Death of a PowerBook
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- stewdio
Yesterday my 15" PowerBook (2004) shit the bed. His name is Milton and I've loved him dearly. Milton had given warning signs... The eerie squeaks after typing each character in an unsaved document -- that started months ago. The 5 to 10 second total freezes that would completely recover as suddenly as they began -- a more recent phenomenon. Yes. There were signs.
From what I can tell it's just the reading arm on Milton's hard drive that died. There's a stabilizer that engages when the drive "senses" it is falling. This device seems to have gone totally haywire. I can no longer boot from Milton and booting from CD or as a target drive only works at random intervals -- because Milton's internal drive doesn't want to mount of course.
Right now I'm lucky: Milton has decided he's willing to mount as a target drive and I'm pulling off my files as quickly as possible. Like I said, the drive's platter seems to be fine. All the data is coming off uncorrupted.
The trick is, because the drive's stabilizer seems to be f'd I have to actually *gently rock* Milton in order for anything to transfer. Yes. If I let him sit by himself he just grinds away, either transferring data incredibly slowly or not at all. The grinding sound is horrible. But if I rock Milton the stabilizer engages / disengages and the transfer rate shoots up. Not to normal speeds, but there's a significant performance improvement. I've never heard of such a thing and it's been humiliating to sit here and rock my little baby to his final sleep mode.
- skelly0
based on passed experience, i can't think of many sounds worse than clicking/grinding from the HD. they make me cry.
- ribit0
i'm crying just reading this... the poor thing...
- stewdio0
He's gone now. Rest in peace Milton.
- mayo0
Lenore (my iBook) and I send our condolences :(
*hug*
- lvl_130
get outside nerd!
- 305artist0
it shouldnt be dead yet, just needs repairs. As megatron would say:
"I ...still....function....)
- JerseyRaindog0
My thoughts are with you.
Now get a shiny new one and get over it.
- aliceblue0
farwell Milton!
*looks fondly down at the pismo's bronze keyboard and
whispers "this will never happen to you."
- DaveO0
Get it cleaded up and you've got yourself a nice new titanium chopping board.
- gramme0
Mattcintosh & I shed a tear on your behalf.
- stewdio0
...and my cell phone just died today. Not a good week for my gear. At least it's not flooding in NYC like the rest of the Northeast.
- MyNameIsPhil0
I know what its like to loose something close to your heart. My cup holder in my car just broke the other day. Today I poured out some coffee to remember him by. *sigh
- numero10
I always thought they will last forever
- Fanco0
dont give your computers stupid names. in fact dont give them names.
its karma. your computer was produced in large quantities. there are millions just like it. it has no feelings. if you give it feelings, it will get depressed because of the stupid name you gave it. and then it will kill itself.