Well, my computer was down for a week, in the shop. They say it had viruses. When I asked how many, she said, we lost count. Oh. My. Goodness! I've had the Cox Security Suite installed for 5 years, they use McAfee. I though I was secure.
I knew the week before it wouldn't boot up to windows that the computer was acting kind of sketchy. That little voice in the back of my mind was saying, 'you should really do a backup of your photos, get those organized and delete what you can.' And did I listen?
Procrastination is my middle name.
Well, I got lucky. My personal stuff is intact, but I have limited functionality. My audio doesn't work, only one drive works, and it's misnamed. When the computer shop repaired my computer, they used an older version of my windows XP Media. I have 2005. They used 2002. They say it's the same workings. I say, I've used this computer since Jan 2007 daily, and I know what it's supposed to look like. It looks slightly dated, and the drivers are all messed up.
AND, I never did update to Vista, although I've had the disk for years. Now, I can't, because it's an update to vers. 2005, not 2002. Sigh.
I've learned alot in the last couple of weeks. How to save my .pst files for Outlook, that I should have a backup plan and use it DILIGENTLY. That I have, are you ready? about 60 GB of photos and videos alone. Not including my documents, which thankfully are a fraction of that.
Do you know how long it takes to upload all those photos? DAYS. Actually DAYS AND NIGHTS. Seriously. I've been uploading for 4 days and nights steadily.
And did I mention music files? I've just been getting into buying I Tunes and Amazon MP3's for my I-Pod Nano (which I still love, btw!) I can't remember how much I have been it's not as serious as the photos. I uploaded all my music to Amazon Cloud and SugarSync, so I should be ok.
Speaking of SugarSync, that is who I decided to go with for online storage/backup. It's costing me, but I am hoping to downgrade my package after I get this mess straightened out. I did run into some trouble with the last 10 files, they don't seem to want to upload. Spent time chatting online with tech yesterday, need to upload the log to them for analyzing.
In the meantime, after searching online for others opinions on this stuff, I decided it wouldn't hurt to go with Carbonite, another online storage/backup site, as a backup to my backup. They offer a free trial period, unlimited upload. Yee haw! (seeing as how I uploaded about 85 GB to Sugarsync) So that is what I'm doing now.
AND, the repair shop said that AVAST is a great free antivirus software, so they put a copy on my computer before I brought it home. So far, it's blocked a couple of malwares.
I think I've done well over the years, as that was the first time I've ever had a computer in the shop, and when I really sat down to think how long I've been online, well, it's been since about 1997. I've been operating computers since the 1980's. Wow. I didn't realize it's been that long!
I've owned 3 computers, each one basically becoming severely outdated. This one is 6 years old. I remember when I ordered it from Dell, I could have a TV Tuner come installed in it, and I thought, that's crazy! So I didn't. Now I get it. Sigh. :0)
Well, I hope this helps someone out there to stop procrastinating and get things in order on their computer. I had a close call - nearly losing all my beloved family photos for the last 6 years (last backup was 3 years ago), our trips, my pets, my flowers (What was I thinking? A bazillion flower pics!) scanned slides of my childhood... everything.
And did I mention I save emails? Yes, I have several folders and sort family and friend emails into them and keep them - at least the meaningful ones. I am quite sentimental. I need to do something about that. :0)
So, what did we learn today?
1) Backup your computer! Regularly!
2) Sort those photos, make prints, CD's, etc.
3) Keep a copy of your music online, on CD's, etc.
4) Check your virus software - I think you can do a free virus scan with other reputable software now and then just to be sure.
5) Don't procrastinate. You might not be as lucky as I am next time.

I don't know how much longer this is going to take. I've been at this since last Friday, a week ago. I still have several thousand files to upload to Carbonite. It could take another couple of days, I think I managed 6GB overnight last night. Make sure you turn off your screensaver, your hibernation mode and sleep mode - and just shut off your screen.
My plan is to finish this, then reinstall my correct operating system, and then install my Vista upgrade. I'm going to finally do it and get it over with. I think it's patched and fixed as much as it's going to get now, and I hear Windows 8 is coming out soon. Sure is hard (and expensive) to keep up with technology. Hmmm, do I really need it? That's a post for another day. :0)