I don't have any love for CompUSA but it is kinda sad to see them go.

We've got a MicroCenter in Chicago where I tend to do all my non-Apple Store shopping. I went to the CompUSA store in downtown Chicago when they were having their going-out-of-business sale a while ago, but nothing jumped out at me that I had to buy....

I feel sorry about CompUSA in the sense that they were the first place you could get any kind of hardware and software back when nobody thought that anyone but geeks would have a home computer. I think they made their own bed, though.

Yeah, they really sucked, especially after the first few years. I just remember making treks up to their story in Kearny Mesa in 1988 as a total computer geek and loving the handful of places that dealt with this kind of stuff. At the time I was working for Egghead Software, another company that has long since passed.

I have a question that needs the hivemind to help me come up with a solution.

Beau and I are AT&T wireless customers. Don't laugh. Beau has been talking up a fucking storm and we only have 120 minutes (give or take) between now and the 25th. That is not going to work given the time of year.

I figure I have only a few options including the ones below that I've thought of but I would appreciate any additional suggestions. What I would like is to expand our plan by about 400-500 minutes. But AT&T wireless will not do that for us until the 26th (when our month starts over).

I can think of the following as options:

1) that I get Beau a phone card and he uses a landline for calls (especially when he travels)

2) that I add a 3rd line to my wireless acct for 30 days and he use that phone for at least 2 weeks, then I cancel that acct.

The real problem (IMO) is that I will have to restrict my calls in either case because we have so few minutes. I do talk less on the phone, so I might be able to make do with 120 minutes, but I would love a little more flexibility. Maybe I need to add a 3rd and 4th line (on a separate family plan) to the acct.

I'd rather not juggle weird telephone numbers, but if I have to save $$, I will.

Please note: any overage on my plan is $.45 a minute.

LeN, that's a shame, dang. I'd probably go for the calling card, but then, I hardly ever talk on the phone.

I'm surprised you don't have a plan that lets you talk to other customers on the same network/top people you choose/whatever for "free" (no minutes).

oh we do.

apparently all of his friends are not on at&t...

ask if they will pro-rate the half month so you can ramp up now.

Yeah but even in the early days I remember how they sucked. One example I remember is that I was buying network equipment, the CompUSA service department offered to do a wiring install. This was a no-notice thing so I was interested; the SOB offered to install ethernet (not arcnet) over standard phone cable. (Arcnet was a mostly no longer used protocol that ran over standard twisted pair, if certain conditions were met. Ethernet, no so much; and our runs were short enough that Ethernet might have worked with intermittent failures over phone cable.)

And he had a big grin on his face; he was enjoying the thought of how badly he would be screwing me if I accepted. I called my boss and got permission to buy the equipment from a small place down the road where the equipment was 20% more, but the people would at least not offer to sabotage our network. I did my own cable install (I really hate cabling - but budget had to come from somewhere, and saying "no" to an offer like that was not strong enough".) I avoided doing business with CompUSA for years after that, as did the company I worked for.

A question for the techie hivemind, especially those professional computer techies: I'm looking to expand my (rather limited) computer skills, so I'm thinking about going for a web design program/certification to add to my resume. Does this look like it might cover at least a few of the basics skills needed to work in web design?

My professional background is in publishing/editing, but I figured web design combined with that editing means that I might be able to produce web newsletters for professional organizations, etc.

Kathy, for the Flash and Fireworks, XML, etc. it would be useful. There's nothing in there about CSS, or PhP, though, and those are a necessity these days, and there ought to be a class on content management systems--at the very least an introduction.

edit: Most of it looks useful, especially if they're good about teaching you useability, accessibility, meeting web standards. I wouldn't want that many classes in software, the Dreamweaver, FrontPage, etc.

I like W3Schools for learning things I don't know how to do, and they have some sort of certification program. [link] [link]