SuziQ, 500GB backup drives are approaching cheapness these days -- certainly not all that much more expensive than a bunch of DVDs and the time needed to burn 'em. I keep mine in the car in the the car on the theory that if something takes out the house, the car will survive (or vice versa).
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Theodosia - Oct 18, 2009 2:28:48 pm PDT #11394 of 25501
'we all walk this earth feeling we are frauds. The trick is to be grateful and hope the caper doesn't end any time soon"
le nubian - Oct 18, 2009 2:36:47 pm PDT #11395 of 25501
"And to be clear, I am the hell. And the high water."
I'm with Theo. You can get a great external drive pretty inexpensively. Good, reliable, external drives.
That said, are you sure your computer can read/write DVD-R and not DVD+R?
I purchased a spindle of blank DVDs from Amazon, and only about 50% seem okay to burn.
SuziQ - Oct 18, 2009 2:41:26 pm PDT #11396 of 25501
Back tattoos of the mother is that you are absolutely right - Ame
What is the difference between DVD-R and DVD+R?
Even if I had an external drive, the back-up process doesn't let me pick where to put the files, it automatically picks my DVD drive.
le nubian - Oct 18, 2009 3:08:47 pm PDT #11397 of 25501
"And to be clear, I am the hell. And the high water."
Suzi,
You should just copy the files (from the Itunes directory on your computer) and not use the Itunes process. That's what I did when I moved computers.
beekaytee - Oct 18, 2009 7:59:47 pm PDT #11398 of 25501
Compassionately intolerant
There are a lot of new-ish netbooks out there now, which are pretty stripped down, and most importantly INEXPENSIVE. Howver, it sounds like she wants a bigger screen because of vision issues, right?
Theodosia, I think the bigger screen thing is mostly for the luxury of it. She seems to have pretty good eyesight...perhaps even better than mine!
I kept trying to get her to buy a $400 refurbed Toshiba that looked great to me, but she kept wandering over to the 1K machines that are roughly 3 to 4 times what she really needs.
ND, I like the Toshiba's too and, believe me, I pushed hard on the Apple issue. I can't imagine why she is entrenched when ease of use would be so much higher with a Mac.
I'll look for a Toshiba model to contrast with the Dell and let her decide.
Gudanov - Oct 19, 2009 5:27:10 am PDT #11399 of 25501
Coding and Sleeping
My only laptop experience in Toshiba and it has worked well. I'd make sure to get Windows 7 on it, they've made some nice UI enhancements.
SuziQ - Oct 19, 2009 6:28:49 pm PDT #11400 of 25501
Back tattoos of the mother is that you are absolutely right - Ame
le nubian - thanks for the help. I have all my iTunes stuff on my new computer. Wheeeeeeeeee!
I also have a shiny new external hard drive and have backed up the old computer and have room for backing up the new one too!
le nubian - Oct 19, 2009 6:37:47 pm PDT #11401 of 25501
"And to be clear, I am the hell. And the high water."
awesome cakes! :-)
Theodosia - Oct 20, 2009 3:45:51 am PDT #11402 of 25501
'we all walk this earth feeling we are frauds. The trick is to be grateful and hope the caper doesn't end any time soon"
Yay SuziQ! Tech to the rescue!
beekaytee - Oct 20, 2009 7:08:26 am PDT #11403 of 25501
Compassionately intolerant
Update: Thanks to encouragement from ND and Gud, I steered my friends to the Toshiba Satellite L550. I'm excited for my oldster friend to have something she can rely on.
Much obliged gentlemen.