Brave new world!

[Dry Rot]

I have just spent the last four days glued to the computer. In my utter stupidity, I installed an SSD to replace the CD/optical drive on my 2010 27" iMac (that's new equipment to me) and was feeling rather smug about it as it required major surgery (to the Mac). I also did a fresh install of Safari, added an external SSD drive and attempted to do a Time machine back up. Then my troubles began!

No wonder our younger generation are suffering an epidemic of mental health issues. I won't bore you with the catalogue of problems these "improvements" have served up but the climax came when I decided to open Word and cut-and-paste an address. That's all. Hardly major programming. Ha! Every time I leave my desk for 20 seconds, I return to a pop up demanding my password. I can't use Word because that's disappeared and if I try to download a fresh copy I'm told it's free but I might just as well download the 'suite' while I'm at it as it's only £399.99 and I can claim my money back anyway, so it's free. (OK, bit of journalistic licence there, but you get the idea). I can't just download free stuff any more, but have to join their 'club'. So I switched on my ancient 32-bit Mac Po running Lion and achieved exactly what I wanted within about 30 seconds! (There's a pop up just appeared on the iMac again demanding yet another password! Security gone mad!).

Thank you, guys, for letting me have a rant. I think I'll take the dogs out and go and have a word with a horse. One day someone is going to invent something simple that just works. Of course, they'll improve it and screw it up and we'll be back to square one again.

 

[Kidds]

Security gone mad

More often than not the security on my devices does nothing more than keep me out. Given the choice I would opt out and just accept the risk, some times I would gladly hand the bloody things over as its easier.

 

[farmerm]

Upgrades on a ten year old PC Sad truth it is would surely be better on the wallet and your sanity to simply bin it! A new machine might have cost you 2 days work, 1 day setting it up and still left you change for a day trip to the beach and an ice cream.

 

[Dry Rot]

Upgrades on a ten year old PC Sad truth it is would surely be better on the wallet and your sanity to simply bin it! A new machine might have cost you 2 days work, 1 day setting it up and still left you change for a day trip to the beach and an ice cream.

Ah! The innocence! Have you seen the price of a new Mac? It makes my eyes water just to think about it!

 

[Dry Rot]

More often than not the security on my devices does nothing more than keep me out. Given the choice I would opt out and just accept the risk, some times I would gladly hand the bloody things over as its easier.

During my bout of stupidity, I thought the answer might be to just hit return when it asked me to make up a password, so just leaving a blank space. That worked fine until "they" discovered a "breach of security" and demanded I change it. Of course, I had to type in the 'previous password' which was a blank space....so it asked again...and I repeated the process...finally had to phone Support. Still getting problems. If it works, I am quite happy with obsolete.

 

[farmerm]

Ah! The innocence! Have you seen the price of a new Mac? It makes my eyes water just to think about it!

I agree, a new Mac is probably better than a new PC but a new PC is far better than an obsolete Mac

 

[Av Gorritt]

Most of my computer problems are self - inflicted too.

 

[steveR]

I am still working up enough courage to make the transition from a W7 PC to a W10 machine...

The old W7 is now in need of a major clean out, so ahrdly woth teh effort.

 

[Oliveau]

I have just spent the last four days glued to the computer. In my utter stupidity, I installed an SSD to replace the CD/optical drive on my 2010 27" iMac (that's new equipment to me) and was feeling rather smug about it as it required major surgery (to the Mac). I also did a fresh install of Safari, added an external SSD drive and attempted to do a Time machine back up. Then my troubles began!

No wonder our younger generation are suffering an epidemic of mental health issues. I won't bore you with the catalogue of problems these "improvements" have served up but the climax came when I decided to open Word and cut-and-paste an address. That's all. Hardly major programming. Ha! Every time I leave my desk for 20 seconds, I return to a pop up demanding my password. I can't use Word because that's disappeared and if I try to download a fresh copy I'm told it's free but I might just as well download the 'suite' while I'm at it as it's only £399.99 and I can claim my money back anyway, so it's free. (OK, bit of journalistic licence there, but you get the idea). I can't just download free stuff any more, but have to join their 'club'. So I switched on my ancient 32-bit Mac Po running Lion and achieved exactly what I wanted within about 30 seconds! (There's a pop up just appeared on the iMac again demanding yet another password! Security gone mad!).

Thank you, guys, for letting me have a rant. I think I'll take the dogs out and go and have a word with a horse. One day someone is going to invent something simple that just works. Of course, they'll improve it and screw it up and we'll be back to square one again.

Oh for the good old days of the pencil & back of the fag packet! But of course nobody smokes these days……..

 

[som farmer]

just learnt how to get a photo, from my phone, newish, to laptop, and get it on to here. I felt l had really achieved something, alas, no one else did ! I am ok, as long as the computer does what l think it should, usually ok, but panic when not !
Paypal is a right pain, keeps asking for verification, that's fine, they send code to mobile, we don't get a signal at home, and l am disabled, so cannot run a 100m to where we do get an effing signal.

 

[Dry Rot]

just learnt how to get a photo, from my phone, newish, to laptop, and get it on to here. I felt l had really achieved something, alas, no one else did ! I am ok, as long as the computer does what l think it should, usually ok, but panic when not !
Paypal is a right pain, keeps asking for verification, that's fine, they send code to mobile, we don't get a signal at home, and l am disabled, so cannot run a 100m to where we do get an effing signal.

Yes, the modern world is for the young. And they are like an earlier poster who thinks if it's over three years old, time to throw it out...and then wonder why the landfill sites are filling up. I resisted getting a mobile phone until finally forced to it. They are no use to me as I'm deaf and can't hear them anyway. Call blocker on the landline catches most of the nonsense. If they can't read and write, I am not sure I want to know them!

 

[Av Gorritt]

Oh for the good old days of the pencil & back of the fag packet! But of course nobody smokes these days……..

That's a bit like saying "I'd horsewhip him -- if I had a horse ! "

 

[steveR]

I am still working up enough courage to make the transition from a W7 PC to a W10 machine...

The old W7 is now in need of a major clean out, so ahrdly woth teh effort.

It is the ballache of all the transferring/re-installing of old, but still wanted programs, etc... along with the data that comes with them!

 

[Dry Rot]

It is the ballache of all the transferring/re-installing of old, but still wanted programs, etc... along with the data that comes with them!

Probably easier on a PC. Macs definitely have built in obsolescence. Can't fault the woman who explained about upgrading etc. but it's not so easy for old brains with the memory span of a gnat.

 

[Cowabunga]

I upgraded my ten year old [mid 2011] iMac a while ago by simply giving it 8GB extra RAM to make 12 in all. Massive improvement.
A couple of weeks ago I decided to clear its hard drive, or at least the OSX side of the partition [it has Bootcamp Windows on the other], because all its files are duplicated on my 2020 iMac and backed up to an external drive and to the iCloud anyway.
So I did the format, or tried to. Had to scratch my head a bit but decided to reset the VRAM and it went fine after that. No issues except that it tried reload files from iCloud, so had to go into System Preferences to stop that. Works like a dream.

On the other new iMac I have an issue with an external SSD that holds my Photos album of some 700GB. Got a redundant 2TB drive that was previously used on the old Mac to download copies of my photographs, which took a while due to slow bank holiday 4G internet, but fine now.

Nothing is easy and nothing ever was easy. The past was the worst. Different age, different problems.

 

[Av Gorritt]

It's all double Dutch to me

 

[Lazy Sod]

I am still working up enough courage to make the transition from a W7 PC to a W10 machine...

I changed from W7 to W10 last year. If you also add Classic Shell, W10 looks like W7. I found it quite easy.

 

[Dry Rot]

It's all double Dutch to me

Technology might be advancing but they are losing the ability to communicate. Modern man seems quite unable to tell a story to get the message across. Many writers are paid per word, so we just get a lot of unintelligible verbage instead of an intelligent explanation.