Category: Housekeeping

Computing Thoughts

Advice, Housekeeping

While waiting at not-so-Best Buy to have my hard drive backed up / wiped prior to sending my ASUS Brick Model off to be repaired, I took a little walk around the store just to look at my options should the laptop be “unrepairable” and ASUS refusing to replace it (I know, it shouldn’t be a problem to replace a piece of equipment that was purchased in January of this year, but it’s a fool who doesn’t make at least some contingencies in case of corporate bastardy).

All the laptops looked the same, had too many unnecessary features and cost too much, so I didn’t spend too much time there.

Then my eyes fell upon this creature:

It’s one of those “everything in a screen” systems, and I must admit I was drawn to it — in no small measure because of the earlier suggestion from The Reader Formerly Known As CoffeeMan that I look at a desktop PC instead of a laptop. 

While my need for portability has admittedly been reduced because I no longer travel as much as yore, I still might need to take a computer out of the house when going somewhere on vacation, for example — or needing to carry the thing out if there’s a fire in the apartment block.  Carrying a PC tower and screen out is a non-starter for all sorts of reasons, but a single screen (plus keyboard) that in extremis  could be carried in a large suitcase?  That is a distinct possibility.

Here’s the White Monster’s spec sheet:

Hmmm.  Big screen for my Aging & Failing Eyes, a properly-sized keyboard for my Fat & Fumbling Fingers, manageable size (see dimensions) and if I may be greedy for once, more computing power than I would ever need for the remainder of my existence on Planet Earth.

There’s the small matter of the dollars required, but I’d just raffle off a gun or two from my ever-dwindling stock of Second Amendment appliances.

If anyone’s had actual experience with one of these beasts, let me know in Comments, because right now it’s looking awfully attractive.

Still Bricked

Housekeeping

Here’s the back story, and it’s time for an update.

There is no update.  The fucking ASUS is still dead, unresponsive to all blandishments and tricks (such as suggested in Comments originally) and a trip to Geek Squad up the road to see if someone perchance could go “Aha!  We know that problem!” and fix the thing (Best Buy does sell ASUS laptops).

I have a warranty — and an extended one as well — except that the details thereof are safely installed on the hard drive of the ASUS itself.  So I’ll have to contact ASUS through their website [groan] and try to get the situation resolved that way, somehow.

In case you’re wondering, Best Buy does do warranty repairs on ASUS laptops… but only on machines purchased from Best Buy.

Doubleplusfucked, I am.

As I said in the previous post, blogging is going to be light because trying to function on the old HP laptop is akin to taking a covered wagon from coast to coast instead of flying the friendly skies NYC-LAX.  There was a reason I quit using it, after all, and replaced it with the shiny new… brick.

Raw, unadulterated suckage.

Wish me luck as I try to get this issue taken care of.

Bricked

Housekeeping

On Monday morning, just as I was starting a fresh round of posts, the new ASUS laptop bricked.  Black screen, no response to the power switch.  Tested the power cord (I have a spare), but nothing.

So I took it to the Geek Squad, who took two days to tell me that the problem was not the power cord.  And I was out of town for those two days on personal business, which is why I only got this thing back in motion last night.

Aaargh.  So now I’ll probably have to send the fucking brand broken new laptop to the ASUS service center or some damn place, while I revive the old HP and press it back into service one more time — you remember, the old machine held together with duct tape, with the touchpad masked with cardboard and the letter “o” which doesn’t always respond to a finger’s touch.

Hello, Windows 10 my old friend.

Of course, I don’t know what the real reason for the bricking can be — broken motherboard, some other problem from a cause I know not what, it will all be revealed at some point.

Fortunately, all my data is backed up, but there is a distinct possibility that I’ll have to rebuild all the apps and programs and such from scratch, as I did when the ASUS was fresh out of the box.

Fuck.

Bear with me while I go through the travails of the modern digital world, again.

Posting may be light for a few days, I’m sorry.

The Elephant In The Room

Housekeeping

Folks, it’s time to approach this topic head-on.

I refer here to the issues that several Readers have had with the Comments on this website — i.e. email addresses blocked, unable to re-register, etc. all with the end result that you are unable to post comments.

The problem appears to be with WordPress (hic delenda est), and neither I nor Tech Support II have been able to fix it.

I can only surmise that this is being caused by the old version of WordPress that I currently have installed, but I have to confess that I’m really nervous about upgrading because the last time I did so, all sorts of things changed and it took me about a week to fix it all up.

Nevertheless, I’m going to do the upgrade sometime over the next weekend in the hope that this will fix Comments, but I’m not too sanguine that it will.  If everything gets fucked up as a result, please be patient with me.

In the meantime, if you absolutely want your comment published but your access has been nuked, please email it to me and I’ll pop it under the relevant post.  Just put in the Subject line:  Comment for post [title] and I’ll get to it as soon as I can.

I really miss my old website, but that software was compiled from scratch and maintained by Connie, and there’s absolutely no chance that it can ever be resurrected, more’s the pity.

Anyway… wish me luck.