Google Groups

Hi;

I just wanted to relay the events of the past few days regarding my pride & joy - 2001 9-5 2.3t estate. Had it for just over a year and it's behaved impeccably, a real joy to drive. However, on attempting to start the car on Saturday, it sounded like the battery was almost flat, which was weird, as I couldn't pin down why. Got a car-lighter charger from Halfords to charge up from my wife's Focus, but according to the LED indicator, my battery was reading fine just as it was. I then though it must be something more serious. Decided to do some Googling, and came across some alt.autos.saab archives from as far back as 2001. Some of the similar problems owners had experienced had me literally panic-stricken, and I could see myself shelling out a lot of money. But I highlighted some simple advice from a guy called Brian, who suggested to someone with a similar sounding problem as mine (dying battery on starting, followed by a rapid clicking noise, I guess the starter motor? - then all functions, including central locking dead). He suggested tightening the battery terminals. As they were already tight, I managed to tighten them only a fraction, so I didn't hold out much hope, but amazingly, the car sprang back to life - I despondently tried operating the remote key fob, and was delighted when it worked! The car started (not with it's usual vigour, but hey! it started!) and I was chuffed to bits.

Isn't the internet wonderful?!!

Thanks to Brian, and all the advice out there offered by groups such as alt.autos.saab.

Chris.

Reply to
vox
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On a broader note, Google Groups is pretty much what should be the reason for users to keep many a usenet group lively. Many forums and discussion boards work just a well and yes, with a browser. But most of them are not archived properly, if at all. Good information gets lost.

I too have found cure for my Saab's rare illness from Google Groups.

Reply to
Simo

For the record, guys, this group was around for more than a decade before google existed. "google groups" is just a web-based newsreader program, this and the other groups are from an entity called "Usenet" which predates the www by many, many years.

Reply to
Dave Hinz

Indeed, but the point about Google is the fact that it works as an archive for usenet, which usenet doesn't do on it's own. It comes in

*very* handy sometimes.

It was a much better service when it was run by Deja though, but you can't have everything, I suppose..

Cheers,

Colin

Reply to
Colin Stamp

Yup.

Well, dejanews never found a way to make it a paying proposition, I suppose.

Reply to
Dave Hinz

Google Groups does RSS for every group ...

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Reply to
Paul Halliday

On the dark side, Usenet newsgroups are unmoderated. They can have so much flaming and spams that they're rendered largely useless, like my local ones such as hk.rec.cars.

Reply to
ngu

Well, groups develop "personalities". This one is mostly signal with very little noise. When we're having an argument, it's just Paul not understanding me, or the other way around, and it's done in a good, non-threatening, "I know this person and we're disagreeing on something" kind of way, rather than a "Holy crap, what psycho did I just run into on that topic?" kind of way.

Seems to me that if the problems aren't discouraged, entropy wants to take all groups in the 'useless' direction.

Reply to
Dave Hinz

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