A collection of great stories from spiceworks, retold.
̲𝚃̲̲𝚑̲̲𝚎̲ ̲𝙵̲̲𝚛̲̲𝚎̲̲𝚎̲̲𝚣̲̲𝚎̲̲𝚛̲ ̲𝙶̲̲𝚊̲̲𝚖̲̲𝚋̲̲𝚒̲̲𝚝̲
Nothing quite says “I’ve completely lost the plot” like putting your broken hard drive in the freezer. And yet, that’s exactly what some bright spark did when their parents’ HP desktop started making the sort of noises you normally associate with a Boeing 747 attempting to land on a motorway.
You see, in their infinite wisdom, they’d remembered some university professor once mentioned this absolutely MAD technique of freezing a failing drive to temporarily resurrect it. It’s the sort of thing that sounds like it was invented by a drunk scientist at three in the morning. But here’s the thing: IT ACTUALLY WORKED.
The drive, probably as confused as the same professor at a fashion show, spun up long enough for them to rescue their precious family photos. It’s the equivalent of jump-starting a dead horse with a defibrillator – completely mental but somehow brilliant.
̲𝚃̲̲𝚑̲̲𝚎̲ ̲𝙼̲̲𝚊̲̲𝚐̲̲𝚗̲̲𝚒̲̲𝚏̲̲𝚒̲̲𝚌̲̲𝚎̲̲𝚗̲̲𝚝̲ ̲𝙼̲̲𝚊̲̲𝚐̲̲𝚗̲̲𝚎̲̲𝚝̲ ̲𝙼̲̲𝚊̲̲𝚜̲̲𝚜̲̲𝚊̲̲𝚌̲̲𝚛̲̲𝚎̲
Some people believe that hotels are safe places to store your luggage. These people are WRONG. In what can only be described as the most spectacular demonstration of magnetic destruction since Magneto had a temper tantrum, one poor soul left their laptop bag in hotel storage during a conference.
What happened next was about as predictable as 1 number roulette. In their infinite wisdom, the hotel placed the bag next to what must have been the sort of magnet they use to lift cars in scrapyards. The result? THREE hard drives – the laptop’s and two externals – were transformed into expensive paperweights faster than you can say “backup to the cloud.”
̲𝚃̲̲𝚑̲̲𝚎̲ ̲𝚁̲̲𝙰̲̲𝙸̲̲𝙳̲ ̲𝚘̲̲𝚏̲ ̲𝙳̲̲𝚘̲̲𝚘̲̲𝚖̲
Now, RAID arrays are supposed to be like the German automotive industry – precise, reliable, and utterly dull. But sometimes, they go Ferrari and decide to burst into flames. In this case, LITERALLY.
Picture the scene: It’s 10 AM, payroll needs to go to the bank by 5 PM, and their server has decided to do its best impression of a bonfire. But wait! Surely their backup expert, whom I shall call “Competent,” has this covered? WRONG. This absolute PILLOCK hadn’t bothered running backups for A YEAR because, and I quote, “he didn’t know what that server did.”
But then, like the automotive equivalent of a Rolls-Royce emerging from a scrapyard, one clever chap revealed he’d been secretly backing everything up to tape drives in his office. Despite being lectured EVERY WEEK about throwing away his “old rubbish,” he had everything back up and running in two hours. GENIUS.
̲𝚃̲̲𝚑̲̲𝚎̲ ̲𝙶̲̲𝚛̲̲𝚎̲̲𝚊̲̲𝚝̲ ̲𝙲̲̲𝚑̲̲𝚒̲̲𝚗̲̲𝚎̲̲𝚜̲̲𝚎̲ ̲𝙷̲̲𝚊̲̲𝚛̲̲𝚍̲ ̲𝙳̲̲𝚛̲̲𝚒̲̲𝚟̲̲𝚎̲ ̲𝙼̲̲𝚢̲̲𝚜̲̲𝚝̲̲𝚎̲̲𝚛̲̲𝚢̲
If you’ve ever wondered what happens when you take an unencrypted laptop to China, wonder no more. One company director found out the hard way when she returned with a laptop so thoroughly infected with viruses, it made the average teenager’s download folder look positively sterile.
The new IT chap, probably grinning like a Cheshire cat, happily volunteered to reimage the entire machine. What he DIDN’T know was that this particular director had decided to keep every important document she’d ever owned on the local drive, none of it backed up, because apparently backing up data is something that happens to other people.
𝚃̲̲𝚑̲̲𝚎̲ ̲𝙽̲̲𝚎̲̲𝚎̲̲𝚍̲ ̲𝚏̲̲𝚘̲̲𝚛̲ ̲𝚂̲̲𝚙̲̲𝚎̲̲𝚎̲̲𝚍̲ (̲𝙰̲̲𝚗̲̲𝚍̲ ̲𝚁̲̲𝚎̲̲𝚐̲̲𝚞̲̲𝚕̲̲𝚊̲̲𝚛̲ ̲𝙱̲̲𝚊̲̲𝚌̲̲𝚔̲̲𝚞̲̲𝚙̲̲𝚜̲)
And now for something that will make your blood run colder than a penguin’s kneecaps. Imagine, if you will, a company storing their entire BUSINESS HISTORY of contracts since 2010 in the digital equivalent of a cardboard box under the bed – the “My Documents” folder.
Now, some GENIUS managed to accidentally wipe this folder faster than a Bugatti Veyron can reach 60 MPH. Years of contracts, gone in less time than it takes to set the kettle on. This isn’t just dropping the ball – this is dropping the ball from the top of the Burj Khalifa, into a volcano, while someone plays the sad trombone.
The truly remarkable thing about this catastrophe isn’t that it happened – we all know computers have a sense of humor darker than a black hole – it’s that someone managed to do it accidentally. It’s like accidentally invading Poland – there are quite a few steps between “I’ll just organize these files” and “I’ve just erased our entire corporate history.”
̲𝚃̲̲𝚑̲̲𝚎̲ ̲𝙰̲̲𝚞̲̲𝚝̲̲𝚘̲̲𝚖̲̲𝚊̲̲𝚝̲̲𝚎̲̲𝚍̲ ̲𝙴̲̲𝚡̲̲𝚌̲̲𝚎̲̲𝚕̲̲𝚕̲̲𝚎̲̲𝚗̲̲𝚌̲̲𝚎̲ ̲𝚘̲̲𝚏̲ ̲𝙸̲̲𝚗̲̲𝚌̲̲𝚘̲̲𝚖̲̲𝚙̲̲𝚎̲̲𝚝̲̲𝚎̲̲𝚗̲̲𝚌̲̲𝚎̲
And finally, the pièce de résistance of backup brilliance. Picture, if you will, a remote office with a sophisticated backup system that consisted of – and I’m not making this up – several USB drives in a six-week rotation. All they had to do was change the drive every Friday. Simple, yes?
To make it even MORE foolproof, they set up an automated email reminder. But here’s the thing about foolproof systems – they consistently underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools. For TWO YEARS, these emails were dutifully ignored. The drives were never changed. Not once. It’s the equivalent of having a Formula 1 pit crew that decides to take a two-year tea break during a race.
When disaster finally struck, they discovered that their entire backup strategy had been about as effective as a chocolate teapot. The best part? The person responsible had been diligently marking the task as “completed” every single week.
And on that, it’s time to end. Remember, folks: backing up your data is like wearing pants. You might think you can get away without it, but eventually, you’ll have a very public and very embarrassing disaster. If you end up any of these situations and require some extra help, contact us