Computers and pancakes
Well, I’m back online, and the computer is hopefully fixed. I got a new optical drive installed – it’s supposed to be faster than the one I had, so that’s good. The only problem is that I can’t burn disks until I install a patch that tricks the computer into thinking that the new drive is an Apple product. And I can’t install that patch until I upgrade to OS 10.3 or higher. So I went ahead and ordered 10.4 “Tiger.” I’ve been wanting to upgrade the OS for a while, since I’m essentially running the same system the computer came with when I bought it four years ago. I’ve just kept putting it off for financial reasons. Oh well, at least now I have an excuse.
The computer gave me yet another scare this morning. After having gotten it back yesterday, apparently fixed, there was yet another power out at around 6 this morning. I woke up when the power came back (and all of our electronic gadgets clicked back on.) I was instantly paranoid that something would be wrong with the computer. So I got out of bed to check, and I was right! The exact same problem as before – The button lit up, but the computer wouldn’t come on at all. So come 9:00, I was back at AIS Computers. I talked to the same guy who worked on it before, and told him it was an emergency, so he took it back to the shop while I waited. This time around, the problem apparently WAS a dead battery. They replaced it for free, and the computer was back home and running by 9:30.
I can’t help but be a little suspicious… didn’t they check the battery when I brought it in last week? My first suspicion was a dead battery, but I didn’t think to try changing it myself until after I took it into the shop. When they told me it was the problem was a short in the optical drive, I was pretty surprised. Hmm…
Anyway, there is a pretty awesome pancake place in Savannah – the “Original Pancake House,” supposedly. Eleanor and I’ve been there twice in the last week or so. They have 18 different varieties of pancake at our location, and we’ve been working through each one (in order of appearance.) This morning it was “chocolate chip” and “banana.” The chocolate chip pancakes were a little much (more dessert than breakfast,) but the banana pancakes were pretty good. The best we’ve had so far have been the “49’er Flapjacks” – a basic sort of pancake, but very well done. Every time we eat a new pancake, we come home and cross it off of the takeout menu we have pinned up on the bulletin board. 8 down, ten to go.
I’m thinking of just biting the bullet and revamping my website, which I’ve been wanting to do for a little bit.
There’s another thing you can try under power-outage circumstances. When you open the computer up, there’s a teensy little button on the motherboard that the stores won’t tell you about because, apparently, they’re not allowed to.
It’s called the PMU (Power Management Unit) button. You should unplug the computer, hold it down for, like, ten seconds, and plug back in and start ‘er up. I had exactly the same problem you did after a power outage, and when I took it to the store they charged me $150 to pretty much push that little button. They tried to dress it up and make it seem like they had to do all kinds of work, but they basically charged me for storing my computer for over a week, pushing the button and then “running a check.” Meaning they turned it on, watched it boot up and turned it off again. I know that’s what they did because I’ve since done it myself, with perfect results.
Touching the PMU button yourself voids the warrantee, but if you’ve had the thing for four years, you don’t have to worry about that. And if you have a bigger problem, like a blown drive or something, hitting the PMU won’t hurt anything.
-Chris
Thanks, that’s good to know. The warranty’s long since bit the dust.
Ah, macs. So easy to use when they’re working, such bitches to fix.