Saturday, April 2, 2011

Saying "Goodbye" to an old friend.....

Two weekends ago was the "last weekend" for me and my trusty HP Pavilion Laptop.  I'm not a "power user" but I am a "persistent user."  My laptop comes on before 6AM and stays on mainly to 11PM, sometimes longer.....7 days a week.  It simply got "tired of me."


IN 3 years, I've gone through 3 letter "O" keys, two power supplies, and was on my second hard drive. Kind of like the family axe that has had 3 heads and 4 handles, but its still viewed as "Grandpa's family axe."  Yes, it was all salvageable, and in the end, I restored it to original condition ready for its next owner, like factory new.......but, time lost in saving and restoring e-mails and reinstalling programs on it for me was higher than buying new, and migrating the information to  a better machine.


Now it's time to turn the Carbonite backups on for the new machine, having moved all my thousands of e-mails from (years ago) Outlook Express to Windows Mail, and now to "Windows Live Mail."  All the mail survived, along with my contacts, and in the "file" department, the voice of my late Father which I am so glad to have with me to play back now and then as I interviewed him years ago. It was six years ago this weekend that I was attending his funeral, and deep in grief. Now, the computer is a bit of a comfort as his voice is saved for me to hear now and then, when the mood hits.


Bottom line?  Keep your backups going. Schedule them, or somehow remind yourself to back up your contacts, your e-mails if they're based on your PC and not in "the cloud"....subscribe to a backup service like Carbonite, or buy a (now very) inexpensive External USB drive, and stick it in your fireproof safe when you're not doing regular backups.  Protect your information. Not just from thieves, but from mechanical failure, loss, and more.


Two weeks into "Windows 7" I've not got the horror stories I've head from some others, but...you will need printer drivers for your network printers installed locally, and migrating to "Windows Mail" has been an experience, but I think it's getting used to me.  Web editing is back up for our station site, and all in all, I can't complain.  I CAN, however tell you that within 24 hours of buying the new machine I needed the e-mails I had automatically backed-up with both Carbonite and the program called "Express Assist." 

It's nice being back with you...with only one full weekend's interruption now in the rear view mirror..... 

And the 3 most important words in this day and age are NOT "Location, Location, Location"..they're:

"BACKUP, BACKUP, BACKUP"

You can never have enough of 'em.