Tuesday, October 31, 2006

I have returned from another visit to Cardiff (I wonder if it would be cheaper to buy myself a train season ticket) and yesterday was, in effect the first "normal" day for the better part of a week. And it was good, a quiet day when life got back to normal and I did some cooking and other normal things, all went well. Today, however, has been different, a day of frustration after frustration. And most of it has been my fault.

Yesterday evening I was having some trouble with downloading an audio book and I decided to tidy up the computer system to make it neater and quicker. No problem with the anti-spyware software, I've used it lots and lots of times before. But then I decided to use the software for tidying up Registry keys etc. Then I went to bed. This morning turning on the computer and I got some error messages which just would not depart from the center of the screen. OK, I thought, I know how to deal with this, I've had it before when I've used the registry key cleaner, just have to insert the Microsoft Windows disc into the computer for a couple of seconds and all will be well again. Could I find it anywhere? No. I spent the morning looking for it. It's astounding how many discs one accumulates over the years so I took the opportunity to do a fair bit of "weeding" of those discs I no longer needed. It was during lunch that I suddenly realise that there was another way to sort this problem out: by restoring what the Registry software had removed. And it was sorted out in a matter of minutes.

Then there was the problem I had downloading that audiobook. After e-mailing the Help Desk for the audio book website (ww.audible.co.uk) I got an almost immediate response to say that my surmise that it was because I'd updated my computer to Internet Explorer 7: CopCar had mentioned that it was available and she found it good (see here) so I did it too. I managed to sort the problem out in a few moments once I knew what to do. And the books arrived into my iTunes. Success!

This afternoon I made the mistake of trying to move the Audible Download Manager to my F drive, failing horribly and then failing also to move it back to my C drive. So I've just sent a long e-mail to Audible's Help Desk, long because it all got very complex and I had to expalain just what I did. I am awaiting their response.

I've been sitting at this computer since 9.00am, with breaks for lunch and tea, and at the moment I'm fed up with the sight of it. So I'm turning the whole lot off for the evening and tomorrow I hope I can do some fun things on it as well. Oh, and sorting out the Audible thing too.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

What did you do with all of your time before you got a PC, Val? It's amazing how much of our lives can be absorbed in just doing simple things with our machines. Good luck! Cop Car
P.S. For anyone who installs IE7, you will need to go to the "Tools" icon and click on "Menu Bar" to get back the bar with the familiar "File, Edit, Vie, Favorites, Tools, Help" headers.

Adele said...

CopCar,

Thank you so much for that advice for IE7. It's only been installed on my new p.c. for about 24 hours but I've already followed your advice and it works.

Anonymous said...

Also, and this may just be with my blog provider, when I want to publish a link in my blog, I get a message saying that the machine isn't going to do it. (On my display, the message is in a line above the toolbar that has the stars on it.) Then, by clicking on the message, I am given two options. I don't recall what the 2nd option is, but the 1st is to temporarily allow something to happen (I don't recall what the words are!). I click on the "allow" option and, for the rest of the time I am logged into the blogging service, I am allowed to insert links. We have to give one another these tips to shorten our learning curves!
Cop Car
P.S. I get 5-10 questionable emails each day--mostly from lists that I've signed up for. Actual spam is so well blocked by Earthlink that I get little of it--maybe 1 or 2 per week.

Adele said...

CopCar,

Hmmm, I'm not sure but is this allowing the ActiveX thingy to work? I know I get that message on a bar across my screen when I want to look at some sites.

You are lucky with Spam. It all reaches my p.c. and I use Norton Internet Security to weed the Spam out. Realistically I'm glad I do it that way as sometimes the folder containing the Spam will contain something that isn't and I have the chance to rescue it. (I also remember at work that when an anti-Spam package was introduced it caused major ructions as important work e-mails were weeded out also.)