world backup day

Today is World Backup Day.

Everyday should be World Backup Day. If you aren't backing up your computer files, why? It is easy and necessary. Computers fail. Hard drives crash. Backups help.

One back is good. Two backups is better.

I use Apple Time Machine to back up my computer hard drive every hour. I use SuperDuper! to make a boot drive every night.

My music and movies are on a separate drive. I use SuperDuper! to make a back up every evening.

My photos are on another separate drive. I use SuperDuper! to make a back up every evening. I also backup my photos off-site using CrashPlan. Unlike my music and movies, I cannot get those photos back if they are lost.

What is you backup plan?

computer less. the last day

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I was getting pretty antsy to get back to my computer. I thought about cleaning my desk but never got around to it. I did vacuum to large dust bunnies last week. Even with the computer to distract me, there is plenty for me to do other than what I should do.

I was waiting all day for the call. Dinner came and went. I got an email after 6 telling me that my computer was ready. An email? Sure, OK.

I asked Ryan if I should go since he is almost as anxious for me to get the computer back. “What time will you get home?” I thought I should be back by 7:30. He said OK and I left. I had to wait about 5 minutes for someone to help. They are always busy at the apple store. I was back home at 7:37.

I loaded up my extra ram and booted the iMac. I was expecting a generic computer but they managed to put almost everything on the new drive. I quickly connected all my hard drives and started syncing my iPad. I got a message that I needed to authorize iTunes, so I entered in my password. Only to have another dialogue box say that this computer is already authorized. Silly computer.

I backed and synced the devices and some other maintenance. SuperDuper! is running its backup. And CrashPlan is figuring out what is different as well. Happy.

computer less day 6

I didn't miss my computer much today. I don't use it too much on Sundays. Once my POTD is posted, I rarely go back until eyeing when I plug in my devices.

The stuff I will need to do is piling up. But without a job I will have plenty of time to get it done.

computer less day 5

Ryan was upset that we still don't have the computer back. "I'll never be allowed to sync.” I offered to set up iTunes on his computer using my back up drives. “But that will take too long.” Actually, it won't take long if I just use my boot drive. But he doesn't want me to use his computer. Today he is learning patience. Next we will work on compromise and sharing.

catch up

Saturday is the day I catch up on some computer tasks. I download Year of Icons for the week. I add the week’s worth of photo of the day to the monthly layout. I make a digital card to add to be printed folder.

web transactions

One of my domains was due for renewal. It is registered at NameCheap. I went to 1Password to renew it. I logged in OK but each time I click to renew, I got sent back to login. I went to Safari and logged in. It worked this time and I got to the checkout screen. I chose PayPal knowing it would be less fields to fill in.

blogging

The same problems occur with the SquareSpace app. The iPhone app does not have the option to flip to Markdown. I wanted to try to fix it using the web app but cannot login using cut and paste. I will not enter the long password manually. My bank is the same way. Why do these sites make it more difficult to use safer passwords?

computer less day 3

I am finding it easier to be without a computer only because I know I will have mine back in a few days.

Because I knew I couldn't upload my photo of the day, I didn't even take the shot until 5 pm.

Today I miss being able to order online easily. I use 1Password and it is simple to fill in logins, passwords and credit card information when using a computer. 1Password is available on the iPhone and iPad, but it is not as easy to fill in some of the information. I went to JetPens and found that password field would not accept a copy and paste. My passwords are not easy to remember which is the point of 1Password and I sure didn't want to try to remember that 12 hexadecimal password. Or better yet, write it down so I could type it again into the password field. But I found that if I used the link to JetPens from 1Password, it filled in the information when it got to the page. But how will it work with credit card information?

computer less day 2

There are so many little ways I miss my computer.

music playlists

While I walk, I listen to songs which Tangerine chose for my pace. Tangerine isn't perfect so I rate songs that work well for walking and those that don't. Some don't work at all and I skip them. When I get back home, I look at my walking playlist and remove those with low ratings or skips. While walking this morning, a song came up on shuffle and I didn't like it for walking. I skipped it to go to the next song. I realized that I would not be able to take that out of my walking playlist. Well, I could remove it from my iPhone but what happens when I sync?

tv episodes

I watch TV episodes on my iPad. I purchase episodes through iTunes on my computer and download them there then sync to my iPad. I only keep current seasons that I am watching. On my iPad, I only keep the latest unwatched episode. Two of my current favorite shows are Bones and Castle which air on Mondays. I wasn't able to get the new shows before the computer problems. I decided to try to download to my iPad using wifi. It is a slow process and my iPad 1 tends to crash while in iTunes app.

rss

I use Reeder on my computer and iPad and sometimes on my iPhone. I subscribe to too many feeds. In the morning, the unread count is high and I can go through a lot of feeds quicker on my computer using keyboard shortcuts. Using the iPad is OK but slower.

tumblr

I love to look through tumblr and if I have away for a while, it is best to use the computer. Again, keyboard shortcuts are key. The tumblr app is OK but I miss being able to click on link in another tab. If I go out to safari, then go back to tumblr, it takes me back to the top of the dashboard. It is annoying having the scroll through all the read posts. Tumblr app on my iPad 1 will crash if I try to move it along too quickly.

watching Internet videos

Some videos are just not compatible with iOS. And some are too long or are slow to load. With those I save them to Instapaper to view on my computer. I will have a bunch to view next week. And many will no longer be timely.

computer less

Every evening before I go to bed, I connect my devices to their chargers for the night. I do this at my computer so they can sync at the same time and so that I do not use them in bed.

Monday night, I noticed that SuperDuper! failed to back up my hard drive. I set it to try to copy again but didn't wait to see if it worked. Backing up my hard drive to a boot drive takes a while, about 20 minutes. I wasn't too concerned since I back up nightly and I also have a Time Machine backup. I went to bed.

I got up the next morning to a gray screen. My first thought it is that it was stuck between awake and sleep and needed a nudge. I tried the track pad and tried the mouse. Nothing worked. I had to force shut down my machine. I restarted the iMac and it took forever to boot up. Then it seemed stuck in one of the login items. Force quit was not working so I had to force shut down again. This time I opened in safe mode. It took a while but did get me to the login screen. I tried my account and had the same hang ups. Repeat. This time I logged into my Test account. It seemed to work a little faster since I don't have any start up items. I clicked on safari and it took forever! Force quite took minutes to show up, minutes to allow me to click on anything.

More restarts resulted in the same thing. I tried using Disk Warrior but it ejected the disk when I tried to reboot. I tried resetting PRaM. Finally I took out the added ram and made an appointment with the Apple Genius.

I got my iMac in early 2010 but it is a model introduced in late 2009. A few months ago, there was a recall on those iMacs to replace the hard drive. I did not take it in because I wasn't having any problems. I didn't want to be without a computer for a few days. And the iMac is heavy to haul somewhere. It is only 21.5" and after taking it in Tuesday, I was glad I didn't get the 24". Jonathan was my Apple Store genius. He tried to boot up the computer and then ran diagnostics. He said that the hard drive was covered under the recall and that they would replace it then test to make sure everything worked. He asked if I had a back up. I have two. The bad news is that it would 4-5 days for the repair. Ugh.

The boys noticed right away when they got home from school. They weren't too concerned since their computers work and so does the wifi. Then Ryan remembered that he syncs his iPod on Wednesday mornings. He backs up his iPod and then chooses his music for the week. In typical Ryan fashion, he said he would never be allowed to sync again. I told him that would could sync if I set up iTunes through his computer. He thought about it but didn't want me using his computer. I understand his reluctance and I am doing my best not to need to use his computer. Ryan said he would OK for a week with not syncing.

I miss my computer but am OK with my iPad and iPhone. There are a few things I miss and cannot do on my devices. I cannot use Lightroom nor Photoshop so POTD, Project Life, scrapbooking and cards will have to wait for a few days.