Dev error bricked 600 PCs, caused $1M CD-ROM write-off

On a Monday, The Register introduces a new column called "Who, Me?" that shares stories of mishaps, apologies, and redress. This week's featured story comes from a reader named Oriel, who worked for a vendor of small business accounting software. In the past, the vendor shipped their software on CD-ROMs, and customers purchased it from physical stores. Oriel was part of the team responsible for preparing the annual software release before a major holiday.

Previously, the team had encountered issues with installation on certain Windows 95 or Windows ME PCs due to registry corruption. In an attempt to improve installation success rates, Oriel decided to force the updating of registry keys, asserting that "What could possibly go wrong?" was a reasonable assumption. However, shortly after shipping the software, the vendor's support lines began receiving complaints from customers who found that installing the accounting package broke their other software.

The company decided to offer these customers replacement PCs, covering the costs without any questions asked.

In the week leading up to the holiday, the company replaced over 600 machines. Oriel and his developers struggled to reproduce the problem, but they found a solution by requiring users to have created a Windows Registry restore point prior to installation. When a customer volunteered their machine for examination, an engineer visited on the morning of the holiday to retrieve the broken PC and replace it with a new one.

The engineer spent the day setting up the new system and was invited to stay for the holiday meal before returning to the office with the faulty box.

The following day, Oriel and his colleagues identified a fix for the issue and created a new version of the accounting application that wouldn't cause further PC damage. However, senior executives decided to pull buggy CDs from stores, resulting in the destruction and disposal of CDs and packaging valued at $1 million.