Frustrating Stuff

 I mentioned previously that I couldn't get my CD player to work and kept thinking it was the wiring.  But then just replaced the CD player with a new one and that fixed it.  

But I then discovered that the glass door in front wouldn't close.  Well, the rack cabinet is really old.  It came here with me, so I suppose it is 40-45 years old.  I had recently had to push it sideways to get it to close the door so I assumed the box itself needed some corner reinforcements, which I put off having more urgent things to do.  

But yesterday, I noticed the small box that connects the optical fiber to the TV cable box was on the floor next the the TV stand.  Well, one of The Mews must have jumped on the cable and pulled it off the stand.  But when I tried to put it back, it wouldn't go back.  One cable was too tight, and I couldn't tell by feel what was wrong.

So I had to pull the stereo rack out.  Well, I'm glad I put the stereo rack on a wheeled support stand, but I have to raise 2 levers in the back to engage the wheels.  Which is not really easy to do.  It involves twisting my body around the sides and that usually results in rib muscle cramps.  And I could feel the muscles threatening to cramp as I did it.  Thankfully, I got the levers raised just before they went full cramp.

When I pulled the rack out, I discovered that some kitty had looped a cable around a lever, effectively shortening it.  I got that loose and got the optical fiber box back on the stand.  Hurray!  And pushed the rack back close to the wall.  Then had to release the wheel levers (another threat to my rib muscles).  

And then the glass door still wouldn't close properly.  Since I was dealing with the rack anyway, I examined the glass door.  At first, I thought it was bumping against CDs I had stacked in there.  But when I took them out, it still wouldn't close.  ARGGHHH!

So I examined the glass door.  Hinge on top and hinge on bottom.  Both were tight, so that wasn't the problem.  So I looked at the hinges with a magnifying glass and a flashlight.  The glass door slides into the hinges and is held in place with 2 screws on each (not touching the glass, but squeezing the metal hinges.

The glass went fully into the top hinge.  The bottom was out of fully in the hinge by just 1/8th inch.  Loosened the screws, pushed on the glass door, and retightened the screws.  I still had to push the top of the rack sideways a tiny bit, but at least it closed!  Good enough for now; I have other things to do.

I'm no real handyman.  A real handyman has experience fixing a lot of stuff over and over.  What I have is persistence.  

It almost sounds like a Murphy's Law (of which I am a dedicated believer).  If you recall that, the basic Law is "If anything can go wrong, it will".  Over the years, other people have added to that Law.  In fact, I have 2 books of "Murphy's Laws".  Some are silly things like "You can't fall off the floor" or serious ones like "If you drop something, it will fall to the most unretrievable place possible" or "No matter what you want to do, you have to do something else first".

I will add a more positive Law.  "If you stare at a problem long enough, you will find a solution.  That's MY motto, anyway.

A Minor Computer Win

1.  I bought a color toner printer 2 years ago.  I don't print often, so the old color ink-jet printer cartridges dried up before being used up.  And at $50 for a whole set of cartridges was annoying.  I read that toner lasts forever, so I bought one.

It has been difficult to use.  Apparently, it is intended for multiple user office use.  I did not know that at the time.  It has many functions and setting designed for office use and you almost have to be an IT person to understand them.  Just getting it to merely print seemed like an insult to it.

I succeeded (sometimes, after struggling), but never knew why.  A few days ago, I wanted to print out my vaccine record (flu, covid and others) from a govt website.  I could NOT make the darn printer print.  I searched all over the commands and settings, to no avail.  

But I noticed one setting that said "network".  I unclicked it.  IMMEDIATELY, it printed out my document. Glory and Hallelujah,  all I had to be was just "myself and no other users".   Two years fighting with it and one click solved it all!

2.  I have a really nice keyboard (dasKeyboard).  The letters seem slightly embossed.  I wear out certain letters on standard keyboards fast, so I appreciate that.  But it uses 2 ports and I struggle with that.  I have an added multiport connector

Not this one, but one like it...  Even that didn't allow all my cables.  But it works for devices not used all at the same time.  So I unplugged the 2 port keyboard from the direct computer connection and moved it to the multi-port.  Obviously, it worked.  And I even (somehow) have a free port.  I haven't figured out the "why" of that yet.

But Yay!  😎

Two problems solved in one day.  Now, if I could get Safari autofill to work, I would be thrilled...

The Computer

Its working, but it wasn't for 3 days at first and I was going nuts.   There is bad news at first, but good news at the end, so keep reading.  

It arrived last week.  I made sure my Time Machine backup had the latest version of the old computer.  Went through the migration process.  Answered all the questions along the way.  Recorded all information it suggested.  It took 9 hours.

Migration is supposed to retain all settings.  For the most part, it did, but for some things it did not.

When the migration process was ended, it said to restart the computer.  That made sense, restart incorporates the old into the new.

When it came back up, it wanted my admin password.  I know my admin password.  But it wouldn't accept it.  I struggled with that the entire next day.  No luck.  The new computer software wouldn't recognize me.  

Hooking my old computer back up, I researched "recover admin password".  By design for security, that is not easy to do, but I did find some instructions about it.  Sadly, none of them made much sense to me (too technical and in terms I didn't understand).  I mean, seriously, "kernal panic"?

I set up the new computer again and tried to follow the recovery instructions.  No luck

I tried sleeping the computer, I tried restarting it, I even unplugged the router to reset it after 2 minutes.  Nothing helped.

I set up the old computer again (which, perversely, seemed to be working fine and made sure I had a new backup.  I disconnected it and set up the new one.  I erased the internal hard drive.  I reinstalled the backup.  No luck.  The new computer would simply not accept my admin password.

I shut it down again.  Let's just say "bad words abounded in the house...

The next day, I started it up again to try and do "safe recovery mode" and other things recommended.  But I tried the same old admin password again first (why not?) and it was accepted!  I have no idea why it was now and not before.

But the new computer is working.  It's not perfect.  I lost all autofills, but I will restore them gradually.  Good news is that it hasn't auto-restarted.  It doesn't get hot in sleep mode.  It wakes up immediately.  It seems to send and receive quickly.  All my bookmarks, files, email and photos are present.  

Time to see if I can FINALLY be able to leave comments on blogs again.  That is the last test and something I have missed doing.  

Fixed Computer Problem

Well, I HOPE I have solved my computer problems (both Mac and Windows actually).

1.  I brought the Mac Mini that won't start to a local computer store today.  They are really a Windows shop, but they will do simple repairs on Macs.  After a half hour, they determined that the CURRENT Mac Mini was not repairable by them.  Some of the spilled wine got inside and shorted out some circuits.  Too complicated and time-consuming to clean and no guarantee that would solve the problem...  They did say they could pop the drive out and migrate it to an external storage device if I provided the device.

And they didn't even charge me for the diagnosis work!

They also advised me not to bother shipping it to an Apple repair store; saying that Apple doesn't actually repair hardware anymore, they just migrate the drive to a new unit and charge you for it.

The OLD Mac Mini I'm limping along with right now is making fan noises (which assures that it will fail soon).  And it is SLOW (well it IS a 2010 model).

So I went to Amazon and looked at new ones.  They are all designed for Cloud use, meaning they have less storage on the hard drives.  I'm not ready for the Cloud yet.  So I did a google search for Mac Minis  and found there were more powerful standard Mac Minis.  One site lead me back to Amazon, where they also offer 3rd party "diagnosed, cleaned, renewed" Mac Minis guaranteed by them, 90 day warranty and 3 year repair guarantees (for under $60).

I ordered and renewed Mac Mini with a faster Intell chip, 1 TB storage, and 2x the Ram of my current one.  That should last a while, and it will arrive in 3 days.  Plus I get 5% back using my Amazon Cedit Card!

AND, I got no flak this time requesting to return the underpowered128 GB Mac Mini I bought last month.  They even sent me a free shipping label.

So I am returning a useless new 128 GB Mac Mini at $720 for a fully renewed faster 1 TB one at $560 that will probably serve me well for many years.  I will migrate the OLD Mac Mini I'm using right now to the new one.  And I will have the local computer place copy my drive on CURRENT one that wont start to a 512 GB external drive I saw at Walmart for $50.

That way, I will have all my OLD files saved onto the new one and can pick and choose which newer files to save to it from the CURRENT one.  That's not as complicated as it seems.  I migrated the backup of the CURRENT Mac Mini to the OLD one (which is sort of why it works at all).

So, cheers and drinks all around!

Cat-Blog Comment Problems

I may have A solution for some of us who have been having problems leaving comments on blog sites!!!

As many of you who mostly visit my Mark's Mews cat blog know, I have had on-and-off problems leaving comments at blogs.  It has driven me to distraction sometimes, but mostly, I worry that my blog friends will think I never visit them.  It was so bad that I couldn't even get Preview of my comments to show up, never mind sent.

I kept trying.  Sometimes I could comment for weeks and then suddenly I couldn't.  I don't know about you, but I have Statcounter.  Its a simple free program that shows you some very general data about visitors to your site.  If you recognize a visitor, you can label them so you see a friend's name.

I'm not pushing it.  It has some flaws.  It doesn't recognize every visitor (mobile phones maybe).  But it gives me a general idea of how many people visit the blog.

So, if some of my friends have that too, they see that I visit but never leave comments.  When in fact, I am trying like crazy to do so, sometimes several times at a single site I visit.

I thought I fixed the problem once by switching my feedly.com reading list from Safari to Firefox, and indeed it worked for a while.  But it would always stop in a few weeks.

Recently, I was looking around at some app settings after yet another frequent upgrade from Firefox, and I REALIZED SOMETHING (all caps to get your attention).

My Firefox was a Beta version.  You can tell by clicking on "Firefox" in the upper left corner and then clicking "About Firefox".  That tells you the version you have.  A "b" means Beta. 

I'm generally willing to go with a Beta version for the improvements, but I started to wonder about that.  Betas are not final versions and have flaws.  And also (and I think this is the most important part), other apps haven't adjusted their programming to the Beta version yet.  Apparently, at some point in the past, I agreed to receive Beta versions of Firefox.

Think about that.  My Firefox Beta app is ahead of the regular sites who sometimes have to make some adjustments!  That takes them some time.  And during that time, there may be programmibg conflicts.

And it seemed to me that the last time I updated the Firefox app was just when I stopped being able to comment on blog sites.

I had a hard time finding info on the Firefox Beta Program, but I eventually found a discussion of it by people like me who were trying to get off it.  Firefox didn't make that easy.  It seems they get a lot more information about your usage in the Beta Program than they can if you use the Regular versions.  And they share it with other companies.

I finally figured out that the solution was actually simple.  All you have to do is download their current regular version and move it to your apps folder.  I don't know about Windows, but in Mac it asks you if you want to replace the previous version.  Click YES.  Your bookmarks will transfer and you will be off the Beta Program.

I did that a few hours ago and immediately tried commenting.  I knew the instant I typed in a comment that it was different!    My avatar showed up.  Preview worked.  Publish worked!

My comment went through to the site.  And all I did was change from the Firefox Beta Program to the Regular Program...

I hope that works for anyone sufferring difficulties commenting...

A haiku of joy...

A problem of late
Became a problem no more.
I can comment now.

Hope this helps anyone else as it has helped me.