I have not had access to a computer for about 2 weeks so when I got my new one yesterday, one of the first things I did was set up some giveaways.
I set all 9 (two were for groups, the other 7 are public) to run for a week. The issue was that around giveaway three I noticed that the start time was in 18 hours, not immediate.
I watched closely with the next giveaway, set it up to start "now" (which actually gives me a few minutes) and to end on Feb 1st. When I got to the confirm page the current time and date showed correctly. After confirmation, the start time is in 18 hours.

Now I realise this is not critical, just really annoying. My computer has the correct time and date (I guess that should not matter as the giveaway setup is on Steamgifts online). My timezone is Australian Eastern Standard Time. A helpful friend suggested it "might be me" (yes, I suspect if it had happened just the once or twice it could have) - but with 9 giveaways in a row, well, I think something glitchy is going on.

Not that computer literate so if anyone has suggestions for me, they might need to speak plainly, lol.

Solved. My computer was set to the incorrect timezone, so in concert with an ignorant user (setting time and date manually and not looking at the timezone) I ended up with this issue. Thank you all for helping :)
Have to confess that my son bailed me out as googling what to do got me to the right section (changing date and timezone) but the timezone dropdown box only gave me North American timezones so I got shoved out of the chair whilst my son took over for a while.

The giveaway will not start for another 5 hours so I will try to bump it then. Thanks again for the help everyone.

And the obligatory giveaway. Yep, it starts in 18 hours :(
https://www.steamgifts.com/giveaway/kHjS9/apple-pop

4 years ago*

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Is your correct region shown on this page?

4 years ago
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It says Australia, so the country is correct. It is greyed out so does not look like I can change it.

4 years ago
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That's probably not the issue then. I think SG pulls that info from your Steam account, but I'm not positive. It says you can't change it, you have to contact support to change it. They probably do that to prevent people from changing it on a regular basis to enter region restricted giveaways outside of their region.

4 years ago
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True. Thanks for trying to suggest things though

4 years ago
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The date selector in Create Giveaway page always uses your computer's time zone. The region on that page has nothing to do with it - it only affects region restricted GA.

4 years ago
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Thanks for the info about SG using the computer's time zone setting, that was the issue here. Delisper's computer had the wrong time zone set, but the time was correct on the computer because it was manually set.

4 years ago*
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Are you using any SG related script/addons by any chance? If yes, have you tried to disable them to see if that is maybe the cause? While I never had this issue in particular, I had issues related to giveaway time due to ESGST before.

4 years ago
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No addons from me. The computer guys were transferring data from my old Win 7 computer to this new Win 10 one. Computer got sent back to them as all my photos were missing. No idea what they may have loaded on. I know they did have issues trying to get the photos off the old hard drive

4 years ago
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When I got the computer back finally yesterday, there were 3 links on a new Chrome tab. one was just for apps (Gmail etc), one was them googling how to transfer steam files and then this https://www.exedb.com/en/mbshlext.dll/1080794

4 years ago
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Space Standard Time(´・Θ・)ooO(🌏 Not a member) Mission Elapsed Time!o(・Θ・´)oYay!!
ISS observes Coordinated Universal Time (UTC/GMT)

Accidents about time are constant. difficult.┐(´Θ`)┌

4 years ago
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I guess if this is permanent, I can cope. I just cannot gift anything quickly :)

4 years ago
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I'm blacklisted (why, if I may ask?) and I can't really help with your issue, but have a bump anyway. I hope someone else can help! :)

4 years ago
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Knowing her, probably your ratio in combination with the group giveaways.

4 years ago
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Mm, that's a reason I can very much understand (though more than half my CV is on public GAs). Thank you. :)

4 years ago
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Yes, am on a ratio blacklist session. Once someone's win to gift ratio gets up to near 4 to 1 l usually blacklist. The idea behind that was to try spreading the wins around. Not sure I am achieving that aim. I did join the Unlucky 7 group which was setup to gift to users with a low win count (personally a more satisfying end result).
And after all that - I have a cakeday coming up in February and am pondering wiping out my blacklist for that event. Cakedays should probably include everyone. Thanks for the bump.

4 years ago
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I see. Yeah, I understand that. Thanks for detailing your position.

If you don't mind, and assuming you don't unblacklist me until then, maybe I'll poke you once I manage to get my ratio back up? It will definitely happen at some point (not very soon, by the state of my financial affairs, but one can hope!).

Also, I see that you managed to get your issue solved. Glad it worked out in the end! :D

4 years ago
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No problem at all. Was thinking I might try deleting most of my ratio blacklist tonight, sort of a new year effort (there are about 20 that have earned a permanent place there because I am a little unbending). Depends how long you have been on there as to when you drop off (mid Feb is cakeday so maybe a bit soon).

4 years ago
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I'll try to improve my finances before I get the chance to drop into the permanent area. :)

4 years ago
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May be a stupid question but is Windows showing correct time and date?

4 years ago
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It is in description already

4 years ago
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This comment was deleted 4 years ago.

4 years ago
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More important would be to check if Windows is showing the correct time zone.

It could show the correct time and date, but that doesn't mean that the time zone is set correctly. I set the time zone in Windows, but I set the time and date manually, so the time zone has no affect on what I see. The time zone could have been set wrong and someone fixed the time by manually changing it. Then SG might only look at your time zone on your computer to figure out when to start the giveaway.

4 years ago
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When I first got the computer home I did have an issue with setting the time. It showed 3am when local time was afternoon. I set the time (date was correct) and then had issues as the time kept reseetting to 3am. So yes, I think I did it manually. The computer went back to the computer shop next day to fix the "missing photos" issue. This might be the problem.

So if this is the issue, then I need the system to automatically set it?
Will try googling setting the timezone.
Thanks for your input.

4 years ago*
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It was the timezone in my computer. When I googled how to change that there was supposed to be a drop down box of options, but the only options were North American. My son bailed me out (well, he moved me out of the room and spent some 10 minutes googling and checking). The Timezone now shows our correct one and the time and date are correct. Thanks for your help :)
I guess "it was me" after all.

4 years ago
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You're welcome. I'm glad you got it fixed. Now we know what the issue is if another user has the same problem in the future :)

4 years ago
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hopefully no one else will be quite as dense
Thanks again for helping :)

4 years ago
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There's nothing unreasonable about what you did. I think most people would do the same if they had a problem with the time being wrong. If you can't figure out how to set the time zone, it doesn't seem important if you can just manually set the time and then it's fixed. I didn't know SG or other sites and programs use that time zone setting and I'm sure most other users don't know either.

Edit: There should be a little warning notification next to the time zone setting on Windows saying something about making sure that the time zone is correct because programs and services rely on it to know your local time. I think that is important for users to know, but almost nobody probably knows about it.

I just found out about SG using that time zone information because of nhahtdh's comment to me here.

4 years ago*
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Well I certainly learned something. Maybe others can benefit down the line :)

4 years ago
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i blame sg 🙋

4 years ago
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Lol

4 years ago
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This comment was deleted 1 year ago.

4 years ago
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Thanks for the link. It shows my timezone to be Australia/Sydney which is correct. AllTracTurbo had an interesting suggestion and I need to google how to see what timezone my computer thinks it's in. Thanks for your input :)

4 years ago
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Bump for the giveaway finally starting

4 years ago
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Bump for the GAs and congrats on your new computer.
I'm in the process of getting a new one and it's going to be a while. So many choices, so much hesitation lol

4 years ago
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Well, I maybe should have taken more time. I know how to use a computer for the things I like but have no knowledge about the inner workings - ended up with one that has no dvd drive :(
I work quietly on my family tree and have a number of cd/dvds that are now just rubbish. I also have a few older cds with old family photos. Going to have to use a camera store to get at those photos now. So ... take your time, save your pennies. It will be worth it.
Having said the above, the new machine does not squeal the way the old one did if I played certain games (I did use canned air to blow out dust every now and then but that did not seem to help). And it is a lot quicker. Plus it has Win 10 (the old one was Win 7).

4 years ago
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You can always buy an external DVD drive, or if you have an old working DVD drive, you can just buy an external DVD drive case. Just make sure the interface is correct for your unused computer ports (USB 2/USB 3/SATA II/SATAIII and more - they come in many versions). Actually, I've just upgraded my laptop, moving the DVD to an external case, and putting in it's place an SSD.

4 years ago*
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the computer shop did give me my old computer back - but they also handed me my hard drive from the old computer, which I put in my desk drawer as I have no idea where it fits :)
So ... buying an external DVD drive does sound like what I need to do. Thanks for the link :)

4 years ago
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Have you asked them about putting the DVD (and the old drive) inside? If it's a desktop, then most likely they should be able to easily do this, at least for 1 of them.
Such cases also work for hard drives. They are much slower, if they use USB instead of SATA, but still very good for backups and keeping things like pictures and movies. And the case should cost less than $10.

4 years ago
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The new computer?
Err, no. We walked in, told the shop what I used a computer for, and got this thing (which was in a box out the back). My husband thought it was funny that it was termed a gaming computer. Damn thing has fans all the way up the front, covered in tempered glass. The side is solid glass. Really no idea how I would fit one in. Bit sad as the inside of this new computer is mainly empty space. My daughter and partner will visit for two weeks in late March and I think I will ask them to refit the old hard drive into the old computer for a bit (Glenn has built both his and my daughter's computers). This will give me a working dvd drive and another chance to double check for old photos.

4 years ago
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Yeah that happened with my Mom too. I ended up buying some sort of cradle for the old internal DVD drive that's really just an empty shell with an input/output that can probably be replaced with a cable.

Anyway, you're into genealogy? That's brilliant.
And yeah I need a new computer for pretty much the same thing. My old one, despite working well for most thing but gaming is now obsolete. It still runs nicely when it comes to games specs but my graphic card is giving me trouble and it's heating like a stove every time I run CPU hungry games. It's time for a change.

4 years ago
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Genealogy is one of those divisive hobbies - you are either interested or not. My own husband - not that interested (Why bother? All those people are dead :)

Good luck with your new computer (when you get it). Whatever you end up with it will be worth it )

4 years ago
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Closed 4 years ago by Delisper.