Shiny things!

[thealmondtree]

A week ago I went to turn my computer on and lights flash then... nothing. Not a squeak.

So now instead of a nearly 10 year old w98 box I have a shiny new laptop with winXP (not touching Vista with a barge pole until it settles down some more!). It's amazing how much faster everything is when the limiting factor is the broadband and not the computer. Local fix-it shop diagnosed motherboard failure and put some of the stuff from the hard drive onto disk for me but weren't exactly over helpful so R bought an external box for the old hard drive so we have been able to recover all the data we wanted not just what the computer shop interpreted my instructions to be.

I also have a shiny new portable multi-region DVD player so T can watch without taking up my screen (previously he would watch such things as Thomas the Tank Enging or Pingu or The Wombles (yes really, he's totally fascinated by the original 1970s Wombles) on my computer if I needed to do anything on the computer when he was around). I was surprised at just how difficult it was to get a multi-region player at a sensible price.

Comments

[submarine-bells.livejournal.com]

It's probably a bit late for Helpful Tips, but I've found that most DVD players, even the $50 cheapies, have hidden "unlock codes" that will magically turn them into multi-region dvd players. Just google the brand, model, and "unlock code", and voila! All the unlock codes I've encountered have involved typing some 4 digit number into the remote while the dvd tray is open. It's not a complicated process, and worth knowing if ever you need to multi-region-ise a dvd player again in future.

[thealmondtree.livejournal.com]

As you say, a bit late now. But thanks anyway. That's the sort of thing that just manages not to occur to me.

[bookwyrm40.livejournal.com]

Ouch...motherbord failure! Glad you were able to recover your data though. I've got my old win98 hard drive in my son's win98 computer...we had a motherboard fry too a few years ago. Scared to make the jump to Vista right now too...we rock along with an XP for our main computer too.

[bookwyrm-sr.livejournal.com]

I refuse to let DH put Vista on my machine. Win XP works *just fine* for me.
He can have Vista on his laptop and spend all the time he wants swearing at it.
*snirk*

[thealmondtree.livejournal.com]

That's about where I'm at. DH and I agree that we really, really dodn't want Vista until it's had proper time to settle down.

[gwendraith.livejournal.com]

The new laptop sounds good ;-) Glad that your data was saved.

It's a bit late to tell you this but I got my Phillips DVD player from Tesco for £27. There was an instruction in the handbook on how to unlock the code so that all regions could be played on it. It works perfectly.

[thealmondtree.livejournal.com]

I did look at Tesco but the cheapest portable they had was not very cheap and also out of stock!