Yesterday brought one of the most unusual calls to the helpdesk in recent memory. Our user, let’s call him Dave, rang in sounding genuinely frustrated. After some preliminary chit-chat, he dropped the bombshell: his computer was “too fast,” and he simply couldn’t keep up.
Naturally, we brace ourselves for a classic slowdown or lag issue, but no. Dave explained that every time he tried to work, windows and applications would open so quickly that he wasn’t able to read error messages or dialogues in time. Even typing was a challenge—his words vanished from view before he could finish or correct them.
I asked if he was joking. He assured me he was not.
After some back-and-forth, it turned out Dave had recently upgraded from a five-year-old creaky laptop to a new, blazing-fast machine with an SSD and plenty of RAM. His productivity was “off the charts,” but the transition left him overwhelmed. He missed the comforting pace and “predictability” of his old computer, where he had plenty of time to react to prompts, click buttons deliberately, and savor the slow but steady hum of a machine struggling along.
We tried to reason that faster means better, but Dave was unconvinced. He requested if we could somehow “slow the computer down.” We briefly entertained the idea of launching a software slowdown or screencast delay but decided that was likely as useful as adding training wheels to a Ferrari.
After patiently chatting, we suggested he try out some accessibility options like increasing the duration alerts stay on screen and slowing down keyboard repeat rates, so he could better keep pace. We also pointed him to tutorials for some brief adjustment exercises. Dave agreed to try these out and called it quits for the day.
In the end, it was a startling, if amusing reminder that not all users want speed and efficiency. Sometimes, the best help is a little empathy for the pace at which someone feels comfortable working—even if it means embracing a slower, steadier rhythm in a world obsessed with going faster.