It’s the last 2 weeks of the semester, and things are beginning to spiral out of control, right on time as usual. It seems that every year around this time, my list of things to do gets bigger everyday, even though it should be getting smaller. And it never fails that something catastrophic will happen. And this year certainly doesn’t disappoint…
Yesterday I was studying for an E&M 2 test all day long, because our professor had threatened to make it a very hard test, with a double stub impedance matching problem with a Smith Chart, which aren’t exactly the easiest problems in the world. So I’m arms deep in my textbook, with papers all around, and my computer starts freaking out.
My trusty old iBook has been on the last legs of its life for a while now, and I’ve been preparing myself for its inevitable demise. It randomly shuts itself off, but not before displaying LSD induced images on the screen. And the left speaker has been on the fritz for quite a while. Well yesterday the speaker started one of its episodes again (basically it emits this very loud vibrating/popping noise). It kept going for a minute or two, and then with a loud pop, the computer turned off. I’ve been trying to revive it since last night, but nothing has worked. My hunch is that the speaker caused a short somewhere on the motherboard, and that’s why it won’t turn on. So now I’m computerless, when I was hoping to have a bit more time to save up for a shiny new MacBook Pro.
But before I can lay my iBook to rest, I have to remove its brain. See, my iBook guards a good portion of my life on its hard drive, and I have to rob it of that data before it can be sent to computer heaven. So this afternoon I’m going to crack open its white plastic case (for the 2nd time) and take out his hard drive, so that I can pull the data off onto the iMac. I’m secretly hoping that the source of the problem is just a minor short, and that I can play Dr. Frankenstein and resurrect my little white friend. But if not, I suppose that there’s a shiny metal friend in my future sometime soon.
Rest in Peace iBook, I will miss you :(
You could apply all of your E&M knowledge to the resurrection of the iBook. I haven’t taken mine apart yet - it’s too new and shiny. Although I did have to reset the power management unit, but that didn’t require opening the case.
Ugh…brilliant timing, eh? Here’s hoping that your Frankenstinian operations can resurrect the iBook at least until the tests are over…
The good thing is you should have plenty of $$$ for a shiny new computer once you start working, no? :-)
Looking forward to seeing you at graduation!
i guess the bizarre methods i use to revive my thinkpad wouldn’t work on an ibook, would they? really, it doesn’t seem like removing the power sources and holding down the start button should work, but for some reason, it does.
poor ibook. :(