i am mad

[swish513]

just after new year's, my comp got hit with some nasty malware. after trying everything under the sun, the only option i had was to reinstall windows.  i lost all of my pics/scans of my collections!!  anyone want to reshoot/rescan them? just kidding.

on a different note, sorry i've been away, but, well, with all my pics going bye-bye and not having purchased anything new for my collection since 2012, i haven't really felt like being on here. however, i just purchased a new coin, which means i'm getting back into collecting. new stamps are coming soon!

[khj]

Sorry to hear about your computer problems, but glad to see you are back in action again, Swish153!

new stamps are coming soon!

And we're looking forward to seeing them and hearing more from you!

k

[MikeC99]

Swish, sorry to hear about your computer problems but glad that you are back with us. My only advice is to periodically backup your data files. I don't back mine up often enough but I do back up my hard drive approximately every 4 months. Critical files I am working on are backed up on a 32 GB flash drive more often.
Mike

[swish513]

Mar 14, 2014 23:26:25 GMT -5 MikeC99 said:

My only advice is to periodically backup your data files. 

i didn't lose any genealogy data/pics. only bookmarks, which were easy enough to find again. personal pics (family, vacation, etc.) are on the original simcard. i only lost/have to re-do my coin and stamp collection pics. everything else is stored elsewhere in other various forms. but i appreciate the advice mike. maybe i will back up my collection pics.

[alanl]

It`s very important when using MS systems to put the OS on one
partition and store your data on another. When the system fails
(and it will) you can wipe it clean and reload without effecting
your data.

[zepherusbane]

Welcome back Swish!

[krash]

Hey Swish! I can relate because that just happened to me last fall and I lost so much information and posts for the forums I visit...It was absolutely sickening. So slowly but surely I'm rebuilding my stamp information. Glad you're back! Sincerely -Jeff

[ChickasawStampMan]

Know the feeling. My computer was under water.. hurricane katrina. My house was on stilts 10 foot high but still got waist deep water in my house. Lost about 1/2 of my stamps and $40,000 worth of tools. But we are alive, well, and mostly happy. I'm grmpy sometimes butthe wife straightens me out.... we have itgood in paradise.

[Craig]

Sympathy and empathy to you, Swish.

[Ebbo]

There are a few free programs you can use to recover lost file. Here is one. I know of a few others that I have personally used but forgot their names so if this one doesn't work let me know I will find the one that worked for me on my other computer.

www.piriform.com/recuva

Also, look at this list, it may help too.

pcsupport.about.com/od/filerecovery/tp/free-file-recovery-programs.htm

[khj]

Also, if you are NOT running the very latest Windows operating system and you know the DOS commands (yes, I'm that old), you can actually try to bypass the Windows bootup and jump into DOS. Then use DOS commands to copy your uncorrupted files over. A couple years ago I neglected to backup one of my PCs and critical Windows sectors and parts of other files got fried. But jumping into DOS, I was able to copy over 95% (over 50GB of data) onto an external hard drive. The only problem I had (besides the loss of 5% corrupted files) was the limit in pathname length in DOS. So some directories with very long pathnames I had to enter and copy those directories one by one. A good friend and computer repair specialist suggested that method to me (since he knew how old I was), and it worked better than I had expected.

k

[krash]

How are you making out with this Swish?

[Admin Bear]

SWISH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Welcome home my man, we missed you a great deal mister!

oh i am very excited to see your posts brother.. 3920004554

[JanetC]

If you use another server for your stamp pics like I do (servimg.com) all my collection photos are stored on that website. As soon as I scan and post them on here I delete them from my computer. The only thing I think that would hurt me more in a crash is losing all the bookmarks that I have to all the wonderful stamp information sites. I may copy and paste that into a word file and print that out.

Good luck getting everything back up and running.

Welcome back!!!

[swish513]

i appreciate all the advice everyone, but i'm just going to take new pics. it gives me something to do.

[cbavier]

Swish do you have only one computer? Also Best Buy sells external Hard drives for around 60 bucks that store everything including your operating system automatically so if something happens you can jusy go back to prior to the problem and restore everything. I have a MAC desktop and a PC Laptop and use "Dropbox". I would be happy to refer you to "Dropbox" and explain to you what it is and we both get extra space.

[tomd]

Welcome back Swiss.

We would still love to have you around weather you have new stamps or not.

Your knowledge is a great asset to all of us.

As far as your data, so sorry to hear that.

First of the year I had a hard drive crash, but I was lucky and The Apple Store was able to retrieve all my data.

BUT, I did go and buy an external backup hard drive to make sure I do not lose data.

I was putting it off, but now I see how lucky I was and maybe next time I won't.

Either way it is so great to have you back with us, you were missed!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[cbavier]

I use the external Hard drive for my MAC Desktop. Plus I use Drop Box. So anything I put in the Drop Box is found on both computers. Drop Box is free. Yea Swish we are anxious for you to share with us and welcome back to our little Den of Stamp Bears.