Critter Alley

Critter Alley

Sunday, June 21, 2015

My Computer is Lonely














We get all kinds of messages on our computers. Great news, interesting news, cute stories. However, there's one bit of news we never want to get:

Warning: back up your computer, hard drive failure is imminent

Guess who got that news last week? If you guess me, you're right. Luckily I backed up all my manuscripts over a week ago. This consisted of me emailing all my documents to myself. Pretty sophisticated, right?

So here I am, hundreds of dollars and hours of frustration later. I now have a new computer. I like it. I really do. But here's what I don't like. Apparently the new computer and my old printer don't get along. Like a blind date gone awry, they simply are not compatible. So now my next mission is to hunt down a new printer.

I prefer a monochromatic laser printer with scan capabilities. What do you use, love, and adore? Suggestions are welcomed. I need some advice on fixing up my computer with a hot new printer.

10 comments:

Sioux Roslawski said...

Pat--Monochromatic?

We have a HP Office Jet Pro 8600. It scans. It prints. It's wireless. It works despite my screw-ups.

That's all I know about it. I hope you--soon-- get a printer that wants to marry your new computer. Or at least make out with it on a regular basis...

Lisa Ricard Claro said...

Ugh. So sorry you went through that. Stuff like that is always such a frustration. I'm actually in the market for a new printer myself as the old one went kerflewie on me a couple weeks ago. My husband is the official printer shopping guy. I'll let you know what I end up with.

Ann Summerville said...

I have an HP and don't like it. Sometimes it scans, sometimes it doesn't know it's hooked to the computer but apparently Paint does and I can scan through that. In a ploy to make me buy numerous ink cartridges, it asks me to print a page supposedly to adjust something which I never do and it seems fine. I won't buy another HP. by the way for backups I bought a WD My Passport, the software isn't that great at doing scheduled backups but I do manual ones (it holds a lot).
Sorry you've had to deal with it - very frustrating.
Ann

Sketching with Dogs said...

Believe it or not, that exact same thing happened to me a few months ago. My friend got me a hard drive for Christmas and I backed up my whole laptop. About a week later my son spilled a cup of coffee on it and it was ruined. Thank goodness I had backed it up because the whole lot would have been lost.
Glad you did too.
Lynne x

Fireblossom said...

I have no helpful ideas, but good luck!

Tammy said...

I'm so sorry to hear that. Did it work to email everything to yourself? After many catastrophic crashes, I can't live without cloud storage. I can't remember now why I vowed never to get another HP printer, but I know I did. I remember the ink was cheap, but it ran out constantly. Oh! I know what it was. When I called HP to ask them about it, it seems they wanted to charge me just to ask a question. That was when I got an Epson XP-300 that I like. Walmart is the only place I've found the ink so far, but I'm okay with that. I don't know what a monochromatic one is, though. I do have to buy black and the three colors.

Linda O'Connell said...

I can imagine your frustration. I am techno challenged. My advice, call a geek.

Lynn said...

I have a Brother wireless - laser, straight up black ink. I had a colored printer that was also a scanner and a copier and although I liked it and had it a long time, the ink was so expensive. Not that the black and white is much cheaper. The colored printer was an Epson... but it was pretty old when it bit the dust, so it's probably not around any longer. And yes, it is aggravating, so good luck! Oh, and loved the baby raccoon! Oh, so cute!

CreekHiker / HollysFolly said...

Oh! So sorry for your loss! I use HP ink jets and hate them all. I've even been known to chuck them across the yard!

Unknown said...

Oh, Pat, I certainly know how you feel. Hope you learn the new computer and find a printer soon. Oh -- and I use an HP Officejet Pro 8610, just a month old because I too have been having computer/printer problems. The struggles we writers go through...