New Computer

I don't know whether this counts as a Christmas present to myself or not, but I have been contemplating buying a replacement desktop for some time now.  I was finding that my main home computer was having frequent memory problems (and once a week or so would in fact crash and restart itself with only a handful of programs open).  Perhaps even more frustrating is that the optical drive completely stopped working, so I couldn't back up CDs or burn data CDs/DVDs.  So I knew a replacement was inevitable but was having trouble convincing myself to get around to it.

I did a bit of on-line shopping hoping to find a computer with Windows 8 (or perhaps Windows 8.1, since Windows 8 is completely unsupported now).  I really have not liked dealing with Windows 10 on my "upgraded" work laptop, though, to be fair, my biggest gripes are not being able to turn off the constant syncing with OneDrive and the constant notifications.  At least at home, I have more control over those settings and don't have to defer to corporate IT policies.  Anyway, the only Windows 8.1 machines were refurbished ones, and I didn't feel like going that route.

So that reduced my interest in getting a computer, since I wouldn't be able to get Windows 8.1, but I still needed to do something.  I saw that Staples was having a pretty good sale, and it was possible to arrange for curbside pickup, as the computer was in stock in the store.  I ordered a new monitor as well and a portable external hard drive to help with the data transfer.  One nice thing about Gerrard Square is that, while there are generally quite long lines to get in (and probably likely to be even longer as the lockdown rules get stricter) if you have a "curbside" order to pick up, they let you right in.  Now I didn't have to give them an order number or anything, so I could have been scamming them, but that is hardly my problem...

It basically took all weekend to transfer all the files over, and for the time being at least, I am letting my daughter use the old computer as a backup (though mostly I think she plays games on it...).  Then it took a long time to get software reinstalled and tweaked.  I was particularly worried about migrating my email archives (in MailStore) but that was a breeze.  I had to follow some bizarre process (spelled out on the internet) in order to restore the Tif editor (called Mobi) and then figure out how to get my ancient scanner working with Windows 10, as it is not natively supported.  The program that took the most fiddling around (so far) was Calibre, but I think I have it whipped into shape now.  I'm still getting used to new versions of PDFSam and FreeRip, and I haven't tested Nero yet, but generally things seem to be functioning.  The last thing is to go around and reset the passwords for some news sites and iTunes (and Blogger for that matter!).  It has been a dreadful headache, but hopefully I won't have to do this again for another 5 years, and at least the files I care the most about have been backed up in a few places as a result of this new computer purchase.