Sometimes you can just buy and thing, rip it out of the box, plug it in and just go without any problems, whereas other times you might buy a thing, turn it on once, later learning that it would be the last time it would ever turn on again. That plug and play appeal has been a big selling point for a lot of products like gaming consoles and at one point, Apple devices just to name a few. But no product is immune to defects, something we all have to learn at some point in our lives. For some of us, we learn this lesson every few months thanks to our superhuman-like powers of bad luck.

Let’s backup a bit though. A few weeks ago my partner and I agreed that I should have a workspace at their apartment so we could spend more time together, which also meant that I was going to be able to justify buying a new computer. I get the hobbyist appeal of building a computer from scratch, but I’ve done that song and dance before and I’ve had my fill of it, which is why I specifically decided to buy a pre-built computer to avoid all of that. Now how do you think that went?

Poorly, is the answer. My lovely little pre-built came with everything I needed including components that rivaled and surpassed my build at home and an obnoxious amount of LEDs on every inch of the case. Upon arrival, I set the thing up at my place, transferred some files and did some big downloads so I could hit the ground running at my partner’s place and not have to worry about configuring everything to my liking. It worked flawlessly and I loved it.

I moved it to my partner’s apartment without any issue, where I proceeded to set it up and give it a test boot to see if it was okay, which it was. Oh joyous day, now I had my workstation almost ready, only needing to buy a new chair to complete the ensemble. Well, yesterday I stopped in and planned to just hang out all day while acquainting myself with my new toy, except yesterday it decided that turning on was an unachievable goal. Yeah, for some reason the computer just decided to crap out on me.

All of the gaudy LEDs would turn on and the fans would spin, but nothing would actually work. The monitor, the keyboard, the mouse, they all knew they were connected, but didn’t function whatsoever. So after a lot of troubleshooting and a trip to the computer repair store, I discovered that the motherboard just up and croaked, which is apparently something that can just happen. So now I’ve got this cool lemon of a glowing monolith just taunting me.

Luckily I was under factory warranty and was able to request a replacement without issue, but the whole situation has just been deflating as all hell. Not only was I excited to play with my new toy, I was excited to be able to spend more time with my partner. Sure they’d be working all day, but I figure being around someone who is actually being productive would inspire me to do the same, but now that has to wait. I don’t know what will come of the replacement process, but I hope it all happens smoothly and quickly. If there is a silver lining, I guess it’s that now I have time to do some chair shopping.