My laptop is dead.
Bob set up shop to see what could be done, did some googling of symptoms and found a probable cause of the machine’s demise.
There is a known problem with heat causing the soldering to come loose on the graphics chip and once that gets knocked out of place, there’s really no fixing it. The tumble the laptop took off the ottoman, while not severe, was probably enough to knock loose what was likely hanging on by a thread anyway. If this was actually the problem (all signs point to yes but we don’t know for a fact) it was really only a matter of time before the chip got knocked out and the machine died. That thing could fry eggs when it got a little dusty or when playing resource heavy games. It’s definitely not at all surprising that heat would be its eventual killer.
The hard drive is fine, so I didn’t lose anything. But I can’t uninstall or deactivate the licensed software installed to be able to reinstall on a new machine. Bob has a possible work-around for that, but we’ll see what happens.
We’re planning a trip to Microcenter on Sunday to see about finding me a new computer.
He works Saturday.
Again.
Boo and hiss.
You’d think I’d be excited by the prospect of a new computer, but I’m really FEH about the whole idea. Setting up a new machine is a pain in the ass and I’m not happy about losing access to some important programs I can’t exactly buy new copies of. Creative Suite is not exactly in the budget.
It seems to have come down in price considerably. My copy was $900-something at a massively discounted student rate.
The only reason I even have CS in the first place is from my short-lived run at online college classes. It was part of the required supply package. I’ve only actually used Photoshop and Soundbooth but I used them A LOT. If nothing else we should be able to call their customer service and work around the issue that way.
I guess I should be happy that my hard drive is actually okay. And we can afford to buy me a new machine right now without having to finance it. It’ll cut into our king-size bed fund, but I need a functional computer sooner than we need a new bed.
Damn us for being responsible with our money, no?
In the meantime I’m trying to steer away from my massive pity party by getting writing done. It’s only sort-of working.
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