# how much to fix blue screens?



## Romulo

How much will you charge to fix blue screens of death?

This is my close friends so I'm not going to charge him, but alot of people are asking me to fix it most of them are Unbootable boot volume. I am a 18 year old male if that helps. 

I don't want to be way high on the price either.

How much to keep files

and how much to delete everything and reinstall windows. 

And I know I sound like a newcomer so please bare with me


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## Ninjaboi

The price is honestly up to you. For friends, you should try to do it for free unless your an expert at it and feel like making them pay. For the others however you should make them pay ( at the beginning ) a low set amount. Later on you can set the price to hours it took to fix, what you needed to do in order to fix it, etc.


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## greenbrucelee

what he said ^. For friends I usually dont charge. For people I dont know I might charge anywhere from £20 - £100 (thats about $40 - $200 if your in the US).


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## PinoyIT

I have a part time job that has me charge $90 an hour and we're the cheapest in our area.


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## Basementgeek

I say more in the range of $20-30 hour since you are just starting out. $90.00 is way to much I'd say 

BG


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## sapikest

i would charge $100 flat fee... also just keep in mind, if you do it for free your called an "amatuer" but if you charge them for the same work you will be "proffessional" on what you do..


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## Daifne

It all depends on what is actually causing the BSOD. If it's hardware, I charge for the replacement part and for labor. If it's a software or virus problem, I just charge labor. If I have to reinstall the OS, and they don't have their disks, I change them for the disks that I get from the manufacturer and the labor. 

Labor charges depend on the going rate in your area and your experience.


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## Gotchaz

Charge by time, you still have to figure out what's causing the BSOD. $20-50/hr is fair


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## brc211835490

Majority of bsod are caused by driver issues


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## greenbrucelee

brc211835490 said:


> Majority of bsod are caused by driver issues


who told you that?

BSODs can be caused by anything. The most frequent problem I see where BSODs occur are because of people using inadequate power supplies or not keeping their system upto date.


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## brc211835490

Your correct all types of things can cause bsod but more times than not it's a driver issue, when you study books on computer technology they tell you that as well


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## greenbrucelee

really do they?

See those certs in my sig and know that I fix systems for living? I have studied PCs for 16 years I can tell you that saying majority of bsods are driver issues is nonsense. It depends on how the systems are treated by the user.

Yes driver issues can cause BSODs but they can be cause by hardware failure or incompatability,heat, power, plus much much more.

Anyway the question by the OP was how much to charge to fix BSODs.


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## PinoyIT

brc211835490 said:


> Majority of bsod are caused by driver issues


This is what I read from books but experience says otherwise.


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## Gotchaz

BSOD can be caused by anything really, I've seen it be cause by memory, software, drivers, root kit viruses, maleware, firewalls, you name it. Saying it's always drivers would be incorrect. Maybe Microsoft says it's usually drivers but in the real world that's not the case.


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## Ninjaboi

I've read a few CompTIA books that say the same thing, that driver's are the leading cause in BSODs in recent systems. However, I've rarely had this to be the case, as for me it's usually either the graphics card, PSU, or the anti-virus. Again, anything can cause a BSOD.


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## greenbrucelee

Ninjaboi said:


> I've read a few CompTIA books that say the same thing, that driver's are the leading cause in BSODs in recent systems. However, I've rarely had this to be the case, as for me it's usually either the graphics card, PSU, or the anti-virus. Again, anything can cause a BSOD.


This, just because a book says something doesn't mean its true.

If studying computers and IT in general you cannot just believe what you see in a book you need to practice and study the concepts in real time by using computers.


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## Blade_Jones

> How much will you charge to fix blue screens of death?


I charge a flat $100 fee for all drop off repairs. That's half of what Geek Squad charges so customers have no reason to complain. Blue screen errors can be either really easy to fix (error check drive) or they can be very frustrating and difficult. As a tech you have to be know how to fix anything and everything blue screen so that is what they are paying for even if you fix it with a simple error check.


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## Dervisher

Blade_Jones said:


> I charge a flat $100 fee for all drop off repairs. That's half of what Geek Squad charges so customers have no reason to complain. Blue screen errors can be either really easy to fix (error check drive) or they can be very frustrating and difficult. As a tech you have to be know how to fix anything and everything blue screen so that is what they are paying for even if you fix it with a simple error check.



On top of this flat fee do you include an hourly cost?


The company i'll be working for charges by the issue at hand, meaning there's different levels of different issues. The level of the issue raises the cost.

Let's say, for example, someone needs a virus removed. There is no flat fee, although the general range is $20-$50. The price depends on the severity of the virus.


In general i'd say the average cost of services for what we do is typically $50. Anything extra is from the parts they buy, which are generally sold for very very little above the price we bought it for (if at all)

We also fix easily 6 computers before I have to leave, which is by 12. I work from 9 to 12, then head back to school. Sadly it's a co-op program, while it is nice to have the opportunity to work, it makes me realize how useless school actually is.

So presuming they keep up the pace of 6 computers. Generally i'd say they slow down somewhat, since there's only 3 of us and one has to answer the phone CONSTANTLY %#@$. The first is typically out on service calls or fixing servers, which the server users tend to have a really bad habit of getting the SAME virus into the server OVER and OVER, then he has to go out and manually remove them from each one.

So it's basically the two of us circling around clicking buttons and finishing scans, repairing physical parts and scrambling our brains. On top of this, there is a steady flow of people expecting us to help them remove a problem via the phone, you know? The ones that learned how to turn on the computer two days ago.

That went from an inquiry into a rant, I apologize. You'll probably read this and get a good laugh. Hahah :1angel:


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## Blade_Jones

> On top of this flat fee do you include an hourly cost?


No. A flat fee is a flat fee. I fix your computer back to working order for $100. No hourly billing gone wild.


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