FASTER, PLEASE!

by Sheila Connolly

A couple of weeks ago I was ready to throw my laptop at a wall. It was doing everything v..e..r..y.....s..l..o..w..l..y, from booting up to shutting down, and everything in between. Okay, it's three years old--not exactly new, but not ancient either. Having overloaded computers in the past with non-essential programs, I've been careful in choosing what to download to this one, so there was plenty of disk space available. I had even added RAM, a year or so after I bought it. So why was it dragging its figurative heels?

I did everything a semi-intelligent computer owner should. I defragged. I ran Check Disk. I dumped my recycle bin and cleared my temporary files. I ran scans up one side and down the other, for all those evil invaders that might have crept in from cyberspace. Didn't make a bit of difference.

I was getting desperate. I mean, I couldn't even log on to Facebook for more than a few minutes. It was freezing when I wanted to add more than a few friends. Who was this piece of machinery to dictate who my friends should be?

So finally, at the end of my patience, I contacted the Geek Squad. No, this is not a paid endorsement. But I've used them before, for a variety of computer problems, including the total meltdown of my daughter's hard drive. They have always been up front about what they can and cannot do, and they deliver on their promises. So what the heck? I needed help.

There's a physical Geek Squad near here, but being lazy/thrifty/impatient, I logged onto their website and contacted a real live person. At least I think he was live, but who can tell these days? He said his name was Jason. Sure. But I'll call you anything you want, as long as you can speed up my computer. Please.

I gave him (gulp) permission to peer into the inner working of the laptop, remotely. Good thing I hid that international money-laundering scheme on a different computer. Oops, never mind. He poked and prodded, and came back with this evaluation: there's nothing actually wrong with the computer, but apparently my assorted virus protections (all recommended by various knowledgeable people, including a U.S. government IT employee) were warring with each other, making it increasingly difficult for anything to open, much less operate. The cure? Let the Geek Squad run their basic clean-up program. Could it make anything worse? I pulled out my credit card and said "go."

And then came the fascinating part. Someone, somewhere took over control of my computer. I know, we've all seen this in numerous movies and television shows. But I'd never seen it on my computer. The cursor darted; windows opened and shut. Decisions were made. Software was removed and installed. All this happened very fast--faster than any human could work? Was Jason human? Heck, for all I know he was working on four different computers at once. Or eating lunch at the same time.

The whole process still took three hours, even with Jason performing at warp speed. I could do nothing but sit and marvel. In the end the machine was purged and polished--and it works a whole lot better now.

But as I watched this happen, I had to remember that I grew up in a pre-computer world. When I was in high school, we took a field trip to Bell Labs in New Jersey, where we were awed by their cutting-edge technology. I took the first "computer science" class my high school offeredBand there wasn't even a computer at the school, so we had to travel to a nearby college to spend a couple of hours a week, mostly waiting for our turn to use the keypunch machine, and if we were lucky, to get one run of our program. The "textbook" was a mimographed copy, unbound (and I still have it, an antique now).

And here I was whining that my home computer is a little sluggish accessing a few million people and websites. What a world we live in!

Stumbling Toward Windows 7

Sandra Parshall

Why does every new version of Windows feel like a major life change? How did a piece of computer software acquire the power to thoroughly disrupt my existence?

In the past I’ve “upgraded” (ha!) Windows only when forced to, and the purchase of a new computer with Windows already installed was always involved. I became acquainted with Microsoft’s product back in the 1980s when my first PC, an IBM that ran on DOS and didn’t even have a hard drive, began to feel hopelessly inadequate. The first version of Windows I owned ran on an 80 MB hard drive and left plenty of room for other things. How quaint that seems now.

One by one, my subsequent computers failed as computers inevitably do, and I had to adapt to a new version of Windows with each purchase of a new system. My Windows 98 computer lasted longer than most, and I expected to stay with it until it died. Then we gave up our DSL phone line in favor of FIOS (a waste of money, in my opinion, but that’s another story). My husband’s computer was newer and had XP on it, and it could handle FIOS internet service. My computer couldn’t even connect to the in-house network. I bought a new one, and I liked Windows XP from the start.

When Vista arrived, I heard and read all the complaints about the behemoth that ate disk space and files indiscriminately, and I was happy to stay with XP. Then my motherboard died. Replacing it on an “old” computer didn’t seem worthwhile, so I gave in and bought a new machine with Vista on it. Oy. What a mess. What a headache. Inexplicable system crashes. Inexplicable program crashes. Software incompatibility (even between new and earlier versions of Microsoft programs). Lost files. Lost patience. Lost temper.

I couldn’t go backward, though, without wiping my hard disk and starting from scratch with a new install of XP and everything else, and the very thought gave me a headache. I waited for The Next Big Thing from Microsoft. Beta testers didn’t like what they were seeing and predicted that Win7 would be another disaster, but I figured nothing could be as bad as Vista.

Friends keep asking me why I don’t buy a Mac. It’s mainly because I don’t want to give up software programs I love that will only run under Windows and I don’t want the chore of converting a lot of files. My word processor, Lotus Word Pro for Windows, is dear to my heart. It has features I haven’t seen elsewhere, and whenever I’m forced to use Word or Word Perfect, I’m reminded again how much easier Word Pro is. I’ll put up with Windows to keep Word Pro.

As last week's Windows 7 release date approached, the opinions of the testers shifted. Windows 7 was suddenly something that everyone MUST have.

I wish I could have bought it, installed it, and moved on. Unfortunately, my hard drive has been making odd clicking sounds off and on. I don’t know what the source of the noise is, but I know it’s bad news. I decided to change hard disks, then install Windows 7.

I’d once had CompUSA copy the entire contents of an old hard drive onto a new, bigger, faster one, but CompUSA is gone now and I thought I’d handle the transfer myself this time. I read articles about cloning, printed out instructions from the internet, downloaded cloning software. With a trip to Bouchercon coming up, though, I changed my mind. I would have the Staples tech service do all the tedious work while I was away. I talked to a guy at Staples who said yeah, they could do that. Well, they couldn’t. Or wouldn’t. Once they had my computer in their possession, they said that cloning a hard disk was illegal, a violation of copyright, and couldn’t be done. Never mind that Vista itself includes a utility, however cumbersome, for just this purpose.

I was back where I started. I could hire a rent-a-geek, but to heck with techies. I would do it myself. I re-read all the articles and instructions, giving myself pep talks.

I can do this.

Yes, I can.

I haven’t even started yet, and I’m a nervous wreck.

I’m not having major surgery or moving to another state. Those events would be relaxing by comparison. I’m doing something much more nerve-wracking: installing a new version of Windows, entrusting all the precious data on my computer to software I’ve never used before. If I suddenly drop off the edge of the online world, you’ll know it didn’t go well. Please send your teenage kid to rescue me and my computer!

How do you handle upgrades? Are you a Windows sufferer or a Mac snob? How many computers have you owned, and do you remember your first one?

STICKY NOTES

By Lonnie Cruse

I’ve been working on the fifth in my Metropolis Mystery Series in fits and starts. Mostly fits. More on that in a later blog, but it seemed as if I kept butting my head against my personal writing wall because of ideas, problems, questions, etc that often attack me when I’m typing, slowing down the flow of words, and sometimes shutting it off completely.

I remembered hearing about writing programs that had little computerized Sticky Notes the author could use in order to keep up with ideas or problems. I thought about getting that program, but realized the Sticky Notes would probably be limited to when I was writing a manuscript. Why not see if there were any free computer Sticky Notes I could download which would sit on my computer’s desktop? I could use such notes not only for my writing but for any personal notes I wanted to keep handy. I’d noticed that the real sticky notes on my real desk had a habit of disappearing, or getting sloshed with coffee or soda, or my hubby would write his own notes on there with mine which meant I couldn’t toss them when I was done, so they cluttered up my desk. Sticky notes on my computer desktop would be perfect.

I did an online search for Sticky Notes, came up with some at: http://www.sticky-notes.net/ and downloaded the free ones. The site has more sophisticated Sticky Notes, some with alarms that sound to remind one of important items. Those cost money, so I stuck with the freebies.

I fiddled around with them and discovered I can make the notes small enough so that only the title shows as a reminder, and they don’t take up much room on my computer desktop. My real desk is, um, well, a teensy bit neater. And I can “lock” the notes so they don’t accidentally get deleted.

The biggest bonus I’ve discovered is how Sticky Notes help me when I’m working on a manuscript. As I said, sometimes I’m typing happily along and I hit my personal writing wall. Maybe I can’t remember the name of a minor character I introduced in chapter three and need to bring back in chapter eighteen. Hey, I can’t remember my own name some days. The sticky note with my character list is right where I need it. Or I realize I need to beef up a character, insert more information about him or her in earlier chapters, or drop a red herring somewhere. But I don’t want to leave the scene I’m working on to go back and search for the perfect spot to slide in that information, so I make a quick note in the current story Sticky to remind me to do it later. Maybe I discover I know zilch about a particular subject I’m including in the current scene (What does the basement of a certain local hotel look like? How long would it take my character to recover from a particular injury? What medical procedures would be used to heal same? Things like that.) so I type a quick note in the story Sticky to remind me to do the research when I’m not deep into writing a scene.

Having the ability to type a quick note into a Sticky on my computer desktop to remind me of what I need to do later has taken the fear of forgetting something important off my shoulders and allowed me to continue typing the scene I need to be in, knowing I can deal with any problems in my work-in-progress at a more convenient time. It helps keep me from getting “blocked.” And if you hang around here, I plan to tackle the subject of “writer’s block” at least from my perspective in a future blog post.


Meanwhile, if you need a quick way to jot down notes and reminders when working, notes that aren’t as likely to get lost on your desk, you might want to try Sticky Notes