This actually happened several weeks ago.

The company I work for does not keep computer parts in stock.  We usually place orders through a distributor.  However, if the need is for one or two common parts, we’ll just make a quick trip to a local retailer.  On this particular day, I was at a client who had a computer where the network adapter (NIC) went bad.  The closest place that would have a NIC happened to be a Best Buy.

So… I make a quick trip.  I walked in to be dismayed by the dearth of networking options.  It seems that most of the networking products at Best Buy are now wireless.  I understand this since, for most people, it’s simple and cheaper than having to run cable.  Unfortunately, this sucks for people with office needs.

Since I was the only customer in the computers area of the store, I ended up with a shadow.  I looked around for a minute and finally found one NIC with an RJ-45 interface.  The brand?  Dynex.  I had never heard of it before.  Keep in mind:  I’ve been working in the Information Systems field for 11 years.  Ten of those years have been working with the infrastructure side of the field (non-programming). 

I said out loud:  “Dynex?  What the hell is Dynex?”  To which, my Best Buy employed shadow responded:  “Oh!  They’re a respected name in networking.”

???????

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO K.  I wanted to call “Bullshit” to his face but I exercised a little restraint.  I looked around a little more and found a Linksys adapter.  This was the only other option and cost $15 more.  Since I’m actually familiar with Linksys and they’re a division of Cisco I decided to go with that one.  I wouldn’t normally go with them but I didn’t see myself as having a real choice.  I made the purchase and went back to the client and installed the NIC without incident.

This got me curious — who the hell is Dynex?  Later that night I fed “Dynex” into Google.  There happened to be a sponsored link for the term.  Dynex at Best Buy.  When you click their link for where to shop it sends you to a page at Best Buy.  This tells me Dynex is a Best Buy store brand.  If you go to the “Contact Us” links at Dynex and Best Buy you’ll find the mailing address for  Dynex is in Richfield, MN and the mailing address for Best Buy is in Minneapolis, MN.  These two cities are approximately 7 miles from each other.  The Wikipedia entry for Dynex is redirected to the Best Buy entry.

I’m not terribly fond of Best Buy hiding their store brand (generic) behind a different name.  But that’s not really what bothered me in this situation.  What gave me a case of the red ass was the Best Buy schlub trying to sell me on Dynex being a respected name in networking.  Shame on you, Best Buy.

Back in May, I posted about some of the most expensive cars being the easiest to steal.  I was reading BoingBoing today and came across a related story.  It seems if you have one of these expensive car security systems, insurers consider your car unstealable — if it’s reported stolen, you must be involved.  This is a highly ignorant stance as there is no such thing as “absolutely secure.”  The best part of the story is the revelation that many of these systems have an override.  In the case of the story’s writer, his Civic’s startup security can be bypassed with a series of pulls on the emergency break.

Overrides render a security system absolutely useless against a professional thief.  The same can be said in the computer world — any system with a backdoor is of no use against an experienced cracker.

I bought my first computer (one I actually paid for with my own money) in 1994. It was an IBM I bought from Circuit City. I followed it up with a Gateway in 1995 which I purchased through the employee purchase plan at my Dad's employer. Since then, I've pretty much built my own computers: the exceptions being a couple Dell servers I bought for myself.

In September of 2004 I decided I wanted a media center computer. Instead of taking the time of putting it together myself, I decided to try retail again. Big mistake. I went with a SONY media center computer. For a little less than a year and a half it was pretty good. A couple months ago, the hard drive died. I bought a new hard drive since it was out of warranty and rebuilt the system. For some reason, the actual media center portion of Windows doesn't want to work anymore.

When I got home from Boston last week the computer was off. This was odd because I always leave it on. I tried to power it on and nothing. I'm guessing something's wrong with the motherboard but I'm not sure. It's difficult to troubleshoot because some of the parts aren't exactly "standard" and it's all packed in rather tight.  This is a bit of a pisser because this system has my media card readers.  I haven't given the set up a good look yet, but I'm not sure I'm going to be able to easily transfer the reader block to another computer.  This means it might be a little bit before I get my pictures from Boston up since I haven't been able to find my camera's data cable.

From now on, I build everything myself. No more crap at retail and definitely no more SONY.