Just caught myself wasting 3 hours on coworking wifi setup before realizing the real problem

I've been bouncing between hostels and coffee shops in Chiang Mai for 6 months now. Every time I'd spend like 20 minutes troubleshooting slow internet, resetting routers, moving closer to the modem. Yesterday at this place near Nimman I was getting ready to complain to the staff when this guy next to me just goes "you know that's a VPN issue right?" I'd been running my work VPN the whole time without thinking. Turned it off and boom, full speed. All those headaches in Vietnam and Bali too. Has anyone else had a dumb simple fix like this that took way too long to figure out?

2 comments

2 Comments

karen3619d ago

Respectfully, that's kind of a different situation. VPNs are a common issue but not the same as wasting time on something that can't be fixed by flipping a switch. I've spent hours trying to get a printer to work with my laptop at a truck stop, messing with drivers and cables, only to realize the power cord was loose. That was a solid two hours I'll never get back. Sometimes the simple fixes are the ones you overthink the most.

ryan_shah389d ago

Spent three hours once trying to connect a projector to my laptop at a conference. Tracked down drivers, swapped cables, rebooted everything twice. Finally noticed I had plugged the VGA cable into the wrong port on the back of the projector. That's the kind of thing that makes you want to just walk away from technology forever. Overthinking is a real trap.