Small office and home
Fixed properly, or told it is not worth it.
No contract and no monthly fee — a machine is broken and you want a straight answer about it. $89 to diagnose, credited against the work if you go ahead, and an honest verdict when something is past saving.
What it costs
$89 diagnostic, credited against the repair. Flat-rate jobs from $149. $145/hr remote, $185/hr on-site evenings and weekends. No trip charge, no contract.
The honest bit first
A five-year-old laptop with a failed motherboard is not worth $400 of repair. You will be told that, the data recovered, and pointed at what to buy — without anyone selling you the machine, because we do not sell machines.
That is why the diagnostic is $89 and why it comes off the bill if you proceed. It pays for an honest opinion rather than a free one that has to end in a sale.
What this usually turns out to be
It has been slow for two years. Usually a mechanical hard drive in a machine that should have had an SSD. A swap and clone typically turns a machine you were about to replace into a fast one for a fraction of a new laptop.
It will not turn on, or it blue-screens. Power supply, RAM, drive failure, or an update that went badly. Diagnosis first — the symptoms overlap heavily and guessing wastes your money.
There is a pop-up saying we have a virus and a number to call. Do not call it. That is the scam.
Everything is on that drive and it is making a noise. Stop using it now — every extra hour a failing drive spins costs you recoverable data. Power it off and ring.
Remote first, because it is faster and cheaper
Remote at $145/hour handles anything software-shaped: viruses, Windows problems, email, printer drivers, slow machines. Often finished inside an hour, and frequently possible during the working day.
On-site at $185/hour, scheduled evenings or weekends, for anything involving cables, hardware or more than one machine.
Bench work from the $89 diagnostic, with most flat-rate jobs starting around $149 — hardware repairs, drive replacements, clean reinstalls and data recovery.
Data comes first
Before anything else happens to a machine, the data comes off it if it can. That holds even when the diagnosis is terminal — a dead computer with your photos on it is a very different problem from a dead computer.
Nobody browses your files, and no copies are kept once you confirm you have everything. If a drive needs specialist clean-room recovery you will be told, with a realistic cost, rather than having it opened on a workbench and the chances destroyed.
FAQ
Questions we get asked
How much will it cost?
$89 for the diagnostic, credited against the work if you go ahead. Flat-rate bench jobs start around $149. Remote is $145/hr, on-site $185/hr. You get a firm number before anything happens.
When can you actually come out?
Evenings and weekends for on-site work. Remote sessions are frequently possible during the day and are the fastest route for anything that does not need hands on the machine.
Can you get files off a dead computer?
Usually — a failed computer very often has a perfectly healthy drive in it. If the drive itself has failed mechanically you will get an honest answer about whether it needs a recovery lab and roughly what that costs.
Is it worth repairing or should I replace it?
Depends on age and what failed. An SSD or a power supply in a decent three-year-old machine is easily worth it; a motherboard in a six-year-old budget laptop is not. We do not sell computers, so there is nothing in the answer either way.
Do you work on Macs?
Yes for software, data recovery, network and general troubleshooting. For in-warranty Apple hardware you are better off at an Apple Authorised Service Provider, and you will be told so rather than have the job taken.
Describe the symptoms.
Most problems narrow down over the phone in a couple of minutes, including whether the machine is worth fixing at all.