Caught in moral dilemma...

I will work on my own computers, my mother's computer and my mother/father in-law's computer. It took me a few years to learn this. My standard answer to people with computer problems now is "Buy a Dell". Then when they have problems and ask me for advice I tell them to "Call Dell.". Much easier this way.

When I do work on computers for my immediate family, my first question is - "Do you have a restore disk or an operating system on CD/DVD." If the answer is no, then I advise them to obtain a restore disk or purchase an OS, then call me back when they get it.

Moppie wrote in post #6312543
I think you should get a medal for driving 70 miles out of your way to spend 5 hours helping people you don't know

Forget everything else, that right there says you are a man of very high moral standards, a credit to society and in need of a beer

Agreed. You have done your good deed - expect nothing but continued trouble and no respect for your good work.
Remember that even if you can fix their computer, stupid can't be fixed.

I had the same delema not too long ago when a friends computer crapped out on him the hard drive failed.

So we bought a new drive and got back to his house and i installed it when i asked him for his Windows cd he hands me this home made dvd with "Deminoid XP PRO +" wittten on it.

All i could do was laugh.. this guy makes a 6 digit salary with a 5 digit bonous every year and is too dam cheap to go out and spend a couple hundred bucks on a software..

I told him i was sorry but i would have no part in installing the software. Not worth the risk even though i did not supply the software.

Hmm... I wouldn't report the poor guys who lost their machine for as you say, they are pretty clueless, but the computer builder handing out pirated software is something else.

The one thing i would do is advise them that while the computer has been fixed everything installed is illegal and could land them in jail or seriously in debt.

Give them the heads up so that if something goes wrong and they end up taking it to a computer store for repairs they don't get reported.

Then give them them the option to have you install the OS correctly at your cost.

Michael_Lambert wrote in post #6317181
The one thing i would do is advise them that while the computer has been fixed everything installed is illegal and could land them in jail or seriously in debt.

Give them the heads up so that if something goes wrong and they end up taking it to a computer store for repairs they don't get reported.

Then give them them the option to have you install the OS correctly at your cost.

I did tell them that the software was illegal, and warned them not to try to register or update it. I also told them that, without disks, if anything fails they are S.O.L.

However, I don't think they have grasped the concepts.

As my wife says, it's not my problem. If anything fails, they should go back to the guy who installed the stuff.

What I did was found and retrieved all their personal files, and reformatted and relocated their D: drive, which they couldn't do because the old O.S. was still on it and conflicting with the new O.S.

Their drives are now C: = System, D: = DVD/CD, and E: = Data Backup. What they do with them is not my problem.