plain jane Posted December 6, 2011 Share Posted December 6, 2011 My Macbook died a horrible death. :glare: It's only two years old so I'm going to pay to repair it (about $300) rather than simply tossing it but I'm still sick thinking about the cost. Thing is, I was about to buy a second computer for the kids because we've finally come to the point where we need one. I was going to get the iPad but am now thinking a MacBook would be better. Here's the thing. I don't have an external hard drive to back up my files. I have pictures saved on thumb drives as well as saved on dh's Windows laptop but no external drive. We had purchased one in the past but I was not impressed with it so we returned it & never had the spare money to replace it. When my Mac went on the fritz we went out and purchased an external drive that can back up both dh's laptop (Windows) and my Macbook. This drive cost almost $300 :glare: and doesn't want to work with my TimeMachine even though the manual clearly shows that it does. Dh spent 2 hours with their tech support last night only to be told that he needs to speak to their 2nd level tech support, which only works until 5pm week days. Dh isn't able to take time off work so he can back up my Mac and I have no clue about such things (or 2 hours to dedicate to this with little kids running around). I'm really frustrated. We talked about buying a TimeCapsule from the Apple store but those won't back up a PC :glare: and they're spendy. I already have to spend an unexpected $300 to fix my current Mac, I don't want to spend another $300 just to back it up and then more to buy a drive to back up dh's computer. Plus, the price of a second computer. :willy_nilly: So, I'm thinking, if I get a second Mac, I can just copy everything from my current one on to that one. That way, I will have two computers with the same files. I can use them to back each other up. Maybe. :001_unsure: I've heard that external drives are not fool-proof either and have had a couple friends tell me their external drives crashed and they lost all the data they thought was backed up. Am I thinking rationally here? Could this work? I'm really grumpy about this whole situation. :angry: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sputterduck Posted December 6, 2011 Share Posted December 6, 2011 The nice thing about PCs is processes like this are *cheap* and easy. I'm sorry you're having trouble. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wendi Posted December 6, 2011 Share Posted December 6, 2011 Hmm. The thing I'm wondering is, how will you know which "new" or "changed" files you want to keep? You can use Migration Assistant to transfer stuff over from one Mac to the other, but that's not really designed to be done regularly. How big is your hard drive? Would a portable hard drive (500 GB is about $100; 320 GB is more like $70) be big enough? I guess you could have one "main" computer, and regularly transfer important files over to the other computer, assuming you know your kids won't mess around with it too much. Also, for another computer, have you checked around for refurbished Macs? Wendi Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
plain jane Posted December 6, 2011 Author Share Posted December 6, 2011 The nice thing about PCs is processes like this are *cheap* and easy. I'm sorry you're having trouble. To be honest, I've not had a PC laptop last more than a year without dying completely. :confused: I got sick of buying a new laptop every year so switched to Mac. I'm surprised to have only got two years of use out of it. At least it's not completely dead, like my PC laptops ended up. But, it's still a $300 fix. :glare: Ugh. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wendi Posted December 6, 2011 Share Posted December 6, 2011 What happened to the MacBook, anyway? I'm surprised, too, as we have been using Macs around here for years, and I just replaced my 7+ year old iBook G4 a month ago. (It has a small hard drive, was slow for video and games, and the trackpad became finicky so I had to use a mouse, but it still works.) Dh has an old Mac desktop that just recently needed a new hard drive, and ds has an old Mac desktop that we bought off Craigslist that works fine. So I'm surprised you only got two years out of yours; that hasn't been our experience with Macs at all. Wendi Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
plain jane Posted December 6, 2011 Author Share Posted December 6, 2011 What happened to the MacBook, anyway? I'm surprised, too, as we have been using Macs around here for years, and I just replaced my 7+ year old iBook G4 a month ago. (It has a small hard drive, was slow for video and games, and the trackpad became finicky so I had to use a mouse, but it still works.) Dh has an old Mac desktop that just recently needed a new hard drive, and ds has an old Mac desktop that we bought off Craigslist that works fine. So I'm surprised you only got two years out of yours; that hasn't been our experience with Macs at all. Wendi I posted about this a while back but then the problem went away for several months. It has since come back with a vengeance. It's the trackpad. It's possessed. It moves where it wants, when it wants and clicks whatever it wants. It opens and closes files by itself, opens webpages, closes them, opens tabs, runs all the programs then shuts them down. It won't do a thing I tell it to, even with an external mouse. It's horrible. :( Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
southernm Posted December 6, 2011 Share Posted December 6, 2011 Did you talk with apple? They have great customer service. It's not still under warranty is it? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lolly Posted December 6, 2011 Share Posted December 6, 2011 For the hard drive and your mac, make an appointment with the guy at the genius bar and let him show you how to use it on your computer. I would not recommend using one laptop to back the other up. It takes up too much space on your laptop and could cause problems due to lack of space. (Unless you don't really have anything on either laptop that takes up space!) Sputterduck, I haven't found fixes for these things on pc's to be simple or cheap. We are a two mac, 6 pc family. The pc's run a whole lot more $ than the macs in trouble shooting. Jane, I have found the apple care to be well worth the price. I like being able to call and talk with someone so that I don't have to make the hour drive to the apple store. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shellers Posted December 6, 2011 Share Posted December 6, 2011 To be honest, I've not had a PC laptop last more than a year without dying completely. :confused: I got sick of buying a new laptop every year so switched to Mac. ... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
plain jane Posted December 6, 2011 Author Share Posted December 6, 2011 For the hard drive and your mac, make an appointment with the guy at the genius bar and let him show you how to use it on your computer. I would not recommend using one laptop to back the other up. It takes up too much space on your laptop and could cause problems due to lack of space. (Unless you don't really have anything on either laptop that takes up space!) Sputterduck, I haven't found fixes for these things on pc's to be simple or cheap. We are a two mac, 6 pc family. The pc's run a whole lot more $ than the macs in trouble shooting. Jane, I have found the apple care to be well worth the price. I like being able to call and talk with someone so that I don't have to make the hour drive to the apple store. Thanks for the suggestions! Unfortunately, I've spoken with the guy at the Genius Bar & he says he can't (won't?) help me. :glare: And yes, Lolly, I will definitely never purchase another Apple product without Apple Care. Sigh. Live and learn. I'm going to talk to dh again about finding a cheap external drive (that hopefully won't crash :rolleyes:) so that I can bring my Mac in for repairs and finally use it again. It's been 2 weeks without it and I'm going insane as it has files and programs on it that my kids need for school. It's frustrating because I need to bring my Mac in for repairs but I can't do that because I need to back it up first but I can't do that because my Mac isn't functioning properly. :willy_nilly: Besides, buying a new Macbook sounds like much more fun than buying an external drive. :tongue_smilie: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.