It’s a goner!
Saturday, 24 January 2009 21:11 GMT | 8 comments
SUDDENLY, after five years and some of flawless operation, the computer refused to boot.
The hard disk looks fine, and I may be able to recover the data (it’s a good thing that I have been replicating all of it onto an external disk for the past few weeks). There are other bits that are worth salvaging; the still-decent GeForce 6800FX, for example.
Just when I was starting to enjoy this computer as a graphics workstation, what with the new printer, scanner, Wacom tablet, and new workflow. I am tempted by a Dell XPS M1330 with Ubuntu Linux 8.04, but in the meantime the aging D610 will have to do — the MacBook Pro has been taken over by Pris.
Eddy.
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I wish I had as much free time as you do. If I had the time (and money), I would have gone the DSLR way and shooting RAW, thus requiring more powerful equipment.
Comment by Patrick Ng — Sunday, 25 January 2009 03:00 GMT #
Since you’ll be using Ubuntu, will it be cheaper for you to build your own workstation rather than buying the XPS?
Comment by Patrick Ng — Sunday, 25 January 2009 03:02 GMT #
Just a thought – why do you not build your own box instead buying the XPS? (Is it that customisable?)
Too bad your computer gave its last breath.
:( *moment of silence…and no beeping!*
I look forward to reading about your new box :) Oh, and build yourself a NAS.
Comment by Shah — Sunday, 25 January 2009 06:46 GMT #
@Patrick – I don’t have that much time to be building my own machine. I work about 10 hours everyday and only have the week-ends to myself. As you may know, fiddling with computer hardware is not my idea of relaxing :-) I prefer to spend my free time doing my photography stuff. (After 10 hours of coding every week-day, I don’t want to do it on my own time these days.)
With a proper workflow, and knowing that you don’t have to process every single picture, working with RAW files is not that time-consuming.
@Shah – The Dell XPS M1330 is a laptop. If you configure it with Ubuntu 8.04 on the Dell store, it will cost less than if bought with Windows.
But, having said that, I have reconsidered. I will stick to the D610 for the moment, upgrading it with some extra RAM (and perhaps with a second battery). The old hard disk will be put in a NAS casing and sync’ed with the external one.
After all, running Linux, the D610 is quite snappy.
Eddy.
Comment by Eddy — Sunday, 25 January 2009 10:22 GMT #
I can certainly understand your point of view. Remember the days when I was reformatting my PC almost once a week? Nowadays, this is the last thing I want to do. In fact, the first thing I did when Sheron bought a Toshiba notebook was to buy Norton Save and Restore so that I could do incremental disk cloning. My week-ends are devoted to my studies. It’s a good thing I have fun with my studies :-) Unfortunately, in Canada, there is not much difference between a Dell with Windows and the same Dell with Ubuntu. That being said, Dell computers generally last for a long time.
Comment by Patrick Ng — Sunday, 25 January 2009 14:15 GMT #
@Shah – On second thought, a NAS casing costs more than a network-enabled hard disk! It’s more cost-effective to buy one of the latter in my case. I have the data replicated on my external hard disk anyway.
Eddy.
Comment by Eddy — Sunday, 25 January 2009 15:46 GMT #
Experience the same thing a few days ago on my IBM clone. I simply switched the RAM to another slot and everything worked ok again. You can also try to flash the BIOS.
Well you might not as well, its the ideal occasion to acquire a brand new one. :P
Comment by Kailash — Sunday, 25 January 2009 20:12 GMT #
@Kailash – I reflashed the BIOS, then other problems cropped up. POST kept complaining about CPU overclocking causing a failure, and resetting the CMOS did not help. A few times, Linux booted, whence I verified that the data was still there, but since this happens rather randomly, I can only count the machine as dead.
You’re right, it’s the ideal occasion for acquiring new gear. I was out shopping today and was seduced by an HP Pavillion all-in-one package. I liked the small form factor of the CPU unit (with card readers on the front panel and a slot for plugging in a 2.5″ HDD) and am now thinking of getting a more recent model together with a network-enabled HDD for backup.
Why an all-in-one? Because choosing the components for a new computer has become so tedious and futile (by the time they are delivered, updated versions have become available) that I would rather not waste energy doing that and instead would just pick a ready-made one from the shop.
Eddy.
Comment by Eddy — Sunday, 25 January 2009 21:11 GMT #