Rfalconcam Forum

Donna's Laptop is Kaput!  I'm trying to diagnose it via text messaging, but it went end-of-life about 4 or 5 years ago and warranty is long forgotten.  She'll touch base later when she can get to her daughter's PC.

Gonna be awful quiet around here!  :surprise:

After it cools down, I can get on for a while...then it goes Black screen..I think it's the fan. OMG...BUMMER. Not a good time for this to happen. Thanks Janet, if it goes again...I'll text ya.

 :( :crying:

I have to go to work...hope to be back on LATER!!

Oh, we'll figure out something  :)

Oh no!!!!

Stick the laptop on top of an A/C vent.

Suck air through the laptop with the vacuum cleaner.

Good idea, as dust and junk have been suggested as culprits.  I have a few fans from carcacess here and I think Donna could go in and replace that fan.  Unfortunately, if it is the CPU fan, it is on the board and not easy to get to - especially if someone has never attempted it. 

Oh, oh!   :o

 :computer:  What will we all do until it's resolved ?!  Hurry up and fix it piglet.   :harhar: :gum:

Working on it - even consulted with my boss, who is like a super electronics geek.

Sh........... :crazy: :hyper: :( :nono: :no: :banghead: :crybaby: :help: :snarl:

One other thing...

This is one reason why we encourage you to team up with a buddy off-line, so the rest of us don't freak out if you aren't heard from in a while.  A couple of us did this after Marty died and it is a good thing.  So, find a buddy and share phone numbers off line....   Just in case....

2 little piggys just doesn't cut it! :(

She said, "oink"

Great idea about buddying up! I think Donna should tell the people she ordered the computer from that this is an urgent need!!!

Thanks so much Janet!!!!!

Janet,

Tell Donna...here are some alternatives if she is in need of a falcon fix:

1. Go to the library, enter library card #, and get 30 minutes access on the internet. 

2. Go to car dealership.  Pretend you are getting an oil change, and use their customer internet access while waiting.

I'm sure we can come up with some more creative ideas.  Do we have to wait a week?

Joyce

She does have her kids' machines and hubby's when they aren't on them, so although greatly reduced, I suspect she'll be able to pop in and at least say "hey"!

I do like the car dealership idea!  Lunch at the Parsippany Hilton would work, too :) 

Via Text Message:
Donna misses all of you.

She's in withdrawal  ;)

 :wave:   I miss her too! This forum is off center without our top poster! Tell her I said hey piglet.   :gum:

Hey guys...popped in for a few. Man, talk about withdrawal!!! I miss you guys and miss posting my daily hundreds  :harhar: How's my piglets doing? I'm just glad I'm working with my dad or else I'd go  :silly: sitting here staring at a laptop that's  :hurt:. HUBBY CAME THROUGH and bought me a new one, guess I'll have to be nice to him for a while, scratch his back, serve his meals, get his drinks.. :devil:. It's all good and he's the best. I only had to ask once. Janet's been a big help, keeping me posted on anything new. Thank God for texting. I have a lot of catching up to do..I read every post so 2 days is mega much behind. Anyway, looking forward to my new laptop with so so so much more Ram than my 56 I have now...this has 3 gig of memory and a huge hard drive....and windows 7...hope I like it. Not sure when I'll get another chance at this so in case I can't get my kids off their WOW (World of WARCRAFT GAME), this may be it until the weekend. Maybe tomorrow night, my daughter bowls. Until then, take care guys and OMG the little monsters have grown so much in 2 days. Off to read then babysit. Missin ya's.

Donna

Donna, so great to see a post from you!!!!!!!!!  I miss reading your posts!!!

 :wave:Hey Donna I hope you have fast delivery on that new laptop! Not the same without you little piglet!!! :gum:

As soon as that laptop arrives, I'll begin the nagging about the anti-virus software, the backups, etc. etc.   ;)  I must admit that I am used to remotely diagnosing problems, but via text messaging was a real challenge  :scaredblue:  I will continue to provide Donna updates, as I receive them ;)

Thanks Janet. :handshake:

Donna's laptop reminded me that there was a sale at Best Buy (strongly dislike the store, but the price was right) on a Western Digital 2TB external hard drive for $119...it's backing up my 9,500 & change pictures as I type.  Half the price I spent on a 500GB drive a few years ago that filled up last year. And I remember getting excited at my first 1.2MB floppy drive...hard drive was still a pipe dream then.

No time like the present to back up your important stuff.  Never know when the blue screen of death will come to visit.

I use Mozy online backup. It stores up to 2 GB for free. I haven't used 3/4 yet as of today. Had it for a year now. I learned my lesson a few yrs ago...when my Hard Drive crashed and I lost all my MK pics, family pics...and other important stuff. Losing MK was the worst.  :crying: When I get my new Laptop, I just click restore and all my stuff is there and in the proper folders.  :thumbsup: I hope!

I fill up a 1GB flash drive just bringing home the stuff I save at work every couple of weeks!  Just got an 8GB one ($19.99-1/4 what I paid for the 1GB 6 years ago)...couldn't bring home all the their baby pics at once  :scaredblue: Between what I save here & my personal photos this hard drive might last a few years  :nerd:

I'm using Crashplan backup software...it's interesting in that it gives you multiple destinations you can backup to.  Their "unlimited" online storage account costs money, but it's pretty cheap, and I need about 40 GB worth of storage space.  I also backup to a network drive, but like having offsite backup as well.

I have ghost images of my HD, the WD 1TB backup drive, 16GB thumbs, backup CDs and I even store the stuff in multiple locations.  Learned the multiples AFTER Rich gave my old laptop a lovely taste of Merlot!   :scaredblue:

I received my new Laptop yesterday, a few hours shy of banding. I'm loving it so far. I tried last night to restore my files on "Mozy" Why does it take a few minutes to backup and hours to restore? I finally had to stop it half way through as it was late. Took 4 hours to restore 875 files out of 1876. I never knew I had so many pics on my old laptop, (no wonder it was slow as Molasses). The 1 program I thought I backed up was PSP 2, I need that for my card making and it wasn't backed up. My daughter has a CD for an older version, so when she wakes up, I'll install it. Not sure how to use this Windows 7 yet. Says you can have a split screen up with 2 tabs open and I've yet to find out how. I'll get around to figuring it out. I should know, I'm Donna, I'm a PC and Windows 7 was my idea!  :silly: I had to throw that in!  :wave:

Well, I'm happy you are back, as I tend to follow Donna for the info updates.   :thumbsup:

 Me too!  
OINK    :yes: :yahoo: goodnews: :the_wave:

Welcome back!  There is something of a learning curve...this new work 'puter is actually a couple of years old and very similar to my home machine, but I'm still being challenged.  And I'm laughing...your upgrade is to Win 7...mine here is from Win NT to Win XP!

I like Windows XP...Windows explorer in 7 is so weird. I'm messing with the stuff now. Change is so difficult! Good luck with yours.

Don't confuse the OS (Win7, Vista, XP) with your Browser - IE 6, 7, 8. 

No I mean Windows Explorer..my files..I use Firefox. My files and folders are weird in 7.

It's funny how people do things differently...I use Windows explorer too to find stuff.  A software guy had to "dial" into my computer yesterday to patch something.  As he was searching my desktop for My Computer I kept wanting to take mouse control and open Windows Explorer for him.  I don't know how anyone ever finds anything using My Computer.

Oh same here, I can't do My Computer either....confusing.

I never use Windows Explorer - plain Jane My Computer and I'm done with it.