[Author’s note: you can skip over today if you don’t want to read about computers. Just remember I am at the stage of trying to make repairs on my own. I had pretty much given up on trying to find an honest Florida computer school.]
I was late getting over to Richard’s computer. [Richard owns a string of ATMs.] It was a strange coincidence, because it was the exact same make and model as The Hippie’s, and was having the exact same problems. That is too much to be coincidence. Both computers had lost communication with their operating systems and data at the same time in the same way. Both computers had the word processing icon disappear and the word processing software moved itself over to the Corel Draw teaser program that comes with Dell machines.Also, when Windows XP is reinstalled, it does clobber the old version, but it also clobbers all the system settings including the user accounts. What dolt came up with that one? Like The Hippie’s computer, Dell had tweaked and over-tweaked the entire system just to sell it, and it is almost like the computer innards finally gave up. Both computers have a weird system where there is no audio cable from the CD/DVD drives to the sound card. The Hippie’s computer has a green 4-wire plug on the sound card to the jumpers marked DAT. Is this a digital sound card? When he tries to play the CD/DVD, it displays that the sound card cannot be found. Yet the play light comes on when a disk is inserted. No sound comes from the headphone jacks but I am not certain
On the way out, I asked him about the ATM business. He owns 18 machines and makes an average of $9,000 per month net. Ah, does anyone recall how I tried to check this business out on the internet a couple of years ago? None of several places I contacted would give me a straight answer. Every one of these places knew I was new and seeking information, and every one of them tried to play me for a sucker. It may not be written anywhere here, so let me quickly give you the details.
All I wanted was information on how to set up ATMs. I viewed them as ‘money vending machines’ which I wanted to know how much they cost both to buy and to operate. This means a price per machine and the details of monthly operating expenses. These would be for a dedicated phone line, and the fee charged by the banking network system that interconnects the machines, usually an outfit called STAR, Cirrus or Plus. In addition, I [had once or twice] tried to find out what some of the margins and operating quirks of these machines were in real life. I was just about to say I’d never met such a bunch of lying, cheating bastards, but then I remembered I’d once worked in Canada.
I had several conversations with the big advertisers on the Internet, and every one of them tried to con me in some way. Not one of them gave me a straight answer. One tried to convince me I had to buy a ‘minimum of ten machines’. Another said they were the cheapest setup at $18,000. And one convinced me that I had to pay a flat monthly fee of $450 for the network, per machine. Every one was lying. I even had one big shot tell me I “could get in trouble trying to find out details about the machines” and that he could not answer any of my questions without betraying his older customers. Sounds a lot like trying to buy a trailer in Miami?
The machines are $2,900 each new and delivered from the factory to a site of your choosing. The machines are anchored by four ½ inch thick bolts that are machine driven four or five inches into concrete. You must have a $50 per month private dedicated phone line as the phone company won’t let you use a residential line. And, the networks charge a flat fee of $20 per month for each location. Richard gave me all this information in probably less than five minutes.
The company in Largo (not Key Largo) will deliver and set the machine up at your location, plus train you how to use it. They have a real help line you can use for up to a year after each purchase. I wish I could have gotten these straight answers a couple years ago. He says you want at least two hundred customers per month but this is not hard to do. He could have more machines, but has chosen to just keep his best sites. This is not as easy to do as it sounds, but I do have 13 more years to think it over. If I invest the $3,000 in the mutuals, I would only make $180 a year.
Now, Richard has far more needs than the immediate fixing of that computer. He has no backup scheme in place. The shell he was using was heavily customized by Dell, and may not be easy to set up again. I did not have time to check the sound cards or their drivers. He will have to call Dell and let them talk him through the entire process, which takes hours on the phone. But, as promised, he has all his data back, and he can use his computer for work.
