Summer is just around the corner, but I recently realized there’s still some more Spring cleaning for me to do. A couple of weeks ago, my ATI All-In-Wonder 2006 AGP video card started acting flaky when using it to watch TV. I’ve used ATI video capture cards for about 7 years. There are only two things, in my experience, that cause that problem:  Windows update driver incompatibility, or card failure. Of course, it was card failure.

It was while removing the faulty video card that I discovered the additional “Spring cleaning” awaiting me—my computer system. Out came the Shop-Vac and the dust and cobwebs were soon things of the past. A mini air compressor is just the thing to blow the junk out of the power supply, and a detailing brush finishes the details the compressor and vac missed. Once the replacement video card arrives, I’ll test it in the system, and then re-load my machine from scratch. I'll most likely bump the memory up to over 1GB as long as I have everything down and opened. The end result will be well worth the effort and the machine will run like new!

My main workstation at home is a ‘can’t live without’ type of machine for me. I figured I would just toss in a spare AGP card, put in a spare Hauppauge PVR-150 PCI tuner card, and call it a day. Would you believe I didn’t have the spare AGP card I thought I had?

After a trip to the store to get a spare AGP, I figured all would be right with the universe—then I found out the new video card didn’t come with the HDMI adapter. Good news!  I had an adapter on hand!  The world is looking up!  Of course, that joy was short-lived when it was eclipsed with the knowledge that the Hauppauge PVR-150 card was DOA!  Guess we won’t be watching TV after all!

Sooner or later, a disaster of some type happens and data is at risk. With the advent of cheap digital storage, our fingerprint of existence has moved into digital collections of files—audio, video, documents, etc.—our data loss risk has reached new highs.

Consider for a moment - what if your computer becomes lost, stolen, or destroyed, then what will you do?  Do you have backups of what you can't live without?  I would hope that every person reading this can say they have backups—but I'd be willing to bet less than half do. I'd also be willing to bet that even those who've suffered some sort of unrecoverable loss still don't keep their backups up to date.

Where are your backups?  If you're like most people who DO actually keep current backups, they are probably in your house. Maybe you've taken the extra step and put them in your safe. Those are good first steps for local storage, but they only give protection in the event of a system failure. What if something happens to your home such as fire, theft, or flood?  How safe and reliable will those backups be?

These questions became important to me when planning my approach for converting my paper documents to digital. When it became apparent that my paper-storage currently had NO backup, I decided it was time to move it digital. After all, how many people have off site backups of their hard copy data?

In February, I set up an account with Carbonite (http://www.carbonite.com). They provide off-line over-the-Internet encrypted backup with unlimited storage for $49.95/yr/computer. You can't touch backup media for that price. Think of it as insurance. That's less than $5/month for piece of mind of recoverable, off-site, encrypted storage!

In any event, don't put off maintenance and backup strategy. Dusting out the cobwebs and checking under the hood can prolong equipment life—particularly fans. If there's data you can't risk losing, then re-evaluate your backup methods and address any gaps.

Are the odds good you'll ever face catastrophic loss?  Well, that depends. All equipment has a "mean time before failure" average. This isn't your 'odds of winning'—it is a life expectancy value. The longer one goes without a failure means the closer an imminent failure looms. During a recovery phase is NOT the time to find out backups were lacking. Enough gloom and doom…

Now that the warm weather is here, I can resume work on my car-PC project. At the moment, it is comprised of a laptop whose damaged screen was removed and replaced with an external touch-screen. It's connected to a Garmin USB GPS device. I was last working with Roadnav (http://roadnav.sourceforge.net/) for a GPS replacement. Right now, I'm just working with separate ideas of things I would like to include in a full-fledged setup in a newer vehicle.

Last summer I didn't get a chance to work on my arcade cabinet I've been building. The control deck and body of the cabinet are all rough-cut wood for 'proof of concept'. This beast looks like an arcade cabinet, and plays like one, but it's very rough around the edges. I need to finalize the cabinet structure and then work on re-working the control deck with better ergonomics.

Last year I finished a picture-frame computer. It is built from a laptop that is not really useful by today's standards as a workstation, but runs Linux and Windows 98 just fine. The case was all cracked up and damaged. For $20 I picked up a shadow-box frame from a craft store, and ordered a sheet of aluminum to mount the parts, and made a picture frame.

Well, with all these things going on, I best get going!  See you at the next SIG!