"In the beginning"

Disclaimer

The views expressed in this blog are not necessarily the views of the blog management, (on the other hand, they are not necessarily not the views of the blog management).

No effort has been made to stay within the bounds of the truth in this blog as it has always been the view of the management that the truth should never be allowed to stand in the way of a good story.

Wednesday, February 06, 2008

What a week

PhotobucketI can't wait for Friday to come


HooBoy, talk about Fun Monday, what about fun Saturday, Sunday, Tuesday, Wednesday!!! I think I might just have got my head above the shit waterline at last, what on earth could have tied me up so completely you ask?

I bought a new laptop computer, complete with the latest and greatest that Bill Gates has been able to torture amaze us with..... VISTA.... now I’m not going to say that there is anything much wrong with VISTA except its total inability to get along with both software and hardware that has been functioning perfectly.... well, alright at least, with the old XP system.

I toyed with the idea of switching over to a Mac system but decided against it as there would be too many compatibility issues... sure there would have been things I would have had to replace with Mac compatible products but I doubt there would have been more problems, (read swearing.)

This beautiful Toshiba (yes my old laptop is also a Toshiba and will now become my home PC, complicated isn’t it) still refuses point blank to talk with, or even recognize, my lovely little Canon ip3000 printer or any of my three flash drives, I’m beginning to think SHE is stuck-up.

It took a day, 8.30am until 3.30 the following am, yeah 19 hours with meal-breaks of perhaps 90 minutes, spent downloading updates and drivers to allow installation of or use of programs and products, until I found an update buried in the files it wouldn’t even recognize a Microsoft Basic Optical Mouse!!!!

It took another day to find a driver that VISTA would use to install my 250 GB Maxtor external hard drive, its all of 6 months old BTW, and then transfer my photos, folder by folder, from the wonderfully simple “My Pictures” to their new home in the not so wonderfully simple “Windows Photo Gallery”, this day wasn’t as bad though, I got to bed at 2.45am!!!!!

There have been a couple of pleasant surprises, like finding that my genealogy program Personal Ancestral File is compatible with VISTA, I had serious doubts on this one, thanks to “The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints” BTW this is by far the best genealogy program that I have used, don’t be put off if you aren’t a Mormon (I’m not) the program is free and excellent, (and it works with bloody VISTA too).

Connecting to the internet wasn’t too bad (a couple of hours) but getting my wireless network to work is still, shall we say “A work in progress” if you have already formed the opinion that “he should be kept far away from all technology based products” I can only agree with you, I’m sure that an expert would have had all this stuff fixed in... Oh, three days!!!!!!!!!!

This will be the very first post to be launched into cyberspace from the new Toshiba so I sincerely hope that it comes to land at a computer very near you very soon... pressing publish with fingers crossed.

17 comments:

Merle said...

Hi Peter ~~ Congrats on catching up
with the latest. Sorry you have had some headaches, but if I can handle Vista, I am sure you can do it better. Good luck and as you can see, it worked when you pressed Publish.
Take care, Love, Merle.

Pamela said...

My computer expert (the hubby) says we;re staying away from VISTA until they get all the bugs out of it.

You see anything crawling around in there?

(:

willowtree said...

Deja vu all over again!

karisma said...

Im sure no matter where you post from, you will still be " a dirty old man" no offense but you even had my daughters frowning at you on Monday! Never mind you make me laugh and thats what counts.

Jeanette said...

Hi Peter, I haven't heard a good word about Vista Yet. Think ill stay with XP, better the devil you.than the one you dont know,,

ChrisB said...

Anything technical is beyond me~ have fun!

Dave said...

Hi Peter,

Well, I'm a 20+ year computer IT person, and I'm currently using Vista on my work notebook (which is NOT Vista computable), and HP said would never work. Everything works, wireless, the USB ports.. everything. Yes, it did take a while. It is different.
I also have Vista on a PC at home (not the main one), that I use for testing things.. and generally, I do like it a lot.
It'll be a pain for you, for a while.. then you'll begin to see the benefits.

Oh, can you do me a favor, and email me the link to the geneology program please!
dchamp@hotmail.com
Thank you!

Suzz said...

Thanks for the tip to the geneology program. As for the computer problems, well, heck, someone has to battle all this stuff before we chickens try it out.

kenju said...

I have read and heard some discouraging words about Vista, Peter, and your experience makes me certain I don't want it - ever!

Jamie Dawn said...

It land here! It landed here!
Hooray, Hooray, Hooray!! Your post made it!!!

Whew!! What turmoil!
I use a Mac laptop, and it is SUPERB!

I wish you well and NO more computer troubles!!

Cliff said...

Didn''t you have the option of buying the male version of that computer?

Jack K. said...

Sorry to learn that you had such problems with VISTA.

Peter, you have bought into a bunch of HOOHA when it comes to Macs. I have been using them for years because they are so easy. In our house I have a G5 desktop and two laptops. One of the laptops, the older one, is one my wife wouldn't trade for anything. The other laptop I use for work and travel.

Macs are the easiest computers to use. A number of years ago Gates/MicroSoft got together with Jobs/Apple. The result was MicroSoft began using drop down menus and other intuitive processes.

This first page launched on the Toshiba came through superbly. Burning the midnight oil paid off. Btw, my youngest daughter uses a Toshiba laptop and loves it. She does have difficulty connecting to our wireless system when she visits. Her older sister uses a Mac and all is smooth sailing as long as she has the wireless password.

ttfn

Margaret said...

Hi Peter I don't think it is a she, "she" is able to multi task very easily, it must be a "fella".
All jokes aside, I am amazed there was not a computer crash from your window to ground. I am pleased you are sorted out now. The cable connection for my wireless has been a great success, it has made no difference to the girls web cam connections so all is good here and I am very happy.
Cheers Margaret

Rachel said...

I sometimes think I'd like to have a laptop computer but I have no clue about which one to get, etc. I just barely am able to work this one, so I guess I don't really need a laptop!

Is that you typing away, drinking, and scratching your behind? Now that is casual!!

Big Dave T said...

I've heard that some folks are going back to XP, they're so tired of Vista. I have Vista too but the only problems I have with it is when I want to%%%#@....... [stream interrupted] ERROR**********************CONTACT MICROSOFT********ERROR********...............................................................

Joy Des Jardins said...

It seems my first comment wouldn't go through...I'll try again.

Glad you got all the VISTA headaches settled Peter...you're much better than I'd be.

It's Casual Friday....like your socks Peter...

Anonymous said...

I feel for you. I've heard a lot of not nice things about Vista and some good things. My PC has XP and it is way too old to even attempt Vista plus it isn't my main computer. My iMac is my main computer. I won't go into details as I'm sure you don't want to hear how easy it was to get things up and running :-)