28 Times IT Professionals Wanted to Just Pull the Plug and Walk Away

John Summers • Contributor

Apr 10, 2025 8:00 PM EDT

You might think working in IT means spending your days updating software, troubleshooting Wi-Fi, and occasionally swapping out a mouse that mysteriously stopped clicking. But the truth is so much darker... and dumber. Tech support isn't just a job—it's a psychological endurance test. Because nothing, and I mean nothing, prepares you for the things people do to their tech when left unsupervised.

We're talking about laptops that have been washed in the sink because someone was told to "clean their desktop." Or HDMI cables being jammed into USB ports like it's a round peg/square hole kind of puzzle. And yes, there are folks proudly carrying around phones with shattered screens and zero functionality, insisting "It's fine, I only use it for incoming calls."

It's chaos. Glorious, horrifying chaos.

These 28 IT nightmare photos are a tribute to the brave men and women of tech support who keep their cool in the face of unrelenting user error. They've seen it all—and now, so will you.

01
“The Switch Is Noisy And Reboots All The Time, Cannot Diagnose.”

via the Chive
02
Surely, No one can be this dumb!

via the Chive
03
Oh great, another one!

via the Chive
04
This laptop was left in the fridge overnight due to overheating.

via the Chive
05
“I Had To Install A Gpu From 2012 In A 2018 Cyberpower PC And I Lost Screws So I Had To Improvise”

via the Chive
06
Dora the Tarnished

via the Chive
07
I think I know what the problem is

via the Chive
08
"It's fine! it works!"

via the Chive
09
A little rusty

via the Chive
10
“The Coax Cable Is Broken? No Problem My Dear, Just Raise The Router With Lunchboxes And Use A Needle (It Actually Works!)”

via the Chive
11
It got a bit hot

via the Chive
12
Ah yeah, the floppy disc drive…

via the Chive
13
Great job there

via the Chive
14
Just burn it

via the Chive
15
“My friend asked if I could recover her photos from this.”

via the Chive
16
Yeah, that’s not right.

via the Chive
17
What could go wrong?

via the Chive
18
Ladies and Gentlemen - The iBench

via the Chive
19
Me: “Has Your Phone Had Any Contact With Water?” Customer: “Not That I Know Of…”

via the Chive
20
What do you mean "a fire hazard"?

via the Chive
21
I am not touching that

via the Chive
22
“Nothing Like A Little Game Of Chicken When You Need To Plug In Your Ethernet Cable”

via the Chive
23
What seems to be the problem?

via the Chive
24
Woman who “doesn’t trust technology” tried to photocopy her digital boarding pass off her phone. The tech support question was “what’s wrong with the photocopier”

via the Chive
25
Help...

via the Chive
26
Someone ‘grandma-proofed’ their remotes.

via the Chive
27
“Spicy Pillow Becomes A Hot Pocket. Causes Evacuation”

via the Chive
28
“I was on vacation and my work tried to figure out why their WIFI wasn’t working!”

via the Chive