I think my computer's gonna die soon

[Hilly]

My computer is five years old, and getting very quirky. I might be able to reformat again, but it's a Dell, and what a pain in the a$$ to reformat, and then reinstall all the drivers and programs and..... well, you know.... STUFF. Yesterday I got some sort of error message, and it sounded as if the hard drive was stuck or something. I'm not complaining though, I've been thinking about a new computer for a couple of years now. My question is this: If I copy the files I want to save such as my favorites, all the info I've collected on leatherwork, and all my photos onto an external hard drive, will they be safe on the external hard drive if my computer goes kaput? Also, if I do have to get another computer, do I have to get Windows Vista? Can I get preloaded Windows XP? Does Windows Vista recognise all the files from my old computer? Will I have to buy another subscription to certain programs I downloaded (such as password manager, etc.)?

Just starting to think ahead a little. Hope I'm not a day late and a dollar short.

Edited March 31, 2009 by Hilly

[tashabear]

Yes, all your stuff will be safe on the external, as long as you make sure that you have really copied the files, and not just made shortcuts pointing back to the file's location on the dying hard drive. I use external hard drives for my music and video files, and they work like a charm.

I'd like to say no, you don't have to get Vista, but do bear in mind that I don't believe XP is supported by Microsoft anymore. Whether or not XP is available to you depends entirely on who you buy it from. Tiger Direct, for example, has lots of XP Pro desktops and laptops. As for whether your files will be recognized under Vista (if you get a Vista machine), that depends on what type of files they are. Image files (.jpg, .gif, .png), text files (.txt), those will be fine. Programs, not so much.

[rdb]

Hilly..backup to your external for sure! NOW!

New machines generally have Vista right now. You can still get XP, but why bother. It is no longer going to be upgraded by MS. The new Windows 7 will be out (End of Summer/Fall?). There are a few stop gap measures you can take to put off the purchase til MS7.

For a hundred or less, you can buy a new hard drive for your old PC. Download a cloning/backup software, open source and free. Backup entire operating system and files from your present XP to your external. Put new hard drive in. Restore from your external to new hard drive. If your PC is okay mechanically, the new hard drive will now contain everything the way it was, including drivers, only working.... If by some chance it is not your hard drive that's the problem, and the PC is kaput, the extra hard drive you can put aside and use in your new one you buy for more storage.

You might give a chance to Ubuntu. It would be a good time to learn about it. Download it to your external. Install it on your PC. Then play with until it's time to buy a machine with MS7. Or keep it once you've discovered the joys of a free operating system, and software.

I can build and repair any of them from PC to server, but the last time this happened to me, I just went out and bought an HP laptop for less than I could build one. It has Vista with all its quirks, but I put Ubuntu on my old one, so I have the best of both worlds.

Before you do anything...close your eyes, and think of puppies.....a smile always starts a project off best...lol

[HorsehairBraider]

I had to do this same thing and for the same reason - old computer, and I was terrified I'd lose all my files. I decided I should just go ahead and get a new computer, since I absolutely could not face losing all my files.

The place I got my new computer was happy to transfer everything to the new computer. Also, they said I could "upgrade" and have XP so I paid a few dollars extra and got that. I don't even think they charged me for transferring the data, nice guys.

Since I had been stressing out about saving my files, my mother sent me a little device called "Clickfree" that backs up your computer... you just plug it in and it backs everything up, you unplug it and there it is. It's about the size of a pack of cigarettes. Here's a link to their site. Seems pretty easy. Even though all my stuff got transferred by the computer guys, I am thinking of the future with this Clickfree thing. Now I won't have to worry... I guess you just back it up once a month or so and then even if something horrible happens you still have your data.

[Johanna]

If I copy the files I want to save such as my favorites, all the info I've collected on leatherwork, and all my photos onto an external hard drive, will they be safe on the external hard drive if my computer goes kaput?

Yes. Unplug the external when not in use just to be safe.

Also, if I do have to get another computer, do I have to get Windows Vista? Can I get preloaded Windows XP?

You can still get XP, but why??? It's going to be obsolete soon, and the support is not there from either MS or the software developers. I've been using Vista now for awhile, and I like it (ducks at the rocks thrown at me!) Seriously, I notice the differences when I use my laptop (old faithful XP Pro) and I like Vista better. I hear Windows 7 is even better.

Does Windows Vista recognise all the files from my old computer?

Yes. You can even buy a transfer cable for about $40 and use the files and settings transfer wizard in Vista to make your new computer pretty much what your old one was. I did that for my mom, and was amazed that her programs still worked, her file system remained intact and it didn't forget to move her address book, favorites, stored email, etc. It was easy, and it worked perfectly. If you decide to do this, you need to keep the old comp running until you have the new one out of the box.

Will I have to buy another subscription to certain programs I downloaded (such as password manager, etc.)?

Probably not. If you have a downloads file with those programs, just make sure you transfer it and reinstall the programs. You may need to reenter keys, and if you don't remember them you can usually request them to be resent- those things are tied to email addresses, not the specific computer.

Unsolicited advice:

If you can, buy a computer that has a real cd/dvd of the OS (operating system) not a little recovery partition. If you have to repair the computer (or replace the hard drive) it's handy to have the disk. When people ask me for help picking out a computer, I go to www.tigerdirect.com . I have probably purchased 50 systems there in the past year, and only had one or two incidents where something needed returned. The customer service is outstanding, and the whole process was painless. I've never had a problem collecting a rebate from them either. If you buy a Vista computer, get enough memory (at least 2 gigs). You can always upgrade hard drive space and optical reader/writers in the future (cd/dvd drives). XP liked memory, Vista NEEDS it.

HTH

Johanna

[TwinOaks]

A neat little thing about some of the linux o/s distributions is that they can run from a "live cd". That means that the whole operating system can run independently from the hard drive on the computer. My personal preference is PCLinux/OS. I have a live cd of it and have used it to fix some issues on my decrepit old desktop. Once running, you can use it to access the files on the hard drive (presuming that it isn't fried) and relocate them to the external drive. So, if it's the operating system that's having a problem, you can still recover files.

Once you back up everything, you might try to do (or have done) a detailed "cleaning" of the old computer, including the registry.

[hivemind]

There is no need to move to Vista, and I don't blame you if you don't want to. I deploy probably 10-15 PCs at businesses every month, and I have NEVER deployed a Vista PC. Not a single one of our 200+ business customers plans to move to Vista. And why would they? Windows XP works great after all these years of patching, and Microsoft is going to continue to release security patches for XP until 2014: http://support.microsoft.com/lifecycle/?p1=3223

But like others said, move that data ASAP to an external drive, and pick up a new PC soon. If you can find one with XP (even the "downgrade" option), do it.

When you're grabbing your files, remember to get things like your internet favorites and your email in addition to your pictures, music, etc. - and if you're the type of person who keeps a lot of stuff on your desktop rather than in My Documents, don't forget that stuff too!

[dickf]

There is no need to move to Vista, and I don't blame you if you don't want to. I deploy probably 10-15 PCs at businesses every month, and I have NEVER deployed a Vista PC. Not a single one of our 200+ business customers plans to move to Vista. And why would they? Windows XP works great after all these years of patching, and Microsoft is going to continue to release security patches for XP until 2014: http://support.microsoft.com/lifecycle/?p1=3223

I couldn't agree more. In the past years, I've had the opportunity to run XP, Vista, Ubuntu, RedHat, etc etc, and can tell you with great accuracy that the Vista OS has been the biggest trouble in our IT environment, and thusly not used. It does appear that Win 7 might be a viable alternative to Vista, particulary because it's hardware requirements and it;s supposedly a less-resource intensive OS.

Windows 7 system requirements

• 1GHz processor (32- or 64-bit)

• 1GB of main memory

• 16GB of available disk space

• Support for DX9 graphics with 128MB of memory (for the Aero interface)

• A DVD-R/W drive

• src - http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-7/beta-faq.aspx

I've been running OSX for a while now and suggest looking into a Mac platform, as well. I run boot camp (Windows XP) when I need to and enjoy a low-stress environment in OS X the other 90% of the time. Not having to worry about worms, viruses, etc is also nice.