The stranges computer error I have seen.

When modems still was the way you communicated I worked with support.

We where the general distributor for TDC's PCCard modems.

One day we got a computer with modem with intermittent problems (worst kind).

After much trial and error we found that stroking the computer lightly in the top right corner made the modem work perfectly :)

Cause will be reviled later :p

SAY THE CAUSE OR DOWNVOTE!!!11!!1!!

Grounding error ;)

The modem was positioned right beneath that corner and when you put your hand there it helped stabilize it.

Toshiba was experimenting with a new power supply which caused fluctuations which in turn interfered with the modem.

That's a wonderful (or terrible...) problem story, which brings back fond (or not so fond...) memories of trouble shooting back in the day.

Like pressing all the chips on the motherboard with your thumb, to make sure they hadn't creeped some fraction of a mm in their sockets (before surface mounted components replaced socket mount).

Or file transfer errors due to some electrician placing a UPS with the-magnetic-field-from-hell too close to coaxial ethernet cables.

You were much closer to the hard aspects of hardware in the old days.

@Grumpy getting an electric shock when touching the coax cable due to the office belonging to two different buildings with different phase.