It never rains but it pours. What I was hopeful was just a cable or optical drive problem with my G5 desktop turns out to be a problem with the logic board: estimated repair cost 1700 bucks. Joy. So, now I get to decide between the cheap(er) prospect of an external optical drive for the G5, and possibly further problems with the logic board (first the optical drive was unreliable in reading discs, then it just stopped working altogether; this leads me to worry that further problems could result), and the more expensive prospect of replacing the G5 before I was hoping to with a new computer. Since I already have a nice monitor, and peripherals, a Mac Mini seems like the likeliest candidate here. An external optical drive that can also burn DVDs would seem to be about a third of that cost...
But, then, the laptop we were using as the "stand-in" computer while the G5 was in the shop started making alarming whizzing/whooshing noises as if the internal fan was going crazy, or the HDD spindle was suddenly making loud noises. No real "grinding", just loud whizzing. Hrm. Drive Utility says the file system is OK, but based on prior experience friends have had with the Hitachi HDDs inside iBooks, I now anticipate a Total HDD Failure sometime in the near future.
Aaaaand yesterday, our vaccuum cleaner stopped working.
This, on top of the three-quarters-of-a-grand repair bills we've dumped on our AC system in the past month?
Gah. Our house is in some sort of technology-failure-triangle, it seems...
But, then, the laptop we were using as the "stand-in" computer while the G5 was in the shop started making alarming whizzing/whooshing noises as if the internal fan was going crazy, or the HDD spindle was suddenly making loud noises. No real "grinding", just loud whizzing. Hrm. Drive Utility says the file system is OK, but based on prior experience friends have had with the Hitachi HDDs inside iBooks, I now anticipate a Total HDD Failure sometime in the near future.
Aaaaand yesterday, our vaccuum cleaner stopped working.
This, on top of the three-quarters-of-a-grand repair bills we've dumped on our AC system in the past month?
Gah. Our house is in some sort of technology-failure-triangle, it seems...