jenepherre | Computer Frustration Update

Current Mood: frustrated & tired
Current Music: A&E Channel

Computer Frustration Update

If you upgrade from an older computer to one with WinXP (or just one with newer technology), be sure and get a data migration software package. Dell has one for about $50. I wish I'd gotten it. I still can't get my new computer to assign a drive letter to my external USB hard drive. It recognizes that the drive is there, but won't assign a drive letter and won't make it accessible in My Computer or Windows Explorer. Thus making it useless. I'm actually on my old computer at the moment, because I was burning some of my files to CD-Rom. But I have many gigabytes of data to transfer, and some of it is just too large to make it practical to burn it all to CD-Rom.

I've written to the company who I bought the external USB hard drive enclosure from, and they tried to help, but no luck. I wrote to Dell, and they gave me a bunch of different ways to transfer files from one computer to another, including "Transfer files using an external hard drive." Thanks so much, Dell. So helpful.

XP apparently has this "Files and Settings Transfer Wizard," but it's not clear if you can use it to transfer files from a non-XP computer. Plus, since I only have one monitor, I can't run both systems at the same time. I'll probably have to borrow my Mom's monitor for a while. Luckily I do have an extra keyboard and mouse. ::sigh::

Getting a new computer is supposed to be fun. This is more like a nightmare.

If I owe anyone e-mail, it'll have to wait. I'm checking my mail on Yahoo web mail instead of Outlook Express, so I feel sort of out of my element. I don't have my usual folders to organize everything and don't have my old emails to refer to and for that matter I don't even have my Favorites list. Those are things I've burned to CD, so I should be able to import them to my new system soon, but I'm really just too frustrated to answer any email right now. Of course I have to answer the tech support emails... and that's about all I can do... I'm proud of myself for putting my thoughts together in a semi-rational manner in this post. Wasn't sure I could. Frustration > Depression > Difficulty putting my thoughts together. Heh.

On an unrelated note, much thanks to

deslea for getting LJ to add an additional text field with each user icon, so we have an easier way to credit people or whatever without having to include all that stuff in our keywords. You rock, Deslea!!

Also, GIP! Okay, you can't call it a gratuitous icon post when it's added on as an afterthought to a completely unrelated post. But still... cool icon, huh? I did this tutorial by

tattood_moon. Way cool, huh?

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You're welcome! Hope the file transferring woes get sorted out, one way or another.

Me too. You don't happen to have any advice on that, do you? It always seems like you know everything about computers...

files and settings transfer is useless. You usse a serial cable and it takes about 1000 hours. I'm going to try setting up a tiny network with a switch and see if that works.
Since I'm assuming my external drive thing wont work any better than yours.

There might still be hope... possibly. I've got Dell tech support working on it now - some guy named Noel. Seems to know what he's doing, but I'm still not able to assign a drive letter. That option is grayed out. Just wrote him back again.

Well, you know you'll be the first person I write to if I do get it working.

I"m sure this is something you've already checked but, are you logged on with administrative rights?

How do I do that?

In XP Pro there is sometimes an administrator account that is seperate from the usual login account. I think if you log off and go to log back in if there is an admin account it will be an option. I'm not certain as I've never had any reason to try it before.

I just have XP Home Edition. I did check under User Accounts and it lists me as the Computer Administrator. ::shrug::

Okay, that'll work. I just checked help and there is a 'removable storage tool.' I found it under 'disk management', not sure if Home has that or not. It shows my USB stick drive listed.

Also, I forgot to ask, but did you try the Disk Management tool to detect the disk? (I typed 'Dick' first, it would be good if we all had a dick management tool...)

I'm copying the directions for doing that from the help menu. I know I had to do it when I installed a second disk in my old computer. It says something about initializing the disk. I'm not sure what that entails.

To detect new disks
Using the Windows interface

Open Computer Management (Local).
In the console tree, click Device Manager.
Where?

Computer Management
System Tools
Device Manager

On the Action menu, click Scan for hardware changes.
In the console tree, click Disk Management.
Where?

Computer Management (Local)
Storage
Disk Management

On the Action menu, click Rescan Disks.
Notes

To open Computer Management, click Start, and then click Control Panel. Double-click Administrative Tools, and then double-click Computer Management.
You must be logged on as an administrator or a member of the Administrators group in order to complete this procedure. If your computer is connected to a network, network policy settings might also prevent you from completing this procedure.
If Disk Management does not detect the new disk after you click Rescan Disks, you might need to restart your computer. New disks appear as Not Initialized. Before you can use a disk, you must first initialize it. For instructions describing how to initialize a disk, click Related Topics. If you start Disk Management after adding a disk, the Initialize Disk Wizard appears so you can initialize the disk.

Been there, tried that. Disk Management *does* detect the external drive, but there's no drive letter associated with it. This is the same place I would go to assign it a drive letter, but that option is grayed out. I've got another letter into Dell... I probably said that before. Anyway... migraine coming on again. Going back to bed for a while.

Thanks so much for trying to help, Quinn. ::hugs::

Can't do much for the computer frustration, but I did want to say how cool your icon is!!!

Did you do that with a brush or with filters?

Thanks for the compliment on the icon! Read the last paragraph of my post - it has a link to the tutorial I used to make it. And the girl who wrote the tutorial did it by making Smallville icons... you'll love it. :-)

Yep - that's me...always in a hurry, skimming thru the posts and never reading all the way to the end!!

Thanks!

LOL Velcome!

sorry to hear this Jen but I'll back you up on the migration software - I bought Intellimover (or something like that) when I got my new PC from Dell and it worked great. Took a long time coz my old PC was OLD and SLOW but gigs and gigs of stuff was moved pretty easily - tho, I do think you might need two monitors to do it.

Hope things straighten out soon.

My brother bought the data migration software too. I'm thinking about calling him and seeing if he still has it and will send it to me.

How many days have I been trying to figure this out now? ::sigh::

Thanks for the kind words, Lidia.

don't know if this helps, but we used the transfer wizard when we got our dell...it had xp but the old one was windows 98...and it worked...

hope everything works out for you soon!!

Really? Can you give me any more info on how it works or how you connected the two computers?

well, to be honest, i'm not that computer literate...i just went with the wizard..we didn't have to connect the two together..we put it on a cd.....and we probably didn't have near the amount it sounds like you need to move....

hope that helps any....

You can pick up that Data Migration kit or Intelimover any place that sells computers such as CompUSA or Best Buy.

And my Dad is in Stockton (where the nearest Best Buy is) today, but he forgot to take the cell phone with him. Arrrgghh! I was thinking about having my brother send me his data migration kit if he still has it, but I don't want to wait for it to get here. Getting sick of this, you know?

Thanks for the tip. I wasn't sure they were that readily available.

I'm not sure if this is what you're looking for, but I found a product on Amazon.com that looks like it might be useful to you. It's called AlohaBob PC Relocator 2005. It's about $26.00 and ships in 24 hrs.

* Powerful migration tool for transferring info to a new PC
* Moves programs, plus all personal preferences
* Packs up all data files and delivers them to the new PC
* Automatically transfers settings, email, shortcuts, and more
* Intuitive wizard interface with step-by-step instructions

If you have an Office Depot or similar office supply store that is closer, you might check there as well. They also carry a lot of computer related items and should carry these as well.

This is probably a stupid idea, but is the external drive formatted? I added a second drive to my Dell a few months ago and had to have Dell tech walk me thru on formatting the drive so that the Me operating software understood that there was a new drive and assign it a drive letter. Once it was formatted, it was set to go. just a thought to your dilemma.

Thanks, but yes it is formatted. And full of important data. If I tried to reformat it, I'd lose everything. I think I've pretty much given up on the external hard drive idea.

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Computer Frustration Update

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probably stupid idea

Re: probably stupid idea