Computer Hell...

...for me anyway.
Last night around midnight we had a hell of a thunderstorm, I woke up to some loud thunder and then an incredibly loud BANG, it had to have been a lightening strike very close by, I almost jumped right out of the bed.
Anyway, this morning one of my GFI's in the kitchen was tripped, the GFI breaker to the barn was tripped, the electric opener for the overhead door in the old barn is unresponsive, I have cable only on 1 television set (think one of my numerous splitters got fried), but the biggest problem is one of my PC's seems to have crapped out.
I removed the hard drive and stuck it in the other PC and made it the slave, fortunately it is OK, I guess the problem is with the mother board. I can explore it but can't open anything on it, I'm thinking it's because it's now the E: drive and the files are all C:. Of course that's the computer I have Quicken on and use for email and word processing, so there are a lot of saved documents on it as well as photos. Is it possible to configure this PC to open the programs on the slave hard drive? The only files I backed up are the Quicken data files on a zip drive.
At this point I'm lost!!

Well, I sure could be a big help here!! I do know that all that sux

I really do hate computers...
The weird thing is that this PC was slow as hell the past few days, now all of a sudden it's Mr. Speedy Delivery.

We must be related John - you have the "Smitty luck"! Man that sucks!


I have no luck with computers either. Every single one slows to a snails pace after 6 months. Drives me absolutely nuts!! It's 2011 - can't someone build a cpu that doesn't f*** up constantly???

My internet connection sucks too, but that's a whole other rant in a whole other thread ....

Hope you get that crap straightened out without too much of a hit to the wallet.

Wood'nCoal wrote: I can explore it but can't open anything on it, .....

It's giving you access denied message?

You have to change the permissions on the files, having gone through it before its PITA.

I believe the procedure differs on on different operating systems. Easiest route might be using Knoppix and copy them to the shared folder on the new drive.

It's giving you access denied message?

Yes.

Easiest route might be using Knoppix

What is that? Gonna look into it.
Thanks.

Knoppix.... Isn't that some thing Elana Bobbitt has????

Knoppix is a linux based OS that boots from a CD. As long as the the computer is set to boot from CD if you have the Cd in the drive it will load Knoppix instead of Windows. I keep a copy around in case Windows dies... You can still access drives, files etc. There's lots of uses for it, Yanche had a real good suggestion. You can use it for things like online banking. It's impervious to viruses because the entire OS and software is on the CD. Soon as you reboot it's like a clean install.

In this case instead of going through the hassle of setting Windows permissions you can just copy the file while in Knoppix. I know I had a hassle changing them myself.

Thanks, going to look into it.
I forgot to mention that my CRT monitor was magnetized by the lightening as well, lots of wild colors yesterday morning, it was on in standby mode all night. When the monitor is powered up it automatically degausses the CRT, much better now! I can't find any evidence of the strike outside, but it had to be close by.

Once you get things repaired or replaced you might want to consider how the lightning entered your house and how you can mitigate damage the next time. Many times the path lightning takes to get inside can a result of improper wiring design. Understanding some simple lighting path principles make a big difference in reducing or eliminating damage.

See my previous post here: Calling all Electricians!!!!

It's all about this basic illustration:

Plenty of moist soil around my house. Don't know if that's a good or bad thing though .....

Smitty, he was talking about AROUND --not IN the house

Once you get things repaired or replaced you might want to consider how the lightning entered your house and how you can mitigate damage the next time.

Thanks, I'm going to look into it!

Hi W&C,

That's how our computer hell started, too - one big bang. I was on the computer at the time. It fried our surge protector and we lost all the software and files but the hardware was ok. DK was able to start it in "safe mode" and started reloading the software but in the short time between getting it running and getting the security programs installed we got a virus that we couldn't get rid of. We ended up taking it to Staples and having the hard drive wiped. They reloaded everything for us and all was good until I re-infected it when I downloaded a window file which was infected with the virus from my memory stick. I still don't understand how that works but that's what DK and the computer geeks at Staples said happened. They had to wipe the hard drive a second time and all is well now. I highly recommend the computer geeks at Staples - at least the Staples at Springfield Mall. They investigated the problem and solved it for a very reasonable price. It sure beat the cost of a new computer.

When DK replaced the surge protector he got one with a battery back up; if the computer closes down for a power outage or surge, the battery gives me 15 to 20 mins to shut it down. I shouldn't lose any files. I had the opportunity to test the battery back up a couple of weeks ago and it worked. Yeah!!!! He also got me a stand alone hard drive to save everything to so I don't have to use a thumb nail drive. I just unplug the hard drive from the USB port and take it with me. I don't understand why that won't be affected by a virus embedded in a file but I'm willing to accept the word of DK and the computer geeks. Sort of like I accept without explanation the concept that you can't divide by zero; it is what it is. Anyway, good luck on your journey out of computer hell. Lisa

The strange thing is that both PC's share the same surge protector, as well as my FAX machine, etc. Everything else is fine.
All I had was a Memorex Black CD-R for the Knoppix file, my CD-Drive wouldn't recognize it at first, after numerous tries it started writing to it.