Go west young man
Warning: External Hard Drives
One of my mantra’s over the years is about backup. Over the past few days, I have been working for a newer customer who hasn’t heard my sermons.
He had a "computer expert" setup an extremely complex home network and a NAS (Network Attached Storage) backup system. None of this is out of the ordinary. However, unfortunately, this was the only backup the customer had. Last week, his external hard drive failed. All of his important data existed on that drive that was seemingly lost.
External hard drives use the same hard drives we have in our computers with an added few components to allow the drive to function independent of a computer. Problem is that a hard drive is a hard drive…moving parts and all. Moving parts eventually fail and power can quit as well. These increasingly inexpensive devices work fine as a secondary backup…but should never by your primary drive.
There really is a first time for everything!
I showed up at the wrong client’s house today. Let me lay out the situation so that I don’t look like a total buffoon. I do take total responsibility for the error, but my reasoning is just…at least in my own mind.
Yesterday, I received a panic call from one of my clients on my voice mail. When I returned the call, the husband answered so I asked for his wife (who had called originally). She picked up the extension line in their home and now both were on the phone talking to each other and I could barely hear either one of them. In the garbled conversation, I determined that they desperately needed help and I informed them that I could squeeze them between two of my already scheduled appointments that were near by their home.
Computer guys are kind of like Zorro
Before I begin, I want to make it clear that I am not complaining in this post at all. I am just explaining the events of the day.
I began my day with a blank schedule. My mother in law was scheduled to arrive to spend a couple of weeks with us so I had blocked today so that I could help my family get ready.
My phone rang at 7am this morning. It was a dentist’s office. They had accidentally done something that had deleted their patient schedule and they were completely lost without it. I told them that I would be right in after I took a shower and got dressed.
As it turns out, they backed everything up on tape drives. It took 3 tries and almost six hours before we finally had a success in getting everything back up. Then one of their laptops died in an unrelated occurance.
Windows XP Repair Option
I was ‘back in the saddle’ today after a hiatus last week for spring break with my kids. Helped a client out with a problem that, fortunately, isn’t too common, but common enough that it warrants its own tip. It applies to Windows XP only and you might need to try using it if you cannot boot your computer up to anything other than the startup menu screen (where you get the option to start in Safe Mode…see picture).
If after turning on and off your computer a few times to try and get your desktop to come up, AND you can’t get into Safe Mode using the menu shown, AND using the "Last known good configuration" option don’t work, try these steps:
Backup Outlook Express Email
The most reliable way is to search your computer for *.dbx files using Start –> Search. Make sure you check the option to search for hidden folders and files. Then backup any of the dbx files.
To restore these files on a new computer or new installation, Start Outlook Express, Click File –> Import –> Messages. Follow the wizard and choose Outlook Express 6 as the type of email you are importing, then click Browse to where you saved the original files.
Add folders to Picasa’s index
When you first install Picasa, it asks if you want to scan your entire computer or just your My Documents folder for pictures. If you select one option but change your mind, you can add more folders or subtract folders to the Picasa index by doing the following:
1. Click on FILE
2. Click on Add Folders to Picasa
3. Select a file then click on the "Always Scan" bullet at the side.
4. Click OK and it will scan all the given folders for photos.
Reboot, wait, and don’t panic about email problems
I started out with a full morning of appointments two of them were email problems. They had called me early in the week reporting that they could not get into their email.
By 9am this morning both appointments had cancelled because the problem had cured itself. If you search through this site you will find no less than five tips and articles about how internet problems of all types are generally not your fault if you haven’t made any changes.
As it turns out both Internet services that my two clients were using had email problems this week. Simply by waiting the problem out the ISPs got the problems fixed and email was back up on its own.
Use the Ethernet port for broadband
If you have broadband Internet and you had the company set it up for you, it is very likely they connected it using the USB cable instead of the Ethernet cable.
The Ethernet cable has an end on it that looks like a giant phone jack and it is the most reliable way to connect your computer to your broadband cable or DSL modem.
Scanners, printers, joysticks, mice, keyboards, and digital cameras are just a few of the dozens of devices that can be connected to your computer’s USB ports. Since this is the case, you must load drivers to get your computer to recognize your broadband modem when connecting through USB.