My computer has been limping along in a near-failed state for over a week now. Well, yesterday I finally got the last piece I needed, a new installation disk for my DSL modem. (For what good is a working computer with no Internet?)<\/p>\n
I will say that someone at Microsoft China had been giving me some help in restoring the system the way it was, but sadly it was not working. So yesterday I began the long, arduous process of Installing The System From Original Installation Disks.<\/p>\n
Step 1 – insert each of 11 disks in turn, including re-inserting a couple of them a few times before the system actually sees that, yes, that IS the disk it is looking for. Takes about an hour, then takes another hour or two installing the new information and rebooting several times.<\/p>\n
Step 2 – Turn the computer on and do MORE initialization stuff. Can take an hour or more, and MAY hang on you in mid-process, forcing you to start over (did not happen this time)<\/p>\n
Step 3 – Go to Windows Update and load the Update Software, Latest Service Pack, etc. — and when you’re done, reboot and do it again, because it never gets ALL the updates.<\/p>\n
Step 4 – Load your peripheral software — Mouse, Keyboard, Printer (if you use a standard mouse and keyboard, you won’t need that. If you use an HP printer, you probably won’t need this step at all.)<\/p>\n
Now you are ready for Steps 5 and 6<\/p>\n
Step 4 – Delete all the Crapware included with the computer — Norton, AOL, MSN, all the stupid games that never work, and all the HP software that you’ll never use (printers, updates (because they are no longer supported on your old machine), ads for service agreements that they no longer honor, etc.)<\/p>\n
Step 5 – Load your old software. I start with AVG, then Firefox. I keep all the downloaded installation files of the programs I use on an external hard drive (where I also keep all my documents, pictures, music, etc., so I don’t lose it when the computer goes belly-up). Keep going until you’re done.<\/p>\n
I started this process around 9 pm last night. I finished around 8 am this morning. At least I think I’m finished.<\/p>\n
But my Baby is ALL HEALED NOW. It was worth it. I slept well, for the first time in over a week.<\/p>\n
Hugs,
Me<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
My computer has been limping along in a near-failed state for over a week now. Well, yesterday I finally got the last piece I needed, a new installation disk for my DSL modem. (For what good is a working computer with no Internet?) I will say that someone at Microsoft China had been giving me […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-403","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/peacefulhippo.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/403","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/peacefulhippo.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/peacefulhippo.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peacefulhippo.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peacefulhippo.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=403"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/peacefulhippo.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/403\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/peacefulhippo.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=403"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peacefulhippo.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=403"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peacefulhippo.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=403"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}