Tag Archives: computer

Dear Apple Computer

October 20, 20092009, angry, Life, Media, rantapple, computer, crying, honestyJessicaDoyle

I purchased a new 24″ iMac 2.93Ghz, 600GB Hard Drive from you on September 4th, 2009 for $2,149.00 CAD plus an additional $199 CAD for extended insurance coverage. I love my new computer and have loved using apple computers since 1993, when I first used a Quadra in art college.

Here is where the love stops.

I see today that you announce a new-better-faster 27″ iMac 3.06Ghz 1 TERABYTE hard drive priced at $1799.00 CAD that includes a standard wireless keyboard and mouse.

I began crying this evening because this is the third time that I have purchased a new computer from you and this is the third time in 10 years that within 2 months of my purchase you release a new version at a cheaper price point with much more bling and I am not compensated for being ripped off.

The first time I bought a Graphite iMac DV Special Edition 13GB hard drive in the summer of 1999 which was quickly outdated with a new iMac.

The second time I bought a 15″ Titanium Powerbook 60 GB hard drive 1GHZ G4 OS10.3.9 that didn’t come pre-installed with an airport card which I had to buy in January of 2004. The version you released immediately after that had OS10.4, more power and had the airport card pre-installed.

And now you’ve gone and done it again by releasing a new iMac. Seriously Apple, I’m upset and not feeling the love right now. I could use that extra $350 to heat my home this winter and the extra screen space and power and extra hard drive space to create and store pretty illustrations and graphics on. To top it all off, I can’t even use my Firewire 400 external hard drive or my Adobe Creative Suite with my new iMac because it only accepts a Firewire 800 cord and CS1 is incompatible with Snow Leopard.

I’m not impressed, and wish I could stop the tears from flowing down my cheeks. You could have told me to wait another month and half before making my purchase. That would have been the honest thing to do.

Three time’s a charm eh?

It arrived! New printer, the Epson R2880

November 25, 20082008, Art, Art supplies, funny, ink, International, papercats, computer, Epson R2880, feline, printerJessicaDoyle

And it is so pretty just sitting in the box.

epsonr2880-jessicadoyle

Me – It arrived!
Missy the grey cat – MEOW!
McGandy the orange Cat – Meow!

Me – Isn’t it cool! (Trying to hold back tears and jumping up and down while the delivery guy is still there waiting for my signature at the front door)
Missy – Meow. Can I get in the box now?
McGandy – Feed me.

epson-missy-the-cat

epson-cat-mcgandy

Needless to say, I can’t wait to test it out. I’ll be able to print on canvas, heavy card stock, watercolour paper and best of all be able to offer hand coloured reproductions of my ink drawings in limited editions. It prints using UltraChrome K3 pigment based inks which are waterproof and will last for up to 300 years under glass. I am currently using an HP Photosmart printer that prints with dye based inks which are not waterproof, will last for 70-100 years and am limited to letter sized heavy paper stock which isn’t bad… but this is better!

Last night I wrote to Epson with a pretty big question after reading through the documentation that accompanied the printer.

I may not be able to plug it into my computer! Uh…oh.

My computer – Titanium Powerbook G4, OS 10.3.9, 1GHZ, 512MB ram

Minimum requirements for Epson R2880 – G5, OS 10.3.9, 1.67GHZ or Intel, 1G ram (2G ram recommended)

Once I hear back from them and get the go ahead to plug in, I will. And, if they say don’t do it your PowerBook will blow up! I’ll simply purchase a new Macbook.

I can increase RAM and update my operating system, yet, I can’t go to G5 or Intel from G4 and can’t increase to 1.67GHZ from 1GHZ as that.is.impossible.

So, I have my cake and I need to wait to eat it.

^{…but it’s worth it!}

I’ll post a review as soon as I am technologically capable to.

Note to self – either use the flash or don’t use the flash when taking photos

Orange cat always wants food. She’s 18, so I usually give in and give it to her.

Grey cat is 11 and always wants into every box I open.

Brain. Fingers. Emotion. Computer?

November 19, 20082008, angry, brain, emotions, gobbly gook, internet, Life, workcomputer, emotion, rantjessicadoyle

I feel so sad right now. My emotions have run away with the circus.

My family is away. A very close friend, whom I love, is leaving tomorrow and I’m sitting here feeling sorry for myself. And words do not express how frustrating it is that my computer is so freaking slow.

No, the computer is not to slow; my brain and fingers are just too fast for this computer.

My fingers type key commands ever so quickly these days that the mac wheel just keeps turning, turning turning… all the while Photoshop, iPhoto, Firefox, Illustrator, inDesign and umteen other pieces of software refuse to do their job at the speed I need to them to do it in and continue processing processing processing. I don’t even know where to find the key commands in the menus anymore. I learn them, remember them and move on to the next one because it’s efficient.

When you’ve been using a mac since 1994 you become adept at making it work to capacity all the while being very efficient at operating three or more programs at once to get the job done, socialize and be productive.

Well, capacity was reached about TWO years ago!

Can I just freak out and not be calm for one minute.

RARWWWWWWWWWWW!

1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10…

And to top it all off most of the online software that would make my job easier is not supported by OSX 10.3.9 which is what I run on a Titanium G4 Laptop from 2003.

^{Rant done.

Thank you for listening.}

New HARD drive and Good Bye

May 19, 20082008, Anxiety, learning, Life, workcomputer, digital artjessicadoyle

My 2004 Titanium G4 laptop is not feeling so well. It’s very sick spitting up and quitting programs daily. Two weeks ago I bought a new back-up Lacie USB2 500GB external hard drive (left) to assist the 2004 Lacie firewire 80GB external hard drive (right) and the hundreds of CD’s I have burned as it has only 1.36GB left on it to store digital files on.

New Hard Drive

To put it plainly one of my little 2.5 by 3.5 inch miniatures scanned at 800dpi is 30MB to 45MB in size. Add to that number the a working file of 40MB to 50MB plus the web, print and pdf files for each scan. Burning CD’s as back-up is futile! And I do not own a DVD burner.

I do not store much music; perhaps 6GB at most. As I begin the daunting but enjoyable task of scanning and creating ready-to-print files of my original artwork the firewire drive has all but filled up. And my 60GB computer filled up quickly to.

And I know what happens when you do not back-up your files. In 2001 I lost (no my ex-husband lost) one full year’s worth of design and illustration freelance work while he was re-formatting the drive of MY computer. I will never never never never never let that happen again nor will I ever ever ever let anyone other than myself touch my computer.

This is how I make my living people. It costs money to buy these things. And when you lose a year’s worth of work in the blink of an eye… I had to decide quickly whether to buy the newest version of OSX as I still work on OSX10.9 (Panther) or buy a hard drive. The hard drive won of course.

Today, I begin the scary task of wiping clean then re-installing the operating system and software for my laptop. I am keeping it clean this time; the Adobe CS package and Firefox. I haven’t reformatted in two years and when I did it then, my laptop cried in exhaltation and the software was happy working toegther side by side co-existing and multi-tasking. I’m tired of photoshop quitting mid-color correction, inDesign freezing, files disappearing as though they were never created and firefox mixing things up. Worst of all I’ve been getting this little sheer multi-lingual black screen pop-up saying shut your computer down now all the while the screen slowly fading from the top right corner inwards, spreading grey, grey… lightening white.

So I’m shutting my computer down NOW. All the back-up and praying I can do is done. Wish me luck. Hope to see you later this evening.

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