Friday, January 16, 2009

Intrepid

I love the word "intrepid." I'm going to live intrepid this year - fearless and bold.

I started by taking my laptop apart. I only just got a cell phone this year, and when video tapes came out, I tried flipping them over to get the other side. Ditto CDs. I am not intuitively adept when it comes to the new technologies.

A couple weeks ago, my 2002 iBook stopped working. According to the folks at the Genius Bar (when you buy a Mac, you get access to the Genius Bar at their stores for free - personal expert trouble shooting for your device), either the logic board or DC in-board failed, but the hard drive was intact. All I needed to do was remove the hard drive and connect it to a reader - how hard could it be? But, the Apple store clerk looked dubious when I suggested that I might do it myself.

Taking the iBook apart was incredible. I had to buy a slick case of little tools, and special order something called a spudger. Including the reader, it cost me less than $50. There was a detailed, diagrammed set of instructions on-line for me to follow. It was so easy! Saved beaucoups bucks and was hugely entertained besides.

The only point at which I thought I could be out of my depth was when a store clerk saved me from wrecking the hard drive (the first reader didn't work and had to be replaced). I had the drive in a plastic bag, where static could build up and corrupt the data. And I was touching it. Hard drives are not for touching, evidently. He initially couldn't get the drive to mount. I told him to hush when he suggested it was damaged - bad juju. After another moment, the drive mounted and there it was - years of correspondence and writing - saved. I think my techno-phobia has been vanquished.

Now, I just have to figure out what to do with all those iBook parts.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Anything you can do with a spudger has got to be entertaining. Conratulations!