So I'm in the middle of a service call for one club, when the IT for the restaurant at another club calls me. He took it upon himself to replace the router (that I also originally installed) and now the vantage lighting system doesn't work. He wants to know if I can tell him how to fix it.

Yes, I can. Call my office to schedule a service call and tell me if I send the bill to the club or to you for screwing with stuff without asking about potential problems.

His reply was, well, what if I just reset the lighting system?

That's when I proceeded to explain if he touches it, he's responsible for the bill.

This drives me to...

I want to design a rack blank with the words


DO NOT TOUCH OR YOU COULD BE SERIOUSLY KILLED


by original install company who has to warranty it.

That ranks up there with...

Client: Hi, the crestron system isn't working.
Us: What part of the crestron system isn't working? Can you control lights and thermostats and arm/disarm security?
Client: I cant control the DirecTV boxes but everything else seems to be working fine.
Us: Your system has 8 cable boxes.
Client: We switched to DirecTV.
Us: Did your crestron system stop working after the DirecTV installers left?
Client: Yes.

When I went by to see what was wrong, I was reminded that I put a warning sticker on the router that stated the network contains static addresses and altering the router or replacing it could cause system failures.

The idiot thought if he reset the router and put it back the same way I had it, he should be fine. Yet he was guessing at what that configuration included

this is genius, do you have a pic of your sticker?

Somewhere I have the word file that I used to print them off with. I'll see if I can find it and send it to you. Btw, I also bought the largest neon pink mailing labels to use so that I could print the largest text as possible

You should just tape a picture of your gun rack to the equipment instead

Or that the ____ is off. Try that Cable Power/BDP Power/etc Power button

Of all people to screw up a router, the IT jags are the ones I would have thought could do it correctly, as in, LOOK AT THE EFFING SETTINGS AND COPY THEM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Ugh...we have a project where the cable boxes all of a sudden started to behave differently For a couple of years they just stayed on. No discretes of course. Then one day they are all off. Site visit consists of pressing power button on cable boxes. It happens again 2 days later and again a day after that. We ended up putting a POWER toggle on the cable menu page so they can try that first before calling. We got 1 more email about it happening again but before i could troubleshoot the client wrote back saying "i was able to get it to turn on with the new POWER button.

I always put a power toggle button on the remote for when this happens.  i just label it "Fix Cable"

So as an 'IT guy' I've had to replace routers where for many different reasons being able to login and look at the original settings isn't possible. In these cases what I do is run an IP and port scan of the most common subnets and then investigate which services are actually used by temporarily inserting my laptop as a man in the middle and capturing the packets while certain activities are triggered (flipping switches, blinds, etc), and then I have a pretty good idea of what needs to talk to what and how. It's easy to setup a new router with all essential port forwards and settings after you have a proper map of the network, unfortunately most IT guys will just assume things and not be that thorough..

Are you saying that most IT guys don't have the imagination to think beyond making physical connections? This stuff is immensely customizable. Ignoring that should be basis for losing a lawsuit, or at least losing payment for any and all work they did on the system, as well as paying the original installer to fix it.

Guys who come on scene later seem to think they know everything!

I have mixed experiences with "IT" types. Some are arrogant and assume that the stereo guy is stupid and that only an IT person can know what is "best". Others are great to work with.

One of my worst experiences was with an alarm guy who assured his clients that the only way his alarm would work is if the client contracted for a second Internet service dedicated to his alarm. I can imagine that he had all sorts of trouble with client systems because he kept moving the IP addresses for his fixed address devices. Every time I went back to that house I found one or more of his devices inside the DHCP range. Rather than attempting deal with a stone, I would quietly move the DHCP range out of his way, only to discover that he had moved again on my next visit.

Another alternative, pick up the phone and call me to see what could be screwed up. Like I said, my number was on the router