laptop housekeeping - not very interesting

[baratron]

Yarg. On the basis that my computer has become unusably slow, I'm trying to clean it up. 2.52 GB free on D: and a mere 0.99 GB free on C: might go some way towards explaining the lag. The cleaning process is itself laboriously slow and involves a number of steps. I'm clearing off a load of crap, backing up everything that I care about to our storage box (called Earth, because that's where we keep our stuff), and eventually will defragment my hard drive, each partition separately.

First, I have to figure out what the crap is. I've acquired a huge amount of dubious software lately, and I don't know why. I think it all came on the "free" CD with my digital voice recorder. Some of it is essential - others, less so. Then, I have to fight with my obsessive hoarding tendencies (which are genetic). I've spent the night on irc saying things like "someone please tell me that I don't need Sims 2 neighbourhood backups from 2006". And I apparently have 4.84 GB of Sims 2 custom content that I downloaded but haven't got round to installing! Seems like I continued to compulsively download stuff even after I was bored with playing the game. Ye gods. Then, I have to decide whether I'm keeping it or not, and if so, where I'm keeping it. It is debatable whether I need all the original .zip or .rar files for Sims 2 and other downloads, but it's definitely true that, except for the most important programs, I don't need to carry them around on the laptop.

I've also discovered that my AVG antivirus program somehow got broken or corrupted, and hasn't been checking the hard drive at regular intervals like it should. Having fixed it the hard way (*complete* uninstall, delete and reinstall - then booting up avgui.exe manually), I have downloaded all the updates and have it scanning for spyware and viruses. Various people have recommended other antivirus/antispyware programs, which I will look into once the computer's running at a sensible speed again.

This is so boring, and I want to go to bed. At least, I will as soon as everything's on the network drive. Then I can set defrag running overnight.

Comments

[hatter.livejournal.com]

If you're not going anywhere for a while, you could just go for the rebuild option. Back everything up, new install, copy things back only as and when. Or just do that with your data partition/home directory. Or cave in and just get a bigger disk.


the hatter

[baratron.livejournal.com]

Not sure that my laptop came with anything other than a Windows XP recovery disc. I think everything was preinstalled on it - where "everything" includes a load of Vaio crap that I've never used and want to delete, but Richard fears Bad Things will happen if I do. And I'm certainly not going to go from a Genuine Licensed version of Windows to a dubious "backup" version!

The laptop seems to have sped up considerably again since Sunday night, so I'm happy enough for now.

[x-mass.livejournal.com]

two options
option 1 work on your need to hoard (issues around safety etc)

option 2 spend 20p on burning a DVD of sim2 downloads. Store disc in spindle pack for a 10 years, then either throw it away or reupload it to (new) earth who by that time will have exabytes of storage

that way you "kept it available"

[baratron.livejournal.com]

Do you think I don't already back up my data to CDs/DVDs? The problem is, I'm a professional paranoid, and I don't trust one disc or memory card as enough. My genuinely important data is stored on a minimum of two computers and on CD, and anything really really important gets backed up to a remote server as well - in case something happens to my house. I have a couple of years worth of photos that need to go online, and it makes me stressed that they're not up yet in case my hard drive and memory card both fail.

It's the irreplaceable stuff that I have issues with. If someone broke in and stole my Xbox and games, I wouldn't be worried about the hardware or software - I can buy it again. I'd be upset about the loss of the hard disc with all my saved games on. I've actually been wondering lately whether it's possible to copy those to a second storage device, Just In Case...