What's the deal, here, people?

[elobscuro.livejournal.com]

Why, in the name of that is unholy, is it so frelling HARD to go through the Windows XP setup unassisted? I'm not talking about deleting partitons, or even booting to the install disk in that two-second window. I'm talking about after the format, where it's all "next, next, yes, change the time zone, next, next, type in my area code..." Two OS reisntalls tonight, neither one would TOUCH the damn computer while not on the phone with us. Literally, twice in a row, it was "Hi, may I speak to ths-and so? This is ****** from The Company Which Must Not Be Named..." and rather than the desktop, from which we could intall drivers (and get me out the door somewhere close to my shift end), it was "It says select country or region. What do I press?" I can understand not wanting to cause any damage without us on the phone if you were, say, manally dinking about with the registry, but this???