Craziest things you've had to do to fix your software - Hardware & Software

One of my friends recently came up to me with his permanently disabled iPhone and asked me to fix it, so I said "Sure". My method of choice was the [URL="http://ijailbreaknow.com/uncategorized/how-to-get-back-your-lost-iphone-passcode-with-gecko-iphone-toolkit-video/"]Gecko iPhone Toolkit[/URL] to get it fixed. I had to also download a different version of Java than what I already had, and they wouldn't let me download it unless I signed up for an Oracle account, and if that wasn't bad enough, they ask for a load of personal information on that, company name, address, business phone, the whole shibang; so I played along with the stupidity and said that I was a professional Hobbit wrestler who worked for the combine. I set my location as some place in anchorage, all this done just for a friend's ipod to get unlocked without wiping all the music, pictures, and contacts off the face of the planet. I know I can't be the only one whose done completely asinine tasks to fix a product, so what crazy stuff have you guys done to fix your software? [B]tl;dr,[/B] What are some incredible reaches you've gone to fix your (or someone else's) broken crap? Edit: Also, I'm kinda new to facepunch and took care not to start immediately posting threads, so if this is going to turn out to be one of those crap threads people get banned for, please let me know.

Ages ago to get my old beaten up computer to work I had to turn it upside down

Fairly sure iphones are counted as hardware, but any way. I once had to sit for 3 hours searching my computer for rests of cola and chips because some nut job spilled shit in my fan.

My ipod's screen glitched out and completely froze trying to load Deviantart's login window It refused any input and I had to leave it sitting beside my bed all night on a metal panel (It was getting hot as fuck) until the battery finally died.

Buy new hardware

I've had a few odd issues with GTAIV. Once, the game wouldn't start up at all. I tried a million things to fix it, and in the end, I had to update Windows Media Player. I'm fucking serious.

I once had to uninstall Skype in order to play Crysis :v:

Many years ago I had to run my old GeForce (Can't remember the card, maybe it was 8800gt. Around 2006 I think) on drivers for ATI cards to play most of my games. And not software but, I have a IDE cable in my motherboard for the last year. It has no function but if i remove the cable from the motherboard my computer will freeze and never start unless I plug the cable in again.

[QUOTE=ica|kvantum;40324462] And not software but, I have a IDE cable in my motherboard for the last year. It has no function but if i remove the cable from the motherboard my computer will freeze and never start unless I plug the cable in again.[/QUOTE] That's a brilliant security measure

Placed an icebrick on top of my old GPU to cool it down and to avoid fragmentation while in playing some game, but then the fragmentation became constant and that was it. Not sure if it had anything to do with the weight of it, or some water drippling inside the PC, but oh well. At least it didn't scorch.

I installed Morrowind Overhaul, and a friend wanted to try Morrowind, so he started a new game, and blackscreen after the FMV. The solution was to turn off AA, start the game, exit the game, turn on AA, turn off pixel shaders, set the resolution to 640x480, start the game, exit the game, turn off AA again, start the game, exit the game, turn all the settings back on, and run MSGO to put the resolution and FOV back to what you had, start the game, exit the game, start thae game, New Game. It worked. Then I found out It was just taking forever to load, and if you give it time, it will work.

The glue/thermal paste thing between the heatsink and GPU on my old Nvidia TNT2 stopped being adhesive one day and the heatsink just kept falling off. Had to use some string wrapped around the card to secure it in place :v:

I had a power supply that would only work once it was warm. I had to heat it up with a hairdryer before it would power on.

I used to have one of those fold up rubber keyboards and I also had some serious computer rage issues and when I kept losing games of Unreal Tournement's Bunny Track's gamemode I snipped the corner off. Eventually I had snipped off the escape key, the left ctrl key and the numpads enter and - key. The keyboard refused to work unless I put a bit of metal in a certain position in the side of the keyboard.

Before I discovered DynDNS and iLO I had to remote desktop into my computer at home, then remote desktop into my server in order to work on it.

Not really unusual but Watched the Diablo 2 download meter for updates take 5-6 hours on dial up, Then when it finished I wasted the next year of my life.

[QUOTE=CubeManv2;40326840]Not really unusual but Watched the Diablo 2 download meter for updates take 5-6 hours on dial up, Then when it finished I wasted the next year of my life.[/QUOTE] Sounds like you've [I]found[/I] a problem rather than fixed one, and I'm not talking about the 5-6 hours on dial up, either...

Once I had a problem where any program that accessed the disc drive (Nero, ImgBurn, EAC, etc.) would disappear once I opened them and their processes were incapable of being terminated. Windows wouldn't shut down because of the damn processes. I replaced the disc drive and everything was okay. wat

I remember a clients PC that i was working on, every hour or so, it would freeze, and the only way to unfreeze it was to give it a very hard whack on the front of the case. I think it still does it today.

[QUOTE=spinpoint F3;40331887]I remember a clients PC that i was working on, every hour or so, it would freeze, and the only way to unfreeze it was to give it a very hard whack on the front of the case. I think it still does it today.[/QUOTE] percussive maintenance

You're silly, OP [url]http://www.oldversion.com/windows/java-platform/[/url]

I once had to reformat Windows and buy a new graphics card (yes, both) in order to get DirectX games to stop minimizing when they started up. OpenGL games were fine though.

-nah-

I don't remember the exact program but it wouldn't install or authenticate or anything once I downloaded it so I went to Taco Bell instead of trying. Worked when I came back. Taco Bell is sacred to my people.

[QUOTE=XL5;40326190]I had a power supply that would only work once it was warm. I had to heat it up with a hairdryer before it would power on.[/QUOTE] Interestingly, I've had this same problem before. That was all the way back in 2002 though.

[QUOTE=B!N4RY;40336404]Interestingly, I've had this same problem before. That was all the way back in 2002 though.[/QUOTE] Mine was around 2003-4 I think.

[QUOTE=Shadaez;40333841]You're silly, OP [url]http://www.oldversion.com/windows/java-platform/[/url][/QUOTE] It wasn't the java platform, it was some sort of JRE that I needed to install that the current platform was keeping me from using, apparently. Still, I feel stupid. You've completed your task, now get out. /joking

This belongs here: [img]http://sphotos-b.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/c0.0.400.400/p403x403/733974_503206003067989_1469586746_n.jpg[/img]

I remember my brother was always really angry at his PC because it was slow as fuck and almost never working. Then, in a moment of unstoppable rage, he kicked the PC with the power of a thousand suns while wearing steel toed boots and that fixed most, if not all of the problems.

Know what the craziest thing anyone does to fix software? Trying to get it to work for hours on end, giving up, then coming back to it after a period of time and it seemingly magically starts working. Yep, the craziest thing I've done to fix my software is nothing at all. That and trying everything to fix a windows install before starting one of the automated repair tools that fixed it. I was genuinely surprised that it worked so I guess that counts.