I think my biggest pet peeve related to computer hardware is shoddy merchandise.
My computer case originally had a power supply that was practically designed to burn itself out. Almost four years ago, back when I was new at building computers and didn't know any better, I got a case (that I still use) that had a 300W power supply with an AMD approved sticker on it (at the time, I thought that was good enough to make sure the thing was good enough quality). After about four or five months, My computer would refuse to turn on most of the time and the system would hang or turn off for no reason. After narrowing the problem down to the power supply, I pulled it out of the case and ordered a new one (made by a reputable company). I took the old one to a friend who works with electronics and he opened it up to have a look at it.
The capacitors (which are normally located near the fan to keep them cool) were near the vent (the hottest part of the power supply)! The capacitors had been constantly overheating and shorting out. There were scorch marks on the board underneath the capacitors! It's a miracle that the rest of my computer parts didn't suffer any damage.
About a year later, my computer was acting up again. This time, it was the motherboard that was the problem. I had a Shuttle AK 32 motherboard, which had received good reviews. I found out the capacitors on the motherboard were leaking. A couple of years later, I found out that there had been a few cases of leaky capacitors in recent years and they have been traced to one capacitor manufacturer which had stolen the formula for the chemical paste inside the capacitors from another company and got it wrong!
Topic: Pet peeves.... (Read 1731 times)