Sunday 11 March 2012

(Temporarily) out of action

For a while now, my computer has been getting a blue screen here and there. I knew it probably meant it was on its death knells, as for most of the three-and-a-bit years I've had it, that didn't happen at all. In the last couple of weeks, I've had a blue screen just about every day!

So on Thursday, I consulted with a couple of people I trust about a computer I wanted to buy. They both liked it and thought it would be good for my needs, so I was about 99% sure I was going to buy it. I thought "well, I better start backing stuff up, right?" In the middle of backing up Sullivan, I got a blue screen. :\

I loaded in safe mode the next morning and tried to back it up again. Another blue screen. I haven't been able to boot that computer since, so everything I hadn't backed up is gone.

Now, I'm not too worried about that. The last back up I have of Sullivan is from June 2037. It was before a lot of moving around and lot placement that I'd done but it's not terribly long ago and at least I still have the hood! What I didn't get to back up though is my Downloads folder (I have a back up but I think it's from January), my Scrivenor notes (this is the one that hurts - I hope I can remember who's supposed to get the remaining ROS!) and all the full size pics from this round. Plus probably a ton of other stuff I won't remember until I need it on my next computer. It sucks.

I have ordered my new computer (I wish I'd asked my tech gurus about this computer earlier, because I'd had it picked out for a couple of weeks) and the store I'm buying it from is supposed to call me on Tuesday to arrange delivery. I don't know if that means I could get it on Tuesday but I'm guessing Wednesday is a safer estimate. It comes pre-loaded with Win7 but I will obviously need to take some time installing everything else, including all those many, many Sims packs! The very earliest I'll be able to sit down and play for an update will probably be Saturday, which would still mean no update until next Monday, so you'll have to be patient for a little while.

Some of you would have pieced all this together from my tweets, my replies to comments here or my posts on N99 but for those of you who hadn't, now you know what's going on. The next post from me will hopefully be the Gottlieb update!

15 comments:

  1. Hope your new computer comes soon!

    Even though your old computer isn't booting, your stuff might still be intact and safe on the hard drive - when my previous laptop died, I took it to a tech shop and they copied everything from its hard drive to my portable drive for $50. I was able to just copy my Sims 2 folder, including the downloads folder etc, onto the new computer. Might be worth a try!

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  2. I'm sad to read this, even though with your tweets I was kind of expecting it. I do hope you can get your downloadsfolder, and everything else you need.
    I hope you can get everything back up and running soon, and will be waiting in the mean time!

    When I back up, I ussually back up my entire Sims 2 folder, but I ussually back up to my desktop, instead of backing up to an external hard drive :s

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  3. I agree with Blackcat that your stuff might still be available. Since you have a desktop PC then I think anyone who's familiar with handling PC hardware would be able to plug the old harddrive into your new PC or you could take it to a tech shop. My brother temporarily installed my old harddrive from my old PC to my current one when I got it. I was able to get everything I needed from there and after I had gotten everything he just took it out.

    Anyway, good luck with your new computer! :)

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  4. If your old HD is SATA all you (or your tech savvy family members) would have to do is attach it to the new PC and pull the data off it from within Windows. I do it all the time and I've saved data from my husband's failing HDs that way. If it isn't SATA, you can still do it, it just requires more work on the tech end (IDE cables, sigh, this PC doesn't even have any plugs for them!)

    I know you mentioned doing it as an external and getting an I/O error. I, thankfully, never ran into that... but I wonder how the setup was. Did he run it through USB or was it a direct connection (like a regular HD)?

    Either way, I hope you guys can figure it out and save that data! Silly computers, why can't they ever do what we want them to? Always crashing and being ridiculous.

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  5. Like I've been saying on Twitter and pretty much what everyone else has been saying, hope you can save everything, especially your downloads and notes! I don't know what I would do if something like that happened. Take your time and get everything situated! We won't be going anywhere.

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  6. Thanks everyone! After I wrote this post last night, my dad came up with the idea of connecting my drive to his computer and seeing if we could transfer the files that way (which is what Mao is referring to - I was talking about this on Twitter too). No dice, unfortunately. We could see all the folders but we couldn't actually do anything with them, without the computer telling us we didn't have permission to access them. :\

    Mao, I think he had it connected like a USB, as far as I could tell. I really do wish computers were a little less fragile and a lot less finicky than they seem to be!

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  7. Good luck with the backups and accessing your files and yay for the new computer!

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    1. Thanks! I don't think there's much hope of me accessing the rest of the files, so I'm coming to terms with that. ;) Should be getting the new PC today though, if all goes well.

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  8. Yay for new computer! It didn't really arrive any faster, which stinks, but at least it wasn't too incredibly long! I saw you are having a windows 7 error, I hope that you are able to get it figured out, and quickly! And that you don't have too much trouble finding your old downloads. At least you have a pinterest account to check into! Can't wait til you are back in the game!!

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  9. Ah, I want to haz an icon too like you do on here in the comments! Guess I'll need to just suck it up and get a blogger profile to link through. Part of me thinks I already did this... end of my sidetracking!

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    1. Oh, man, no one is keener for me to get back in the game than I am! I am a bit discouraged about my Windows 7 issue but I'm hoping the fact that seeing so many others have been able to play successfully (and that I did get it loaded, when it was only installed up to Pets) is a good sign!

      And yeah, I think you need a Blogger profile to have an icon on here! It shouldn't take you too long to set up, especially if you already have a G-mail, or another Google account.

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  10. I hope it all works out Carla. Hopefully they can pull your hard drive for you like they did with mine.

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    1. In the end, I decided not to bother trying any more. If it was going to be only $50, I would have gone ahead with it and taken it in somewhere but it would have been way more than that, with no guarantee they'd actually be successful. But I have my game and am well on my way to redoing all my notes, so it's not too bad. :)

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  11. The good thing at being so late is that I already know you have a shiny new computer now that loads your game in no time, so I'm not worried too much! ;)

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    1. No, thankfully, you have no reason to worry any more! I'm even almost finish redoing all my notes. ;)

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