laptop woes – Steel City Snapper photography

I’m really eking out the shots from this roll. The number of photos I’ve made over the past three months has been minimal compared with what I’ve done previously, and I’m about to run out of new stuff to publish soon (in the next few days in fact). I’ve talked about this before, but have always managed to get some more in the can before that happened, but this time it will be pretty tight and I might have to fall back on the archive.

I start the best part of two week’s leave in a few days time though, so I’m hoping that I can get out and do some proper photography and fill the tanks a little. We shall see.

My new laptop arrived this morning. Thanfully this one a) isn’t filthy and, b) actually works. It’s currently restoring my backed-up data so I’m hoping I’ll be largely back to normal operations by the start of next week (just in time to go on leave…). As is always the case, while I’ve been getting the new machine set up, the weather outside has been (not frightful) lovely and it would have been a great day to head out with the camera. This afternoon the clouds closed in and we now have mist as the evening draws in. Part of me is tempted to go out and do some nightime photography, but I have to cook food for everyone today and I doubt I will still feel like going out when that’s all sorted. Got a day out tomorrow though, so maybe I’ll get some pictures then…

Yashica Mat 124G & Ilford HP5+. Lab developed in Xtol.

Taken on 6 November 2021

My replacement laptop arrived today. It didn’t work. And so the saga continues.

The replacement machine arrived this morning and I made the swap for my old, faulty laptop. I was somewhat dismayed when I saw the replacement as it was covered in scratches and other cosmetic marks and I commented on the delivery man that it looked like it had been through the wars. Still, I need a working machine and I had no option but to make the swap. The first thing I did was to give the case a good wipe down with some disinfecatant wipes. This removed the majority of the surface dirt, although not the scratches. Then I opened it up.

The inside was disgusting. It looked like a laptop that someone had used as an ashtray, or perhaps left it open in a dusty shed for years. It was absolutely filthy. Again, I gave it a thorough clean with disinfectant wipes before then giving the whole machine a further scrub with some isopropyl alchohol to remove the remaining crap. Eventually it was in a reasonable state – although still far from the like-new condition that I’d managed to keep my old laptop in. It really makes me wonder how some people look after things so poorly?

Once cleaned, I took it up to my office to start the process of getting it connected. The first problem I noticed was that it didn’t have a VGA output. While I know time has moved on and such things are passe now, it did mean that I had no way to connect it to the older of my two monitors. The second problem was more significant. Upon powering up the machine I was presented with a message informing me that the power-supply did not have sufficient wattage to power the laptop. This meant I had to call the service desk once more to find out how to proceed. You can only imagine my delight when I was told that they would have to swap out the laptop and PSU as a pair for another machine! I now have to wait until tomorrow for another replacement to be delivered, but with the added annoyance that I spent half-an-hour of my own time cleaning a filthy machine that I’m now going to hand straight back. I’m not a happy person about this.

So, moaning over, I suppose I’d best post a picture on my blog that is supposedly about photography. It’s another from the Clumber Park outing and this one is perhaps my favourite from the roll.

Yashica Mat 124G & Ilford HP5+. Lab developed in Xtol.

Taken on 6 November 2021

Tag: laptop woes

Running out of new photos

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