I got BAD news!!

I am so upset!!
Last thurs nite, I started havin probs with my laptop -got it over a yr ago. So I brought laptop to work to have a friend who works with computers to see what was wrong + try to fix.. I was HOPIN he'd be able to save all my pics, videos, documents but he was able to save ONLY half so I've lost lots of pics (especially the most recent ones)..
I was ok with that- better to have SOME pics than NOTHING....

Anyway my friend decided to run diagnotics + see if its repairable. He said normally it'd take 1 day to run diagnostics. I left the laptop with him fri. This morning (Tues), he showed me the diagnostics and ONLY ELEVEN % of it was done!! he said that shows how bad the hard drive is and at this time it looks like ill have to buy a new laptop!!

I can't really afford tobuy a new laptop! Darn it. As of now, I can access emails and some internet at home via pager.

I've learned a big lesson from this- backup ur info FREQUENTLY so u won't lose all/most of important info!!

woah hard message to read. sorry about your laptop..my friend just lost hers to..she spilled juice on it.

It's a very good idea to back stuff up.. I'm going to do that more often!, sorry about your computer

A very hard reminder to back up that info. Sorry you lost so much!!

Pamela, you CAN just replace a hard drive in a laptop and not have the buy a whole new one! Won't save your data, but it will save a lot of $$$$.

Just replace the hard drive, not the whole thing. It will save you money!!

I did a stupid thing with backup once - I was very careful to download everything regularly onto floppy disk, and I kept the disks in my computer bag. Then one day the whole lot got stolen on an airplane! So keep your backups away fromth e computer.

Oh no, how awful

I'll be backing up all my pictures when I get home tonight.

Originally Posted by valanhb

Pamela, you CAN just replace a hard drive in a laptop and not have the buy a whole new one! Won't save your data, but it will save a lot of $$$$.

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I did check into that possibility and was told that it's very complicated to replace a hard drive and would be easier just to buy a new laptop...

I think how my laptop got damaged was a month ago or so, I was online for a class when a thunderstorm started and it fried my ethercard and cable modem... I had to buy a PCmia card (replaces ethercard) and get a new cable modem. I thought that was all the damage and that I was very lucky but it must've damaged my hard drive and started going downhill from there..

Also, I found out that I didn't LOSE MOST of my pics/videos! What happened in the last couple years was that whenever I borrowed a dig camera, I'd download all the pics onto my work computer then copy onto cd and bring home to put on my laptop... I stopped doing that for the last 6 months so it looks like I only lost the most recent 6 months worth of pics/videos. WHEW! I CAN live with that!

Yes u all need to do backups frequently AND store in a safe place!

Originally Posted by ugaimes

I'm so sorry to hear this Pam

I hope you are able to replace your hard drive easily enough.

Does anyone here use a junk drive to back up their files? That seems like a pretty good solution as they can hold considerably more data than disks can (I only recently learned what junk drives are

).

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What is a junk drive?

Oooooh is that like one of those little usb drive things? I've seen some on play.com for about £20 and they hold a lot of data. Even if that's not what you meant, it's a darn good idea!

Like this............

http://www.play.com/play247.asp?page...39&g=539&pa=sr

Gosh Pamela - I really wish we lived closer!!! My hubby told me that swapping out laptop hard drives is a snap! (I know he did it for a friend of ours fairly recently!)

Originally Posted by ugaimes

Purity- that's exactly what I meant! We use them here to store Powerpoint presentations are. They're awesome for backing up files!

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I've just ordered myself one!

Originally Posted by valanhb

Gosh Pamela - I really wish we lived closer!!! My hubby told me that swapping out laptop hard drives is a snap! (I know he did it for a friend of ours fairly recently!)

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REALLY?? Two of my friends who work as top computer technicans (whatever u want to call that) both said it'd be complicated to replace the bad hard drive with a new hard drive since they'd have to figure out how to put win xp and all other programs on new drive, finding , installing the drivers for toshiba motherboard, ports, screen, etc. It's very time consuming..

DARN IT Now I WISH I live closer to u so ur hubby could help! Maybe I'll ask my friend again how long it'd take and if it's really that complicated. I'll mention what ur hubby said.

Originally Posted by ugaimes

Purity- that's exactly what I meant! We use them here to store Powerpoint presentations are. They're awesome for backing up files!

Click to expand...

I learned something new! THANKS for sharing that. I am an IDIOT regarding tech things.

Originally Posted by Pamela

REALLY?? Two of my friends who work as top computer technicans (whatever u want to call that) both said it'd be complicated to replace the bad hard drive with a new hard drive since they'd have to figure out how to put win xp and all other programs on new drive, finding , installing the drivers for toshiba motherboard, ports, screen, etc. It's very time consuming..

DARN IT Now I WISH I live closer to u so ur hubby could help!

Maybe I'll ask my friend again how long it'd take and if it's really that complicated. I'll mention what ur hubby said.

Click to expand...

valanhb- I want to THANK u for getting me thinking again about this! I asked 1 of my friends and he said it'd take 4 hours to replace and put in the proper operating system so at this time it looks like I will get a new HARD DRIVE and replace that instead of buying a new laptop which will save me $$! I am still trying to do research on this so hopefully this will work out.

I have a USB flash-drive that I use to hold a few important things at a time, things I want to bring to school with me. I'm also going to buy an external zip drive to back up my work...soon, and very soon.