What's bugging your printer?

In a former life I managed 3rd level tech support for a State Government organization. Level one was the help desk that handled the most frequently occurring stuff like resetting passwords. The next most frequently occurring problem was printers. Such a simple piece of hardware can cause so many headaches. When you want to print something NOW, and you can't, somebody had better have a solution.

Sweetie gave me an HP psc 2410 Color Ink-jet - Fax / copier / printer / scanner for Christmas several years ago. It has been a reliable, fast printer. In addition to the 4-in-1 stuff, it also has slots for the top four popular digital memory cards. No headaches EVER until a couple of weeks ago.

Number 1 son came by and wanted to use it to FAX a job application. I usually use the desktop function in the HP Director to do Faxes, since it allows me to customize a cover sheet. That HP Director icon has worked forever, but that day, I got an hourglass for a couple of seconds and then nothing happened. So I had to do the Fax straight from the 4-in-1, didn't need a cover sheet anyway.

But that was bugging me. Without that HP Director, I couldn't scan. Also when the printer tells me to replace a cartridge, the HP DIrector shows me the ink levels. I never replace cartridges until my printed pages start fading anyway...about 2 months after I get a warning.

But that thing was still bugging me. I had not changed anything!!! (Right!?!) So I figured the printer driver had somehow gotten corrupted. GROAN!!! Dig out the original installation CD...(LAWD, where is it?) Do I really want to start this...probably take an hour. So I put it off until I was bored one night.

The installation CD had me to uninstall the old software and install again. OOOPS...after several "NEXT"s, I get an error.

So I use Add/delete software to uninstall. Then install the thing again. By then it was up to an hour. And the HP Director still didn't work. Printer was still printing, FAX was still FAXing, Digital slots still worked.

So I left it alone another week, and it was still bugging me. Saturday night I was waiting for Sunday's chicken to finish cooking, so I had some time on my hands. I went to the HP site to find a fix. Searched for "HP Director doesn't start." I got lots of drivers for "HP Director doesn't install." I downloaded one big one. It took 20 minutes to download. While it was doing that, I was still browsing and stumbled upon "HP Director Window Does Not Open after installing Internet Explorer 7". ARGGHH!! I don't even use IE. But the week before my trouble started, I did the weekly Microsoft update, and it forced that IE 7 on me.

SO I found my fix. It was a patch that took a few seconds to download, a few seconds to install. Now my HP Director works like it always did. Never believe a client who says she didn't change a thing.

I bought an HP 1030NR

Isn't it cute there under my desktop. I plodded through technical specs all over the place. Even tried to build my own on the Dell site and the HP site. By the time I added a few things, the $300 machine was costing $650. This particular model is not available on the HP website. All sources point to Best Buy or Ecost.com

But even after all my research, the best recommendation came from Cynthia Marie. She loves her Mini. My requirements are similar. I went for it. When I went to Best Buy yesterday, my mind wasn't completely made up, so I looked over the other Mini's on display. The ASUS and the Aspire were both stuck and not responding. The HP was running and zipping through the few internet sites I tried. The keyboard is bigger than the others on display. Keys are as big as a desktop keys. I bought it!

Best Buy was offering for an added $39.99, the same model "pre-setup" by the Geek Squad. I decided to do it myself, and it was easy. The hardest part was inserting the battery...I had it backwards...DOH! There is no excess software on the thing. I connected to my home network, let Microsoft do it's update thing, added McAfee Security (I had one remaining copy on my license for three), and Firefox (my favored browser). I folded laundry while various stuff was downloading.

I bought a sleeve for carrying. It will fit easily in my carry-on backpack for travel. And I got another jump-drive for moving files from my desktop.

One problem is the pointer device (mouse thingy). I have never been very good with pointer devices on laptops, from the eraser-head thing on IBM to various configurations of a track-pad. If I'm just doing straight text, I can function OK, but the Mini failed the Pet Society hurdle test. I couldn't click my Esmerelda when I needed to. I'll have to get an external mouse.

Does it pass the Pet Society requirement otherwise? I had to F-11 (I guess I need function keys after all) to get rid of the header stuff, and see my pet and her friends for the visits. I don't do much Pet Society on a real vacation anyway.



By the time we take our next big trip in November, I'll have it mastered. We will probably use the ship-board wi-fi hot spots on days at sea. The mini will decrease the time we have to struggle with those sticky keyboard on the ship's PC, and we can pre-type any long emails or blogs we want to post.

I'll even let Tinker use it.

Why I need a mini

1) It's in the genes! Gordons love gadgets. My brother George has one. Cynthia Marie has one. And I bet half of you reading this have one already. I'm late to the game.

2) Prices are really low! I've been doing my research only to find that the price doesn't mean a whole lot. The specifications are all over the map for that price. The hard drive might be anything from 150 gig to 8 gig. Eight gig? I carry 2 gig on my keychain! But I must remind myself that my very first PC had no hard-drive. The only application in those days was Lotus 1-2-3 run from an 8-inch floppy. And that PC cost as much as my new 1970 Subaru.

3) It would be easier to travel with a Mini. We have a notebook that we take with us sometimes. Mostly on roadtrips, and we took it on our big train trip. It's gotten to be too much of a hassle to get through airport security with the laptop since Tinker's hip replacement. He sets off the metal detector every time, and sometimes the security officer will help me with his stuff while they wand him down. Most of the time, though, I'm the one gathering up 2 pairs of shoes, two backpacks, coats, and the laptop too.

4) It would be cheaper than a Blackberry...no monthly fees.

But to be honest, it's really only #1. It's the gadget thing. I don't know why I need one otherwise. I don't hang out at Starbucks, or any of the other internet hot-spots around town. I could use it for writing when I travel, but I usually carry a paper notebook for sudden bursts of inspiration. Paper is easier to deal with by the pool at Bellagio, or on the beach. But I'm going to get one, anyway.

Now I need to decide what I want the thing to do. Do I need a copy of Word? a CD drive? how many USB ports? Headphone jack? Speaker jack? Some have keyboards with no F-keys. Do I need F-keys? When was the last time I used Function keys? I'm not going to play games on the thing. (Except Pet Society, of course) How much RAM do I need for Pet Society?

OK, friends who have one already, what do you have, and what do you like about it?

The Conflicker Worm

I don't usually pay much attention to news about widespread computer virus attacks because it's mostly corporate computers that get infected. Before I retired, there was a risk of carrying or sending a virus home from the office. Now my home PC is reasonably secure. I don't download music, movies, or games, and I have no kids at home doing that.

I'm rather careful about opening emails with attachments. I have stopped opening all those Powerpoint presentations that people send me in email. Most I have seen years ago anyway. And I know that even a "trusted" friend can unknowingly pass on viruses, or that a trusted friend can have her email hacked and taken over by people sending bogus emails.

My husband calls me "Chuckie" after the Rug Rats character. You know the one who says, "I don't know, Tommy, something bad might happen." That's me. In my last job before I retired, one of my areas of responsibility included Disaster excuse me..."Business Recovery." I was good at thinking of worst-case scenarios, and preparing for them

If you're bored already reading this, scroll forward to the photo down below, and I'll be here when you come back.

I use Mozilla Firefox as my preferred browser, and I control the cookies that are saved on my PC. Each time a new attempt to write a cookie occurs, I have to respond whether to accept it, accept for this session, or deny. It's my habit to deny anything that has "ad" "Click" "zedo" in the cookie name. Some cookies are good, the site keeps them to identify you, and save information about you, like your password if you want them to save it.

I use McAfee for virus protection, and it includes McAfee SiteAdvisor. This may sound like advertising for McAfee, but they help keep me out of bad sites as well. The McAfee SiteAdvisor has a green light in the corner of sites they have checked out, a yellow light if they haven't checked it and a red light for sites to beware. And on my Google search results, McAfee gives the green check for trusted sites.

A couple of weeks ago I signed on to Blogtalkradio for a friend's radio show. A few of my internet pals have radio shows. I had been on BTR many times before but on this particular day there were some new advertisers. There's no such thing as a "free" web-site. Somebody has to pay for hosting it, and many sites get revenue from the advertising. On that particular day, I had pop-up after pop-up from Mozilla notifying me of another attempt to write a cookie. I denied them all. And then this screen appeared.



I got out of there fast, and restarted my computer. I went back into BTR, and it happened again. I saved the screen image, and I was out again. I didn't tell my online friends about it, since they were still online talking. Then I forgot about it until CBS started talking about the Conflicker worm on 60 Minutes last night.

I tell you, Chuckie got busy and deleted ALL cookies last night. I usually clean up cookies once a week and keep selected ones. Last night, they all had to go. Now I have to re-enter every password for every site that I frequent, but it makes me feel like I tried to protect myself. It's very possible that this worm doesn't even travel in cookies. Maybe I'll get past April Fools' Day without incident.