Best Buy/Geek Squad BUSTED!

Seems that Best Buy has had a restraining order put on it by Winternals (the corporate side of IT superstars Systernals). When I worked at the local navy base one of the people I supported worked nights at BB one day he was telling me how they used a BartPE CD to use the winternals tools at the local BB. I always wondered how long they'd get away with it...

You think that they would just pay for it considering how much they charge people to "repair" their computers.

I have never used Winternals software so I can't speak for it but Bart PE rules! I use the Ultimate Boot CD for Windows build.

I have used all three. ERD (the winternals product BB was most likely using) is nice because if you've got an XP box you can restore to a restore point (if you have that turned on, you do don't you?), but XP or otherwise you can change the admin password, manage the PC and all sorts of other goodies, it's basically a professional BartPE but you can't set up a working environment with it.

BartPE of course, is community driven but due to it's plugin nature you can put apps in your build that you may not have licenses for (this is how the guy I knew who worked at BB described how they were using the ERD w/ the BartPE). BartPE of course frowns on piracy, so they require you do have certain files of the application not provided in the plugin. The modular nature of BartPE is pretty slick (if you take the time to build or add some plugins) and you can learn some ways that Windows works doing so. So unlink ERD you can make a bootable environment you can actually work in and use this on friends/Family members PCs so you don't go mucking in their junk as one is wont to do. I'm always tempted to autoarrange the icons by name.

The ultimate boot cd i use but primarily for the drive diagnostics, it's nice not to have to worry abou a system having a floppy or finding the right software to DL to check a dead drive for RMA. I've never customized the workable .iso you can download so I'm not sure of it's scalability or how much you can add on to it.

If you've done so EvilD I'd be interested in knowing your results.

I've had two encounters with the Geek Squad people at our local Best Buy. Neither directly involved me, but I was the one that ended up fixing the aftermath. In both cases they totally ripped off someone I know.

The fact that they were doing something like this doesn't surprise me in the least.

wow pretty stupid given the amount of turnover at a place like BB.. its only a matter of time before someone got pissed off enough to turn over enough info to get a case going.. thats how these audits usually end up happening.

The ultimate boot cd i use but primarily for the drive diagnostics, it's nice not to have to worry abou a system having a floppy or finding the right software to DL to check a dead drive for RMA. I've never customized the workable .iso you can download so I'm not sure of it's scalability or how much you can add on to it.
If you've done so EvilD I'd be interested in knowing your results.

Have you tried the Ultimate Boot CD for Windows? It requires that you have a valid copy of WinXP, but contains legitimate and free copies of many recovery/troubleshooting tools (like HandyRecovery and File Inspector). There's also an optional driver pack that you can include which I've found to be immensely useful. I suggest giving it a try.

Russinovich posted about this suit on his blog today.

What the press coverage to date might not have made clear is what Geek Squad and Best Buy did prior to approaching Winternals in October 2005 about a license to our software, what they continued to do after terminating licensing discussions in February 2006, and why we felt we had no alternative but to protect our software through the legal system. This is the first lawsuit Winternals has ever initiated, and we did not approach the decision lightly.
Eezy_Bordone wrote:

The ultimate boot cd i use but primarily for the drive diagnostics, it's nice not to have to worry abou a system having a floppy or finding the right software to DL to check a dead drive for RMA. I've never customized the workable .iso you can download so I'm not sure of it's scalability or how much you can add on to it.

If you've done so EvilD I'd be interested in knowing your results.

Chum wrote:

Have you tried the Ultimate Boot CD for Windows? It requires that you have a valid copy of WinXP, but contains legitimate and free copies of many recovery/troubleshooting tools (like HandyRecovery and File Inspector). There's also an optional driver pack that you can include which I've found to be immensely useful. I suggest giving it a try.

As Chum mentioned Ultimate Boot CD for Windows is completely different then UBCD. It requires Bart's PE builder and is basically a huge package of usefull plugins and features that are not included in Bart's PE. If you like Bart's PE give it a try!