting, and if you do lose some of a person's data, they are more likely to forgive you because you have some connection to them. At one point I backed up the wrong Outlook file when I was reformatting a customer's computer -- she wasn't exactly happy, but her attitude was more, "Oh well..." than "I'm going to sue you."

[Chazell29]

You won't make TONS of money doing computer repair, but it is a good side job, and also a good job for younger people who haven't gotten through college yet. As for insurance, that's one of the reasons why word-of-mouth business is the best kind to have -- people are more trusting, and if you do lose some of a person's data, they are more likely to forgive you because you have some connection to them. At one point I backed up the wrong Outlook file when I was reformatting a customer's computer -- she wasn't exactly happy, but her attitude was more, "Oh well..." than "I'm going to sue you."
Yeah...my grandfather took his new and old pc to circuit city firedog to do a data transfer, and they lost everything he had, he had i think he said a few thousand pictures, they deleted it all :eek:

[nocturnx]

Just an idea for getting your name out there. Theres a kid here that does the same thing and I saw his flyer posted on the tack board at the laundromat with his number printed along the sides and snipped so you could tear it off easily. I haven't heard much about his service but there is always tags ripped off his flyers so people must be interested in his service. You could also post an ad in the local newspaper or on craigslist.org for your area.

You could also offer "PC Recycling". People are constantly buying PC's and throwing out their old ones. Many people will pay for the peace of mind that their old harddrive has been throughly wiped and pc disposed of properly. You would have to find out the price of pc disposal in your area and tack on your expense. This will also give you a surplus of floppy drives, cd drives, and other components to help troubleshoot pc's with.

[Chazell29]

Just an idea for getting your name out there. Theres a kid here that does the same thing and I saw his flyer posted on the tack board at the laundromat with his number printed along the sides and snipped so you could tear it off easily. I haven't heard much about his service but there is always tags ripped off his flyers so people must be interested in his service. You could also post an ad in the local newspaper or on craigslist.org for your area.

You could also offer "PC Recycling". People are constantly buying PC's and throwing out their old ones. Many people will pay for the peace of mind that their old harddrive has been throughly wiped and pc disposed of properly. You would have to find out the price of pc disposal in your area and tack on your expense. This will also give you a surplus of floppy drives, cd drives, and other components to help troubleshoot pc's with.

Wow! Great idea! Thank you!

[Cricket]

John Doe brings in his pc for virus removal. You fix it and send him home. He calls back wanting to know what you did with the Novel he’s been writing for the past ten years. You say you never saw it. His attorney starts a lawsuit claiming 8 million in damages. You have a heart attack and find another line of business.Yeah...my grandfather took his new and old pc to circuit city firedog to do a data transfer, and they lost everything he had, i think he said a few thousand pictures, they deleted it all :eek:I've never accidentally lost data from the computers I've worked on (I use external HDDs to make backups if necessary) but I've "found" interesting data (naughty pictures) on some computers that the owners should have deleted or moved before they gave their computers to me. People are interesting, that's all I can say.

I've worked on a few computers that lost data when the owners decide to "clean" them...the best one was when my friend's Mom decided to clean the Windows directory and moved everything to the Recycle Bin. The next day the computer wouldn't boot up and she didn't know why. Luckily she didn't know how to empty the Recycle Bin and I was able to install her HDD in my bench system and moved all the folders and files back into the Windows directory and the got the computer working again. I told my friend to tell her Mom not to "clean" her computer anymore.

When I work on my favorite nephew's computer I always check the web brower history and cookies to see what he's up to and then I'd bug him about his browsing habits everytime I saw him. Lately when I work on his computer the history and cookies are empty...he found out how to delete that information before giving me the computer to work on so now I don't know where he's been surfing to...at least he learned something...haha...

:) Cricket

[HAL9000]

I screwed up once and on a system with multiple drives.. formatted the wrong drive... that became a pile of lost time on my part as I did data recovery to get everything back... oops.

[nocturnx]

We ghost nearly every pc we work on here. Doesn't hurt to be cautious and have an image to fall back on. Just throw in a copy of windows pe, map your network drive, load up ghost, create image, save it to the file server. Also great for backing up possible show-stoppers such as the payroll machine, x-label machine, and other business dependent machines.

You may want to do this with customers machines that require retooling of the registry, virus removal, or such. Usually takes a half-hour to 45 mins. and 3+ gigs to ghost a machine though. And if you got the storage you could also offer that as a service, so if their harddrive fails you can just throw their image on a new one and they are good to go.

[Chazell29]

We ghost nearly every pc we work on here. Doesn't hurt to be cautious and have an image to fall back on. Just throw in a copy of windows pe, map your network drive, load up ghost, create image, save it to the file server. Also great for backing up possible show-stoppers such as the payroll machine, x-label machine, and other business dependent machines.

You may want to do this with customers machines that require retooling of the registry, virus removal, or such. Usually takes a half-hour to 45 mins. and 3+ gigs to ghost a machine though. And if you got the storage you could also offer that as a service, so if their harddrive fails you can just throw their image on a new one and they are good to go.
I don't know how to "ghost" a hard drive, is there anywhere that i can look that provides like step by step so i could learn easily?

If anyone can give me any more tips for things like ghosting and what not that could be useful on my journey I'd greatly appreciate it.

[Cricket]

I don't know how to "ghost" a hard drive, is there anywhere that i can look that provides like step by step so i could learn easily?

If anyone can give me any more tips for things like ghosting and what not that could be useful on my journey I'd greatly appreciate it."Ghosting a drive" should really be "cloning a drive"...Ghost refers to Norton Ghost, a hard drive cloning program. Most of us here us Acronis True Image instead of Norton Ghost.

Most of the hard drive manufacturer's have a hard drive cloning program as part of their hard drive utilities. You can usually download the package at their web site.

There are tons of tutorials on the net that cover cloning a hard drive. Google (http://www.google.com/)is your friend.

:) Cricket

[nocturnx]

Heres something I found real quick that will give you the general idea of what ghost is. You can google "norton ghost tutorial" for more info.

http://www.trap17.com/index.php/norton-ghost-tutorial_t9684.html
http://www.cyberanswers.org/norton_ghost.php

Basically it creates an image of the PC in its current state and allows you to restore to that exact state at a later time, in case something were to happen to the pc. Think windows xp restore only much more reliable, not to mention you would be surprised how many people that don't know better disable their system restore.

Edit: Like Cricket said there are several cloning programs out there that you can use. I am just using ghost as an example because that is what our comapany makes us use (corporate licensed on our file server). I can say that it is very reliable and easy to use from experience.

[piasabird]

I was copying one hard drive to another once at home and copied the empty drive to the full drive. Poof it was all gone.

[jer888]

Once you turn 18, won't you have to get a business license? Like I mean, you can't do it under the table forever (right?)

[thefultonhow]

Once you turn 18, won't you have to get a business license? Like I mean, you can't do it under the table forever (right?)

I'm 21 and still doing it under the table.

[glc]

You can keep doing it under the table till someone reports you or a liability issue appears.

[Chazell29]

Oh wow, I didn't even know you'd have to get a license if it was in home. I guess I should start googling the Legal information so i don't get sued and screwed over =/