Microsoft Engineer Volunteers Time Fixing Computers for Free

Not many people would choose to spend their free time fiddling with problematic computers, particularly not if they work with computers at all day long as it is. But Woodinville's Ed Priest loves doing just that. 

Some time back, Priest started helping members of his church with their computer problems. The members of the community were thankful for the help and provided Priest with about one job a week.

Priest was more than happy to lend a hand, so happy in fact that he's now offering his services to anyone who needs some expert help.

"I have a strong desire to give back to my community and a lot of people do that in different ways," Priest said.

Aside from helping out people in his church and immediate community, Priest is looking to help schools and students and low income families. And he's particularly interested in finding low cost solutions to common problems.

Priest, who has been working on the Windows engineering team for Microsoft for the last nine years, says that he can help out with problems like virus and malware removal, hardware upgrades, Windows problems, tune-ups, migrating data between computers, and setting up automated backup systems.

Priest points out that his expertise is pretty much limited to PCs, and that he can't really help with specific software problems.

Priest does most of his repair work on weekends and evenings, and says he can usually turn a job around in a day or two. And all he really wants in return is a kind word.

"People have very nice things to say when you can fix their problem," Priest said.

So if you need some help with that new operating system or device driver, contact Ed Priest at e_priest@hotmail.com.