Adventures in personal computing

[louiselux]

I think I killed my desktop pc this afternoon.

It's elderly, or actually in personal computer terms more like an antique. I bought it in 1999 and we've had our up and downs together. It spent the whole of 2003 randomly beeping. Anyhow, it pulled through but had got the point recently where it was freezing every few minutes, so this afternoon I did a clean reinstall of Windows98, going back to the factory settings. It worked great for about half an hour but now it freezes when I try and use windows explorer. This is a pretty serious state of affairs because it means I can't actually make it do anything. At all.

Hmmm. Bugger.

Obviously there is the laptop to use, but I like the whole notion of having a desk, filling it with crap and then and sitting at my desk doing desk-based things.

Comments

[lady-ganesh.livejournal.com]

It is nice having a desk. My condolences. I hear you can get desktops pretty cheap these days.

[cicer.livejournal.com]

Bummer. I'm amazed it lasted so long, though. 8 years is a long life for a computer! Fortunately, desktop prices are going way, way down these days, since more and more people are primarily using laptops. So hopefully you can find a cheap one if you decide to replace it.

[nekonexus.livejournal.com]

Sounds like it might actually be your hard drive, in which case, you might be able to buy a new one and stick it in, reinstall '98 and get it working again. But I wouldn't guarantee or recommend it really. Microsoft has discontinued support for Win'98, so you won't likely be able to get all the security patches etc.

On the other hand, you can buy a new off-the-shelf PC for about $300 on sale these days.

It's no fun to have a PC die. ~_~ Hope you can work out a fix/replacement.

[vom-marlowe.livejournal.com]

Oh no! That's terrible! I hate when computers die. *hugs*

[i-am-zan.livejournal.com]

oh dear..condolences...I know what its like...or at least I know what the hubby feels like.

Re: the beeping...well ours was constantly doing that about two weeks ago. The hubby, he did some surgery. It seems the fan was bust, so he took that out and replaced that and then he got one of those minivacs., and cleaned up a little inside. So far so good.

Hope you resolve your pc woes. *hugs*

Now I go and resolve my own head woes! I don't think it works anymore...shame I can't replace it with new chips, grey matter or rewiring! At the moment it feels like its full of wool. >.<

[daegaer.livejournal.com]

Oh noes! Your poor PC :-( I hope you can resurrect it one last time.

If it's coming to the time to think of a new machine, PC World has some cheapish desktops all with large monitors, starting at £309 (though going to £349 gets double the harddisk and a nicer monitor, dvd re-writer, etc).

[scribblemoose]

I know what you mean about desks... but I find a docking station and a nice screen means I can have both. :)

Commiserations.

[puddingcat.livejournal.com]

Oh, poor computer :( I only have a desktop myself, and (while I would like a laptop as well, for the convenience) I hcan't help thinking you can fit more in a desktop. Because the box is bigger. *facepalms*

[yami-tai.livejournal.com]

Aww, RIP 'puter... it sounds like he had a good long life though.

[doire]

My sympathies. My desktop is still W98 and I'm sure there are some things it does faster than my XP laptop.

Some of the manufacturers are still offering XP instead of Vista if you want to avoid it.