Computers...A Love/Hate Relationship

Yesterday wasn't a good day. For a week or two, I have been having some problems with Internet Explorer shutting down frequently and then restarting. Over the past few days I have done all the "normal" things I do when I have a computer issue. I ran my virus scan, checked for malware, upgraded from IE 8 to 9 and back to 8 again, checked the disk, defragmented the hard drive, tried several restore points and so on. You get the picture. I googled repeatedly looking for answers and as it was getting worse, I attempted a recovery suggested by someone I googled. Big mistake. Whatever I did...made things worse.

After my "repair" I started getting messages. The first sign of a real problem came when my computer didn't recognize my iPhone and I couldn't fix that. Shortly after that a message popped up that my virus protection was turned off, but I couldn't turn it back on. When I tried to Google to see what might be going wrong...I discovered that IE would no longer open. It was broken/fried/gone. My computer showed that it was still there, it even showed it was running-but it wouldn't open. Long story short, I started this process at about 10:00 a.m. yesterday and I finally went to bed at 2:00 a.m. this morning. I did learn a few things during the process that I thought I would share with you.

1. It was very obvious that my issue was with Internet Explorer, not the computer. I was extremely lucky that I had a secondary browser on my computer so that I could still research things to try. I happened to have Google Chrome and it was still working.

2. I was also lucky that I had a couple of USB Flash Drives at home and I was able to remove all my pictures and my taxes etc. from the computer before I took the last drastic step.

3. It was a serious mistake to make a repair without writing down what I'd done. The suggested repair had me looking up a file, clicking a couple of places and shutting a few things off. I think that I created more of a problem than I had originally and the steps were too complicated for me to remember how to reverse them. I should have taken notes as I did it-lesson learned.

4. I ended up taking my computer back to factory settings. In other words, it is the same as when it came out of the box. I have a Satellite L675 laptop and I really didn't want to have to replace it. Factory setting is a very drastic step, but it also cleans up all the junk we accumulate on the computer. It took a long time and several steps. I had to go online to find out how to do it as they no longer send a recover disk with a computer. It wasn't difficult, just time consuming.

5. So far, I have only found that my daughter's tax information didn't save to the flash drive  for some reason. I lost all of my favorites and the items in my favorites bar as well as the Swagbucks Toolbar. I also lost all of my songs on iTunes (I know-I should have been saving to The Cloud). That isn't a big deal as the songs are still on my phone. As of yet I haven't found a way to move them from the phone back to the computer and that isn't the end of the world.

So-my reminder today to each of you is to:

1) Backup your files and photos to a flash drive (don't just plan on it like I did).

2. Add a second browser, even if you don't use it.

3. If you make changes to your computer-write them down so you can reverse them later.

4. If you have iTunes/iPhone/iPod-use The Cloud if you are going to be upset losing your music.  

I am still a bit stressed, exhausted and very hopeful that I won't still have issues.

My tablescape for this week, isn't happening.

I also don't have to find a way to work a new computer into the budget!

I call that success!