Tech support these days is a bear. Ultimately the end user gets the shaft. I won't go into the accented individual at Dell who is asking me if the green light is let up as my drive rattles around like a metal lathe. I'm talking about how a lot of support isn't really support. Case in point is D-Link. Recently I upgraded casa-Vo to gigabit ethernet, and I purchased an inexpensive D-Link 8 port switch. This switch has a wonderful feature--it likes to restart occasionally. This is particularly sweet when you're on a Skype call, let me tell ya. Anyhow, I went out to their site, and sent an e-mail detailing what was happening (folks, I'm a techie at work and at home, so the detail was very explicit and quite adequate). In response I get this message:

To verify product functionality, it is best if you speak with a live technician to resolve the issue. Please call technical support at 877-45D-Link (877-453-5465). Technical support is available 24/7 to serve your needs.

GRRRR. The whole point in using online support is to save me time and keep me as a happy customer. What's with the policy that pushes me to the phone? I don't believe that this is going to provide the necessary support I need to fix this issue (which I suspect is a bad switch). I'd like to send an email, that when opened, would snap the neck of the little thumbnut who just punted me to dial-in tech support. I'm the customer, I'm right, and this stubby schmo needs a beatdown.