So I'm At Staples Buying a Laptop....

"JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder!" (jqj213) 08/11/2015 at 15:27 • Filed to: off topic, random, pc, computers

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And the counter where you buy is also where tech support is. This really old man walks up with an ancient looking all faded IBM PC. He says that it keeps crashing on him. The young tech lady looks at it funny and can’t find the proper wire to connect it to her monitor. She then looks and explains, “Sir, this PC runs Windows 95. They haven’t supported this in years. I can’t fix this. No one around here can fix it.” He looked all confused and upset saying it was one of the first computers he bought and never had issues before.... I couldn’t help but laugh since this was the only computer this guy had to use and still thought of it as brand new... Gotta love Florida.

64Mali > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 15:30

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I’m actually impressed it still running

R Saldana [|Oo|======|oO|] - BTC/ETH/LTC Prophet > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 15:30

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Dat “Fuck you windows” button~!!!

EL_ULY > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 15:30

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the stains...... YUCK!!!!!!!

crowmolly > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 15:31

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FUCK YEAH TURBO BUTTON

Nibby > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 15:31

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gib pls

JGrabowMSt > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 15:31

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In his defense, a computer shop should be able to fix a computer. Before I left my previous job, I was supporting a workstation that was running NT4.0 because the cost to upgrade that computer system was well into 6 figures. The NT4 machine was running software that paired with a lithium ion battery tester, as the guy built battery packs.

Don’t knock things that still work.

Agrajag > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 15:32

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Moments earlier...

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > JGrabowMSt 08/11/2015 at 15:33

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This.

TheBloody, Oppositelock lives on in our shitposts. > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 15:35

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I actually feel kind of bad for him, also it’s windows 95 for fucks sake which is not exactly rocket science. The least she could do is look at it.

Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 15:37

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In response:

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

I’m really surprised how much I’ve used this picture.

Zipppy, Mazdurp builder, Probeski owner and former ricerboy > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 15:42

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God damn. I miss computers like this.

Roundbadge > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 15:42

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Last year, I walked into a location our company had acquired the year before, and found a PC running OS/2 Warp in use as a voicemail server for their phone system.

Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer > Roundbadge 08/11/2015 at 15:44

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http://oppositelock.kinja.com/in-response-i-…

coelacanthist > Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer 08/11/2015 at 15:46

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Thanks for the lucid and terrifying flashback.

Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer > coelacanthist 08/11/2015 at 15:48

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Any time. Don’t hesitate to ask.

JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! > TheBloody, Oppositelock lives on in our shitposts. 08/11/2015 at 15:56

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The biggest issue was the only monitor they had needed an hdmi connection... which this didn’t have. They literally didn’t have the tools to do anything

jariten1781 > JGrabowMSt 08/11/2015 at 15:58

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Yeah, no shit...if it does what he needs it to do there ain’t nothing wrong with that.

We were still supporting a Netware 2.x system on Token-Ring at a company I worked for back in 04-05. Good enough is good enough.

StingrayJake > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 15:58

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Obviously he forgot to change the oil. Did this fall under the EPA’s emissions crackdown or nah?

Roundbadge > Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer 08/11/2015 at 15:58

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Doesn’t shock me at all. My company still uses a lot of terminal emulation software for day-to-day business.

TheChafing > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 16:00

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They seriously didn’t have a single monitor with a VGA cable?

What the hell?

StingrayJake > TheBloody, Oppositelock lives on in our shitposts. 08/11/2015 at 16:01

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My last employer had a newsroom full of Windows 98 machines. This was a year ago.

Then about three months before I left they took a quantum leap forward with cloud-based Windows 7 systems. I literally didn’t know what to do with all the extra time I had.

Axial > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 16:04

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Staples

Not having accesss to any sort of HDMI to VGA converter

JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! > TheChafing 08/11/2015 at 16:05

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I mean they might have but the tech just didnt feel like dealing with windows 95

Ash78, voting early and often > TheBloody, Oppositelock lives on in our shitposts. 08/11/2015 at 16:05

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There are too many people using technology (including those in service roles) whose only frame of reference is the current generation of technology that’s currently available. And as time goes by, actual diagnostic skills are going downhill quickly. Even the Apple Store’s answer to me on the last two issues was “fuck it, here’s a new one.” Hooray for giant profit margins!

Just because it’s obsolete to one person doesn’t mean it’s junk to the user.

jariten1781 > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 16:05

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If you’re working repair and your only skill is following boilerplate instructions...you’re not a technician, you’re a monkey and subject to replacement and obsolescence.

Win 95 is a pretty easy OS to figure out even if you’ve never played with it before and that vintage PC still has piece-parts which are widely available both NOS and used. Shitty repair counter.

Skamanda > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 16:09

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That’s asinine. Barely half of PCs these days have an HDMI output, yet. Any shop worth paying a penny has something with at least a DVI, and any one worth their salt has a VGA/DVI adapter for even older stuff...

Full of the sound of the Gran Fury, signifying nothing. > Roundbadge 08/11/2015 at 16:11

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I wouldn’t be surprised if a previous employer of mine still has there’s running that way today. I was trying to find some software for the UPS to shut down the system, but not even the UPS manufacturer had the software. They had it years ago, but in 2009 nobody there had a clue.

Skamanda > jariten1781 08/11/2015 at 16:12

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Geebus...Even Novell hasn’t supported Netware 2.x since 1993. When I got certified it was on 3.x, in 1995. Only had one customer with a 2.x box, in the entire time I was unlucky enough to work on Netware. Such archaic ways of doing things.

Still, at least it was better than Notes...

Is the Token Ring running on BNC, or are you at least lucky enough for it to be 16/4?

JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! > Skamanda 08/11/2015 at 16:13

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Keep in mind it was staples and it is very possible they simply couldn’t be bothered to help him and would rather upsell him into something new

Skamanda > Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer 08/11/2015 at 16:13

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Aw heck there are still plenty of places using dumb terminals. Even Art Van does, even if they’re putty sessions on Windows PCs.

Also...IBM? Really? WYSE master race!

Full of the sound of the Gran Fury, signifying nothing. > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 16:14

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A couple of years back I set up a system running Win98 for some classic gaming. It’s amazing just how much better the operating systems have gotten over the years. Just one minor BIOS tweak and **BOOM** the computer would crash. It was such a fine balancing act to make it work - no forgiveness whatsoever. I can only imagine that 95 would be a tad worse.

Skamanda > Roundbadge 08/11/2015 at 16:14

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Any company using mainframes or AS/400 does. Not that there’s really any excuse for using either of those, anymore....

Full of the sound of the Gran Fury, signifying nothing. > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 16:16

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This reminds me of the days when I started in IT back in the mid-90s. I was the only one that knew how to troubleshoot WFW 3.11, which meant I was the only one that got sent out to fix those pieces of crap. Needless to say, those computers were amongst the first that I had upgraded...

Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer > Skamanda 08/11/2015 at 16:17

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I was thinking more of the age of the whole package rather than the terminal part.

In any case, that was kind of my point. If businesses still use something so ancient, you would expect someone to be able to fix a win95 computer.

Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 16:18

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Or would rather sell a new computer...

jariten1781 > Skamanda 08/11/2015 at 16:20

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It was BNC and some old pre-certification Fibre-channel. I don’t remember a whole lot of details of the setup though since it was over 10 years ago and I only supported them when weird shit would break that the normal sustainment group couldn’t handle (I was on the development side).

Skamanda > Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer 08/11/2015 at 16:21

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Well, be fair. There tend to be very few people who can fix mainframes, AS/400, dumb terminals, or those bizarre serial port MUXes...

Not that Win95 is anywhere near as hard to work with as they are, even if the tech doesn’t grok DOS...

Skamanda > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 16:23

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Oh, absolutely - and y’know what? I don’t blame them in the least. Anyone that gets by on Win95 can easily do everything they need on a Chromebook, for just about as much money as servicing a PC would cost them - and they’d get better performance and a nicer screen out of the deal!

TheBloody, Oppositelock lives on in our shitposts. > Ash78, voting early and often 08/11/2015 at 16:25

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Yeah, my guess is that they couldn’t be bothered because they probably felt it was beneath them. The general attitude that these people have annoys me to no end, I mean in terms of the IT industry they are the retarded kid sitting in the corner with his pants on his head eating paste.

Oh, you’re an Apple “Genius”? Great, if you’re so fucking smart how about you come help me rack and configure a cluster of servers so that you can load ESXI on them and add them to the current VM infrustructure. Also make sure you’re puppet skills are up to snuff because you’ll need to build a module for this... /rant.

Wrong Wheel Drive (41%) > crowmolly 08/11/2015 at 16:25

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“Turbo” button in a Honda civic!

Saracen > Skamanda 08/11/2015 at 16:27

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It’s not like it was an independent computer support firm. It’s freakin Staples.

Skamanda > jariten1781 08/11/2015 at 16:28

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haha I’d love to drop a few new kids into a pile of old PCs and BNC gear, and see if they ever manage to make a working network out of the lot, without instruction. T-connectors and terminators....good times!

Still...even 10 years ago... wow! It had to cost them a fortune to pay for someone to service and support that stuff! Surely it’d be cheaper to just modernize. Any box old and clunky enough to run Netware 2.x could be outdone by even an Avoton (these days, back then any cheap $500 server at the time) running Linux, and the network could be replaced with off the shelf home-grade 100 MBit or 1Gbit gear...

wiffleballtony > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 16:29

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My work has a couple 486s running MsDOS 5.0. Whenever one takes a dump there’s a panic to find parts.

Skamanda > jariten1781 08/11/2015 at 16:30

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Bear in mind, this is at Staples. 80% of their repairs are probably shipped to the manufacturer, or a local service shop. I’d be surprised if the people in the store know how to do much more than putting in a factory restore CD, or the company’s canned suite of anti-malware tools.

DoYouEvenShift > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 17:11

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I wonder what he drives

RustedSprinter > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 17:12

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I’d fix it for him. Windows 95 rocks!

j250ex > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 17:23

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Think he can upgrade to windows 10 on that bad boy

Doge_Supreme drives a BRZ > EL_ULY 08/11/2015 at 17:25

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Imagine if he was a smoker, what the insides might look like if the case has never been cracked before.

Doge_Supreme drives a BRZ > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 17:27

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I wonder if this is just as simple of a fix as cleaning it out. It may just be overheating from built up dust.

415s30 W123TSXWaggoIIIIIIo ( •_•))°) > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 17:39

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True! No tube monitors here

Roundbadge > Skamanda 08/11/2015 at 18:38

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We had an AS/400.....actually we had two. One was a backup in case the other failed. I don’t remember exactly when we sold them off, but it was less than 10 years ago.

CB > Roundbadge 08/11/2015 at 19:06

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We still use the AS/400 system at Canadian Tire. Because it would be far to difficult to upgrade to a whole new system.

CB > Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer 08/11/2015 at 19:07

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What I see on a daily basis.

Biggus Dickus (RevsBro) > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 19:09

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I swear my family had the exact same computer from yoyr photo, 17 years ago. . .

Roundbadge > CB 08/11/2015 at 19:13

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I’m reasonably certain that’s why we hung onto ours as long as we did.

CB > Roundbadge 08/11/2015 at 19:14

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The only issue is, the day they have to upgrade the system, it’s all going to go to hell. Nothing will work for at least a week.

Roundbadge > CB 08/11/2015 at 19:29

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Our accounting department was a wreck for a week or so...but they got over it. Mostly it was growing pains...the new accounting system worked fine, people just didn’t like change.

In a Mini; let them mock me as My Mini Countryman is higher than you > Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer 08/11/2015 at 20:48

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ROBCO United Operating System:)

Funktheduck > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 21:58

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20ish years is really impressive. Feel a little bad for him. Upgrading is gonna be a shock for him.

Funktheduck > jariten1781 08/11/2015 at 21:59

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Oh yeah, well, my company runs Mac OS Y Snow Mountain Tiger

Funktheduck > Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer 08/11/2015 at 22:00

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Looks like a compute I used in high school when I worked at papa johns.

Nauraushaun > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/11/2015 at 23:14

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The young tech lady looks at it funny and can’t find the proper wire to connect it to her monitor

She’s lucky she was able to bail out with the Win95 excuse, because this is a really stupid problem to have.

Jailorboy > crowmolly 08/12/2015 at 03:31

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So, here’s a Wikipedia article for those unfamiliar with the notion of turbo button:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turbo_but…

marvthegrate > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/12/2015 at 09:56

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Oh man, I had to deal with these 20 years ago when I worked at Computer City. Those cases were fucking terrible. I am getting flashbacks to machines sticky with cigarette smoke and dust bunnies the size of housecats inside some of these machines.

Skamanda > Roundbadge 08/12/2015 at 10:22

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Tons of companies do. Heck, Ford still buys new ones!

Having worked with them, other than their freaky ability to predict within hours when each component will fail, I still see no point when compared to a far cheaper linux box, other than not wanting to rewrite the software they’re using to run on Linux.

Roundbadge > Skamanda 08/12/2015 at 10:26

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We ended up doing exactly that. The biggest problem ended up being end users who weren’t amenable to change.

You’re right though...their predictions were uncanny!

jariten1781 > Skamanda 08/12/2015 at 10:37

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I don’t remember what was going on for that setup in particular, but a lot of the things the legacy support team had to deal with were where the clients were custom designed terminals. They’d often have stuff that’s normally apportioned to an OS/NIC/whatever hard-baked into the hardware which severely limited upgrades without rearchitecting the entire system plus whatever the costs would be to archive/reformat/access/whatever, the legacy data. Then add to that, since the hardware was purchased in the 80s even the terminals were often expensive enough that they qualified as capital equipment which, in most companies, comes out of a separate budget line that has its own hair for demil/disposal and service life.

I was continuously grateful I was only a firefighter on that effort...I don’t think I could have tolerated doing it full time.

spikespeigel > JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! 08/12/2015 at 10:53

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Ah, the good old turbo button. Those were simpler times.

Skamanda > jariten1781 08/12/2015 at 10:54

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Yeah, I worked at a shop with vintage 400 gear. Their license for the client access app only let them use up to version whatever, which wouldn’t run on any OS newer than Win95 (this was in 2003-2005, mind). They couldn’t upgrade to a newer client app anyways, because the OS on the 400 was the newest the hardware supported, and the newer client app didn’t work with an OS that old. They couldn’t switch to putty or some other terminal app, because the things they were doing didn’t render right on anything but the legit IBM client access app.

It was just a giant cluster. They had the system half-upgraded to a slightly less ancient PHP/Postgres setup, but the CEO refused to migrate any of the manufacturing data in the 400, so they couldn’t just phase them out. I worked for them twice. Once as a developer, once as their IT director. Even as the IT director, I couldn’t get them to move forward enough to get them away from bad, old systems (the PHP/Postgres setup was awful, and ancient, too. PHP3 and Postgres 7.1, in 2005). I cut my losses and ran, and I’m ever so glad that I did.

Skamanda > Roundbadge 08/12/2015 at 10:57

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Ugh...users as old as long in the tooth as the 400, no doubt.

The predictions are still amusing to me. I remember we had the 400 at the shop I worked at that had one, tell us the modem would die in 3 weeks, 4 days, and some hours. We ordered one to replace it (which required finding one on eBay, because the 400 was that old), and sure enough...3 weeks, 4 days, and some hours on the modem fizzled. I think it was off by like...6 hours. 30 years into operation.