This weekend I have been reminded why I use computers for so long. For a few months now, I've known that I needed to get a new laptop because mine had become excrutiatingly slow. I didn't feel that it was really worth buying more memory for it, especially since it had so many cracks in that people gasped whenever I brought it out in public.
Setting-up a new laptop with all the programs and settings of my old one, while sometimes fun, is not always something I look forward to. This time turned out not to be too painful though. I transferred all my files from my external hard-drive, which I used to back-up my old laptop. I connected my Netcom modem to my my new laptop and my settings were retrieved and I was online in an instant. That meant I could get on with downloading Firefox. I was pleased.
Then I opened iTunes to see all my music displayed, but to my incredible horror, NONE of my playlists!!! This was a travesty. I could not imagine spending hours re-creating the playlists that I had lovingly and thoughtfully put together over several months. In this day and age, there had to be an easier way, I thought. I searched online for possible solutions. On various discussion boards and websites, I found long-winded suggestions. One proposed exporting the source iTunes library as an XML file, replacing the file paths in the XML file with the destination paths, and deleting redundant files. Too long and tedious! There has to be an easier way. Some suggested using your iPod as a hard drive to move all the files. This made sense, but I already had an external drive so why would I want to use my iPod as one.
When I figured it out, it was so easy and obvious. I had moved all my music files from my external hard drive to my new laptop. However on my old laptop, the files were in the My Music folder. On the external drive they were kept in My Documents. By simply moving the files into the corresponding My Music file on my new computer, all my playlists were kept intact.
The next thing I had to tackle was my bookmarks. I love to bookmark and I have so many. I don't really use any of the social bookmarking tools out there - amazing given how I love to track bits of knowledge. I discovered a Firefox add-on that allows you to transfer your bookmarks to a server and synchronise these bookmarks on multiple computers. Lovely! I had problems synching from my old laptop and nearly pulled my hair out figuring what was wrong, until I realised that it was my highly effective (read: annoying) anti-virus software, Norton. Once I switched it off, I was able to upload my bookmarks, after which I switched Norton back on again.
Ah, I can sigh in relief. This was certainly a productive weekend.
4 comments:
lucky you, you're changing laptops while most of us (at least the people i know) are still on their first.
i certainly don't look forward to "setting up a new laptop", though i guess embracing external hard drive back ups and getting some knowledge on the act would loosen me up.
Norton? why not try Kaspersky!
You this girl too funny o, y you no just call computer expert make them help you do the job, collect small money. Abi you be ijebu? Anyway sha I dey glad say you finally fix am. Me I no fit change my papa dash me laptop O! the money dear small. These days, I no dey bring am out again in public, last time wey I try am, people just begin take cover, e be like say na al-quaeda want strike, the thing just too dey embarass me, but he still dey work. I sure say your old one for better pass my own, abeg make you dash me now, my sister Nkwoma, don dey beg me already for this one, I go see you for office.
Nkem.
Thanks for sharing I enjoyed this one
Ade
adeave2.com/blog
I downloaded a trial version of Kaspersky. So far so good. I found out that it was ranked No. 1 Anti-virus software by PC World.
LOL @ Nkem. No, I am not Ijebu. I just knew that it was something I could do myself and wanted to. To tell you the truth, it never even occured to me to get some to help me out.
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