If you’re having a problem with your computer and want to document it and give it to someone who can help you, there’s a little-known tool that comes with Windows 7 called the Problem Steps Recorder. You will need recording capabilities to utilize this tool (obviously). To start it up, just go to the start button and type in psr and you’ll see ‘psr.exe’ come up. Click on it and the program will open for you.

When you’re ready, click the ‘start record’ button and start talking and going through the steps on your computer that gave you the problem. If you want to take a screenshot of what your screen looks like, then click the ‘add comment’ button. A snipping tool screen will come up and will allow you highlight the part of the screen with the problem and you can also type a comment in the comment box.

When you’re finished, a box will pop up and ask you to name your audio and it’ll save it as a zip file on your desktop. Then go to your desktop, double-click to unzip the file and you can hear and see what you’ve recorded and if it’s how you want it, then just click on the little question mark and you can email it to a support person for review.

Below is a printout of how the report will look. There’s an option to make it into a slideshow, which I found to be more helpful.

Problem Steps Recorder vs. Jing

Microsoft’s Problem Steps Recorder is adequate -  it’s just a bit awkward when the user has to stop to make a ‘comment’ and use the snipping tool. It interrupts the continuity of describing the problem.

A tool I highly recommend is Jing. I wrote about it last August, if you’d like to read that post. There’s a free version and a pro (I have the pro). There’s a 5” time limit, which is usually enough to explain most problems. It’s better because everything you are doing on your screen is captured along with your voice. So you’re doing a voice and screen recording simultaneously, which is a better way – at least that’s my opinion.

I think the Problems Steps Recorder might be great to use to send someone a voice message. I didn’t see in the article if there’s a time limit, but looking at the image above, there are 2 zeros in the minute field, so perhaps up to 99”? The resulting file you download is zipped, so it does compress it for emailing.

I came across this tool today and thought I’d like to mention it in case someone out there has a need. If you’ve used it, leave a comment about your experience.