The computer repair field is fun and challenging. You get to travel and meet new people daily. Since computer technology is constantly evolving you also get to see new applications and implementations of this technology. Sometimes you are challenged to troubleshoot and help implement new technology that you haven’t had the chance to get familiar with. Google then becomes a valuable resource to help you stay abreast of these changes and provides up-to-date information to help correct issues and configuration problems as they occur. Classroom, self study, or online training and certification are a must for employment in this field.
The CompTIA A+ computer certification has become the number one certification for computer technicians. Employers now require this certification for entry-level positions. Using resources, such as, Craig’s list can provide many job opportunities for part-time work that will soon lead to full-time employment. The part-time positions are great for receiving lots of varied experiences that you can add to your resume as you quickly build skills and knowledge. Most of my students work less than 30 days part-time before they find full-time work. Employers today are concerned most with attitude and reliability of their workers. If a worker will show up each day with a good attitude most employers will do everything they can to make it work for that employee.
Today’s computer repair technicians find hardware to be very reliable, only power supplies and hard drives are now the most common failures seen. Software however, is still the biggest troubleshooting issues and is more than 90% of all problems that techs have to deal with. Windows has improved greatly over the years, but still is very vulnerable to corruptions and virus infections. Hard drive fragmentation, registry corruptions, configuration issues, virus infections, too many programs installed and running, spyware and data mining programs picked up on the Internet are some of the major problems that techs have to deal with. Good security, network access controls, and proper desktop configuration can help minimize most of the day-to-day issues, but Windows self-destructs over time. Regular imaging and good maintenance go along way to keep networks and desktop working at their optimum.
I have used imaging to keep over a thousand computers running well without issues over several sites. Performing imaging on a set schedule you can minimize your helpdesk and maintenance requests and lower your over all IT costs significantly.
The Computer Repair Training Plus website has additional information that you might find useful.