Rather, I should say my computer is not working. I was the one having the meltdown!!
Best news is, I can take my old computer hard drive in to them next week and they will retrieve all my data. Not my programs, but at least the data that I need-tons of client programs, fitness routine client’s music mixes, not to mention story drafts, my second draft edits (because I did finally start on my 2nd draft yesterday, btw!!) and of course photos, music etc.
You forget all that you had saved on your computer until you lose it! I also never realized how many bookmarks and saved passwords that I used till I’m on the internet on a new computer.
It will take some work getting all my programs onto the laptop, and to restore all my old bookmarks and passwords, but I’m grateful because I feel like I have a fresh start.
Here’s to new beginnings! š
Sandra Wickham's Blog 
As you can’t have a mirror drive in a laptop, I would suggest investing in thumbsticks. You could have one solely dedicated to your writing, one for your clients and one for your health/nutrition programs and one for family stuff. They are not that expensive and a lot easier to update than discs. It also means that should you have a crash you will not have lost anything and can proceed immediately with the new workstation without paying an arm and a leg for retrieval.
Oooooh, I’m gonna yell at you now. You need to have a multiple-level backup plan!! What would you have done if the files were NOT recoverable? I have a subscription to carbonite.com (which backs up to a remote server), plus I do weekly backups to an external hard drive, and when I’m doing writing work, I do daily backups of the pertinent files to a thumb drive.
Not having a system for backing up your files is like… working out and then eating a whole cheesecake!!!
Now that I’ve yelled at you… Congrats on the new laptop, and I’m glad that you’re able to save your files!
I back all my work onto flash drives. You can buy them anywhere. 1 gig of memory can run you $15. And the site below was suggested to me after my computer crashed New Year’s Day last year.
http://delicious.com/
Also, laptops can crash too. I would suggest purchasing the operating disks for the system. You should have an address or website on the manual. Good investment.
Thanks-sounds like a great idea…uh, what are thumbsticks? Are those like the little flash drives?
Ha ha, thanks. I like the working out and cheesecake analogy…I HAVE learned my lesson! I will definitely check out carbonite.com, but I suddenly have the urge to eat cheesecake! š
I think the flash drives would be a great idea. Thanks for the link.
Operating disks…in case a crash happens you can then reboot or try and fix it, correct? Great idea.
Sorry, shouldn’t use slang. The little usb drives that plug into ports on pcs and laptops. The come in various sizes according to how much room you want on them.