My Computer Conundrum

My blogging has been pretty slow the past week because I have been without my trusted laptop.  Last week, I turned on my macbook pro laptop and got nothing.  It booted up, but I had no image on the screen.  I did the normal tech support stuff and tried rebooting and resetting and removing the battery, but still got nothing.   I then took my computer to the nearest Apple store in Charlotte.  It’s a 2 hour drive, but at least I got a date-night out of it with Jenni.   The Apple Genius took a look at it and decided they needed to send it off to have the main logic board replaced.  That was about 11 days ago, and I still have no computer.

I was impressed at the Apple store, and I’m glad they decided to send it off.  I’ve seen too many laptops over the years that were messed up by service techs who didn’t know what they were doing.  But Apple threw me a curveball a couple of days ago.  They emailed from the service depot and asked me a big question. They were intrigued by how my laptop died so they wanted their engineering group to study it.  They offered me a brand new macbook pro, straight from the Apple store, as long as they could keep my old computer for research.  The one caveat was that I would have no chance to get any data off my old laptop.

I really struggled with what choice to make.  Either have my 18 month old laptop repaired with all my data intact, or get a brand new one with slightly better specs and have to start over.  I had a decent partial backup from about 3 months ago, but I would have lost quite a few files. SO WHAT DID I CHOOSE ….

I have blogged before about the need to backup your computer (see here)  and I am definitely kicking myself for not having a better backup.  I chose to have my old computer repaired based on the amount of time it would have taken to get a new one back up and running with all my apps and programs.  I missed a pretty good opportunity since I didn’t have a complete backup.  I guess I need to practice what I preach, even when it comes to technology.  It does make me really consider getting either a time capsule or an external hard drive.  You can’t be too careful when it comes to your important info.

and for all you mac-haters out there, I have seen plenty of motherboards go bad on pc laptops as well. The heat from a small case and the vibration from constantly moving them around eventually takes its toll.  It’s just part of life in this digital age.  That’s why you should always get a long warranty on laptops.

Mike

I am a former design engineer who now pastors Cornerstone Community Church in Galax, Virginia. I'm passionate about following Jesus and I love technology. I've been married to Jennifer for 28 years, and we have three adult children.

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1 Response

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    Marshall

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