johnriddle Posted December 9, 2011 Share Posted December 9, 2011 Well I come home from work last night to see the power to my subdivision is off. While the power company is working on the problem my power surges on and off several times. Eventually the power comes back on so I start checking my display and find that my computer is toast. I thought it was no big deal because it was an old computer and I have another one I could use. The problem is I got out my jump drive that I thought had all my sequences on it and for some reason it only has three and one is unfinished and the other two are not even Christmas songs. I know this is my first post on this forum even though I have been a member for two years and I'm sorry that this is my first but I desperately need some help. If anybody can help me to finish out the season it would be greatly appreciated. John Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
-klb- Posted December 9, 2011 Share Posted December 9, 2011 The disk out of the toasted computer may still be ok. You may be able to add it as a second drive on the one that works, or find an external enclosure to put it in. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
johnriddle Posted December 9, 2011 Author Share Posted December 9, 2011 Thank you for the reply. I am pretty dumb when it comes to computers but I will do some research and see if I can do what your talking about. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
-klb- Posted December 9, 2011 Share Posted December 9, 2011 If you are uncomfortable trying, you may be able to locate a pc tech on call company in your area that could come out and try it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
johnriddle Posted December 9, 2011 Author Share Posted December 9, 2011 For more information the bad computer is a desktop and the backup computer is a laptop. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
-klb- Posted December 9, 2011 Share Posted December 9, 2011 That will require an external drive enclosure, or temporary use of another desktop. Many electronics and computer stores will have the enclosures. Or a hired tech may be able to bring their own for the purpose. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
caniac Posted December 9, 2011 Share Posted December 9, 2011 johnriddle wrote: For more information the bad computer is a desktop and the backup computer is a laptop.shouldn't matter, they will take the hard drive out of the desktop and place it into a external hard disk enclosure which usually has a USB interface and cable. if the hard disk is not fried then it will show up on your laptop as drive D: or E: or F:from there it is a matter of finding your sequences and audio and moving them over. if this works then you are up and going again in a matter of 30-40mins. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
imposterbond Posted December 9, 2011 Share Posted December 9, 2011 try googling freecom hard drive dock pro - it does sata, pata and ide drives - which hopefully cover your hard drive Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
imposterbond Posted December 9, 2011 Share Posted December 9, 2011 ..forgot - if ide or pata - you will need to buy / get a power cable and ide cable to connect to the freecom - should be able to pick them up from a pc shop or even out of your fried computer Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PaulXmas Posted December 9, 2011 Share Posted December 9, 2011 Wow that sucks. Little late now but you might want to back up your sequences to a couple diffrent places.If you have a FutureShop/Bestbuy or any computer store close by, then take the whole computer to them and ask what you need. See what it would cost to do it.Some (some) of these places are very helpful and will direct you in the right direction.If you can get the hard drive out you might ask on here if someone could do it for you and ship the drive to them.If you could get it out of the computer then attaching the USB adapter is fairly easy...Good luck. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
johnriddle Posted December 9, 2011 Author Share Posted December 9, 2011 Well I broke down and took my computer to a repair shop. Great news, it was just a bad power supply!! Thank you all for the help. First thing I am going to do is back up my sequences in every way possible. Now I hope when I plug everything back in tomorrow all of my controllers are, I have been to scared to check. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PipefitterDan Posted December 9, 2011 Share Posted December 9, 2011 That's good news. Hopefully this is a learning experience for a lot of folks. I create my sequences on one computer, copy to a flash drive and then copy to the show computer. This way there are three copies of each sequence. I also copy the music in the same manner. If my show computer goes down all I have to do is swap the cat5 and enable the show on the other computer.At the end of each season I burn every file LOR uses to a CD and file that away. I've never had to use any of these backup measures but it's better to be safe than sorry.edit: I really need to use spell checker Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coasterbp Posted December 9, 2011 Share Posted December 9, 2011 That why I use Dropbox. It's free, easy to use and if I every have my show computer take a dump on me, I can have my laptop up and running in minutes. Dropbox is your (free!) friend!www.dropbox.com-=CoasterBP Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steven Posted December 14, 2011 Share Posted December 14, 2011 johnriddle wrote: Great news, it was just a bad power supply!!That's good news, but not really surprising. The problem was caused by a power surge, and the only thing directly connected to the power line is the power supply. I once had the power supply in a (home-built) desktop computer blow up with a loud "bang." It turned out a capacitor in the power supply had literally blown up.I recommend a UPS for your show machine (unless it's a laptop, which of course already have batteries). I power my speakers and transmitter from the batteries of my UPS, so when the power fails (which hasn't happened), the show will continue, minus the lights.I sequence on a different machine, and my practice is to use a CD-R to transfer the sequences to the show machine. Using a CD means I won't erase anything, like I would tend to do from a thumb drive. Each time I write modified sequences to a CD, I create a new folder named with the current date. If I ever need to, I can see the history of a sequence by browsing through the folders. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PaulXmas Posted December 14, 2011 Share Posted December 14, 2011 I second the dropbox idea! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jim6918 Posted December 14, 2011 Share Posted December 14, 2011 Steven wrote:johnriddle wrote: Great news, it was just a bad power supply!!That's good news, but not really surprising. The problem was caused by a power surge, and the only thing directly connected to the power line is the power supply. I once had the power supply in a (home-built) desktop computer blow up with a loud "bang." It turned out a capacitor in the power supply had literally blown up.I recommend a UPS for your show machine (unless it's a laptop, which of course already have batteries). I power my speakers and transmitter from the batteries of my UPS, so when the power fails (which hasn't happened), the show will continue, minus the lights.I sequence on a different machine, and my practice is to use a CD-R to transfer the sequences to the show machine. Using a CD means I won't erase anything, like I would tend to do from a thumb drive. Each time I write modified sequences to a CD, I create a new folder named with the current date. If I ever need to, I can see the history of a sequence by browsing through the folders.I agree with Steven here, except to the extent that, unless you are absolutely sure of your laptop's on-battery run time, I would also spring for the UPS. I use an older laptop that might run for 10 minutes on battery. A small APC 350 VA UPS might run about $45 at Office Depot. I have my entire show set-up on UPS, laptop, transmitter, and USB adapter. Cheap insurance in my book. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
caniac Posted December 14, 2011 Share Posted December 14, 2011 jim6918 wrote: Steven wrote:johnriddle wrote: Great news, it was just a bad power supply!!That's good news, but not really surprising. The problem was caused by a power surge, and the only thing directly connected to the power line is the power supply. I once had the power supply in a (home-built) desktop computer blow up with a loud "bang." It turned out a capacitor in the power supply had literally blown up.I recommend a UPS for your show machine (unless it's a laptop, which of course already have batteries). I power my speakers and transmitter from the batteries of my UPS, so when the power fails (which hasn't happened), the show will continue, minus the lights.I sequence on a different machine, and my practice is to use a CD-R to transfer the sequences to the show machine. Using a CD means I won't erase anything, like I would tend to do from a thumb drive. Each time I write modified sequences to a CD, I create a new folder named with the current date. If I ever need to, I can see the history of a sequence by browsing through the folders.I agree with Steven here, except to the extent that, unless you are absolutely sure of your laptop's on-battery run time, I would also spring for the UPS. I use an older laptop that might run for 10 minutes on battery. A small APC 350 VA UPS might run about $45 at Office Depot. I have my entire show set-up on UPS, laptop, transmitter, and USB adapter. Cheap insurance in my book.I use a APC 550 for my laptop, and show receiver. Can't have enough surge protection. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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