PATIENCE IS A VIRTUE!

By Shirley M. Carolan

This month, the old adage "Patience is a Virtue," combined with Murphy’s Law was brought home to me with a vengeance! It has been several years since I’ve invested in a new computer system. But I was fed up with my HP crashing all the time and getting it overhauled, so I decided it was time to bite the bullet and invest in a new system. I wanted something I could depend upon and was not overly concerned with getting all the latest bells and whistles.

Not being a techie, I enlisted the aid of a friend to help me research best buys and compatability with the type of usage I would give it. That certainly speeded up the process and saved some valuable time. After deciding upon what, and where to buy it, I brought my new system home full of enthusiasm. Connecting everything, I was sure, would not be a problem, since I’d purchased many computers over the years and never had a problem hooking up all the cables and cords to the various hardware.
Alas, that was my first mistake! I assumed that was all I needed to do and voila I would be up and running and enjoying my new computer and software (including Microsoft Windows Vista). Three weeks later and many frantic calls to India for help (Hewlett-Packard outsources its on-line help to folks in India) I am finally up and but not as completely running as I would like to be.

Murphy’s Law took over from the time I installed the first cable. Glitches that Microsoft, Hewlett Packard, my ISP, the phone company, etc. could not help me with I learned on my own by trial and error! For example, when I went to establish my Internet connection I used the Area Code, as well as the number, that my ISP had given me to connect to. This was the biggest mistake of all! Everyone insisted it was a "working number" and couldn’t figure out why I was getting an error message and could not connect to the Internet. It seems I didn’t need to type in the Area Code in order to connect to the Internet, just the telephone number! In pure desperation I figured this one out. But, multiply that glitch by 10 more and you have some idea of the daunting tasks I faced.

Another serious glitch was that the hard drive had not been configured to allow me to save my work to a CD drive. All indications were that I had a C, D, F, G. and H drive but no E drive! I struggled to find a solution on my own. Another fatal mistake ... Meanwhile, I was saving all my hard work and documents to the C drive expecting a solution to miraculously appear.

Would you believe that on my final call to India and Hewlett Packard help, I ended up losing three week’s of work? The hard drive had to be reconfigured to include the E drive (the one that allows CDs to be written to). Why this was not done before it left the factory I will never know! Sadly, there are some files and emails that I will never recover, including all my latest blog posts.

These are but a few of the things that can sorely test one’s patience. Of course, I had some choice words to say about my new system but they are gradually fading from memory. It has taught me that gone are the days when you can bring home a new computer, monitor, printer, etc. and just plug it in, register it, and expect everything to work just fine.

Today, you have to be a lot more savvy about software, drivers, updates, and whether your new system can accept your "old" software, whether you can upgrade it, or whether, heaven forbid, you have to purchase all new software. For a non-techie like myself, this is quite a daunting task. My last system dates back to the "Dark Ages" of 2002. At the time I had purchased MS Office 2000 Professional and was very happy with it. Of course, the new system (MS Vista Home Edition) does not accept it, and it only came with MS Works and Notepad, no MS Word. Right now I am not in a mood to upgrade, although I know eventually I will have to. But, I did upgrade my WordPerfect software on my "old" PC sufficiently that it will work with MS Vista! Yippee! I grew up with WordPerfect in the early 1980's. It’s a wonderful software package and has Quatro Pro, etc. I intend to relearn everything I’ve forgotten about this wonderful software, including saving/sending documents with file endings that others can open!

Take that Microsoft and Mr. Gates! My patience and confidence have been restored!

Shirley M. Carolan
Speaker/Writer/Coach
Carolan Communications
Phone/Fax: 760-732-0663
carolcom@qwestinternet.net
www.shirleycarolan.com
http://carolan'scorner.blogspot.com