Sierra is Spanish for saw and is the name of Apple’s latest operating system OS 10.12.
However, it is not for everybody. It has lots of gotchas that will cost the unwary in time and money.
When you upgrade, it moves your entire Document folder to iCloud. One, the Document folder may contain more data than you have room for in your iCloud account. Two, you will have to always have access to the web to access your data.
The first is not a big problem in that Apple will ask you to upgrade your iCloud space. In my case, 50GB cost me 99 cents a month, automatically taken out of my checking account.
The second can be a really big problem if you either work offline a lot or have limited wireless service. Although I did the upgrade at a coffee shop, I think home usage added a couple of GBs in only a day or two.
My current plan is for 15GB per month and I generally use about 8GB. It used to be rather simple to calculate total prices, but it seems that AT&T is making calculations even more obscure. I gave up for now trying to calculate the cost of unlimited service.
At least I have a nearby AT&T store. I plan to stop by soon for a power-cord gadget. I’ll ask if they can help me calculate the true cost to a significant upgrade.
I think I have all the really important, current “Document” data moved off iCloud and accessible without an internet connection. Now the next question is how do I back that data up to iCloud at my convenience.
P.S. I found out that the latest Epson software for my printer is valid for older operating systems. The list only gives the latest two OS’s but another page shows it would work for several older OS’s. Sigh!
Showing posts with label printer. Show all posts
Showing posts with label printer. Show all posts
Tuesday, July 25, 2017
Thursday, July 20, 2017
Computers under the control of magicians
How many of you are old enough to remember:
“The computer for the rest of us” and
“1984 will not be like 1984”
These were two of the slogans that Apple used in 1984 when it introduced the Mac. I loved it with its WIMP interface (Windows, Icons, Menus, Pictures). Almost everything you needed to know was on the screen.
Many Mac users of that time were eager for the newest operating system or newest Mac: hard drives, multi-tasking, color.
I can’t pinpoint when it all changed, but I stopped looking forward to the latest operating system. Features that worked fine on OS P were a nightmare on OS Q. It seemed that the gratuitous changes were made only to keep programmers employed. Or that a new set of programmers had to do it their way no matter what most long-time customers wanted.
This has been one of those bad years for me.
Sometime in March or April, Apple made a minor update. It did not seem like a big deal and I installed it. I found out much to my chagrin that my Epson WF-3640 would no longer accept paper from anything but Tray 2. I thought the machine didn’t work and exchanged it with Best Buy on a warranty. The second one did the same thing.
After a couple of calls to Epson I learned that Apple had changed the print dialog to all the information the user needed from being on the screen to being buried under certain choices. Once I had that info, I could print from whatever tray I chose.
Then Apple provided a gratuitous “EPSON Printer Software Update, Version 3.3”. I downloaded and installed it. Now my printer didn’t work at all!
A third person at Epson said it was my cable. Well, as I talked to him, I did have my external hard drive connected, not the printer. But when I was off the phone and had the proper connection, it still didn’t work.
I next tried the the friendly folks at Geek Squad. I described the basic problem and they were ready to set me up with a Geek Squad account. Each time I got near the bottom of the payment window it would disappear. What were they ready to blame: my browser (Safari). What? There are dozens of payment windows that work just find with Safari.
I had to go elsewhere and excused myself.
Today, I despaired and went to Best Buy to buy another cable. i also bought a couple of thumb drives to replace those that I “crashed” by taking them out of the USB slot before closing them. Another story for another day maybe.
I plugged my new cable into my MacBook and into the printer. Nothing happened. I couldn’t print.
I didn’t keep track of the buttons I pushed on the printer and the computer, but the results varied widely as to what happened. Eventually my Mac and my Epson printer connected properly with one another. I really don’t want to be a scientist who keeps meticulous notes on every step and every observation. After all, the Mac is the computer for the rest of us. And after 58 years being involved with computers (from punched cards to rooms full of tape drives) I just want to be an ordinary user.
Then I exchanged the new cable for the old cable. Everything worked as it should.
As a senior wailed in the computer lab when I was a graduate assistant, “That isn’t what I meant!
“The computer for the rest of us” and
“1984 will not be like 1984”
These were two of the slogans that Apple used in 1984 when it introduced the Mac. I loved it with its WIMP interface (Windows, Icons, Menus, Pictures). Almost everything you needed to know was on the screen.
Many Mac users of that time were eager for the newest operating system or newest Mac: hard drives, multi-tasking, color.
I can’t pinpoint when it all changed, but I stopped looking forward to the latest operating system. Features that worked fine on OS P were a nightmare on OS Q. It seemed that the gratuitous changes were made only to keep programmers employed. Or that a new set of programmers had to do it their way no matter what most long-time customers wanted.
This has been one of those bad years for me.
Sometime in March or April, Apple made a minor update. It did not seem like a big deal and I installed it. I found out much to my chagrin that my Epson WF-3640 would no longer accept paper from anything but Tray 2. I thought the machine didn’t work and exchanged it with Best Buy on a warranty. The second one did the same thing.
After a couple of calls to Epson I learned that Apple had changed the print dialog to all the information the user needed from being on the screen to being buried under certain choices. Once I had that info, I could print from whatever tray I chose.
Then Apple provided a gratuitous “EPSON Printer Software Update, Version 3.3”. I downloaded and installed it. Now my printer didn’t work at all!
A third person at Epson said it was my cable. Well, as I talked to him, I did have my external hard drive connected, not the printer. But when I was off the phone and had the proper connection, it still didn’t work.
I next tried the the friendly folks at Geek Squad. I described the basic problem and they were ready to set me up with a Geek Squad account. Each time I got near the bottom of the payment window it would disappear. What were they ready to blame: my browser (Safari). What? There are dozens of payment windows that work just find with Safari.
I had to go elsewhere and excused myself.
Today, I despaired and went to Best Buy to buy another cable. i also bought a couple of thumb drives to replace those that I “crashed” by taking them out of the USB slot before closing them. Another story for another day maybe.
I plugged my new cable into my MacBook and into the printer. Nothing happened. I couldn’t print.
I didn’t keep track of the buttons I pushed on the printer and the computer, but the results varied widely as to what happened. Eventually my Mac and my Epson printer connected properly with one another. I really don’t want to be a scientist who keeps meticulous notes on every step and every observation. After all, the Mac is the computer for the rest of us. And after 58 years being involved with computers (from punched cards to rooms full of tape drives) I just want to be an ordinary user.
Then I exchanged the new cable for the old cable. Everything worked as it should.
As a senior wailed in the computer lab when I was a graduate assistant, “That isn’t what I meant!
Friday, May 06, 2016
Helping the help desk
When my old Epson Workforce printer became erratic, I bought a new one from Best Buy (my four-year warranty on the old one paid for most of it). The Workforce 3640 is similar i many ways, but quite different in others.
The old one would print business cards without a problem. The new one often chewed them up and jammed. Today each try jammed.
I looked at the Epson website to see if there was a recommended paper or other solution. I found nothing.
I asked Best Buy’s Geek Squad (online chat) if there was any recommended paper. I was told to check with a store.
I did another search and found that there is a rear feed. This is meant for single feed of paper or envelopes. See https://www.epson.com/cgi-bin/Store/support/supDetail.jsp?UseCookie=yes&infoType=FAQ&oid=232592&prodoid=6309.
It took a bit of doing to have the job started and the feed the paper, but I got the hang of it. When I did a second sheet just now it was a piece of cake.
I went back to the Geek Squad chat and left a heads up for them. The agent replied “awesome”.
It sometimes amazes me how I find a solution that the “experts” didn’t think of. Of course, I’ve been solving (and creating) computer problems for 57 years. It doesn’t mean I could earn big bucks, but I think it gives me a bigger incentive to find a solution somehow.
The old one would print business cards without a problem. The new one often chewed them up and jammed. Today each try jammed.
I looked at the Epson website to see if there was a recommended paper or other solution. I found nothing.
I asked Best Buy’s Geek Squad (online chat) if there was any recommended paper. I was told to check with a store.
I did another search and found that there is a rear feed. This is meant for single feed of paper or envelopes. See https://www.epson.com/cgi-bin/Store/support/supDetail.jsp?UseCookie=yes&infoType=FAQ&oid=232592&prodoid=6309.
It took a bit of doing to have the job started and the feed the paper, but I got the hang of it. When I did a second sheet just now it was a piece of cake.
I went back to the Geek Squad chat and left a heads up for them. The agent replied “awesome”.
It sometimes amazes me how I find a solution that the “experts” didn’t think of. Of course, I’ve been solving (and creating) computer problems for 57 years. It doesn’t mean I could earn big bucks, but I think it gives me a bigger incentive to find a solution somehow.
Friday, March 04, 2016
A lot has happened since you last read this column!
Have you gotten tired of Facebook or Classmates sending you email like this?
I dropped Facebook long ago because what generally happened was a half-sister posted yet another picture of her yard. I ignore Classmates because the great news is that someone who I didn’t know posted something or other.
Well, you may or may not be interested in the “lot” that happened to me last week. If not, go on to something else, If you are curious, I hope to reward you with a few chuckles.
At least twice last week, I woke up with some stupendous ideas for this column, mostly about politics and billionaires. I should have gotten up and written them down, but I preferred trying to go back to sleep. I would remember these great ideas in the morning. Of course, they faded with the rising sun.
Well, a few annoyances happened and they are hard to forget.
My printer started producing broken letters. I twice tried the nozzle cleaning procedure, but the test papers came out even worse. I even replaced the one ink cartridge that was low.
The warranty was about six weeks shy of running out. Oh, well, for a few dollars, it’s hardly worth making a claim.
I looked up a few printers on Best Buy, and of course my model was no longer sold. And of course, none of the current printers used the ink jet cartridges of my model. I selected a model that was similar in functions, took my old printer to be recycled, and at the last minute took the receipt for the old printer.
When I got to Best Buy, I took in the tray that accepted envelopes. I hoped I could use it in the new printer so that I didn’t have to change the paper in a tray.
I looked over the model I had selected and it looked like a good replacement. As I really knew, the old tray wouldn’t fit. I asked a clerk a few questions including how to recycle the old printer. He said to bring it in a cart.
I went to check out, paid for my new printer and some ink cartridges. I couldn’t find my Rewards card but the cashier looked it up. I took my purchases out to the car and brought in my old printer for recycling. I gave the clerk at customer service the old printer and my story. When I gave him the receipt for the old printer, he said that I had a replacement warranty! I could have paid for the new printer with the old printer.
I still couldn’t find my Rewards card, and so he gave me an in-store card for future purchases. I had no idea what I would be using it for in the near future, but as you will read, I soon found a use for some of the credit.
I took the printer home and started to set it up according to the instructions. Things went smoothly except for setting up wi-fi on my modem and on my computers.
Then I tried printing some business cards. The printer broke the card stock apart and jammed. Check instructions. Open back panel. Pull out pieces of card stock, broken along the perforations and crumbled. Also pull out pieces from the front. Put back panel back, but it won’t fit. Just which way does this thing go in? I think it took me ten minutes to do it right.
Print a sheet of business cards and leave for a meeting, finally. This was Thursday.
On Friday, we headed to the Twin Cities. As I often do on trips of an hour or more, I use my iPhone and a low-power FM gadget to play podcasts through the car radio. Except the gadget didn’t work! The power light was on, but the radio frequency lights wouldn’t come on. Nothing I tried would change the situation.
So, we spent two hours barely hearing “To the Best of Our Knowledge” (ttbook.org). I had the iPhone between the seats and we could barely hear the speaker above the road noise. At least we learned more about the operations of Coca Cola than we had known before.
When we got to the Twin Cities, we headed first to the Roseville Best Buy store.
We couldn’t find the same make of FM gadget, but we did find one that was considerably less expensive and automatically found the most open station.
I paid for it with my rewards card and the in-store credit card. I still couldn’t find my rewards card, but I could use the email message on my phone about the rewards credit I received for the printer purchase.
We next stopped at a grocery store. While my wife shopped, I installed the FM gadget. It gave me 88.1 as the frequency and I could hear the podcast scratchily. I reread and reread the instructions, but no matter what I did, I couldn’t get a clear signal.
Because the reception changed as we changed direction, we figured that we were getting interference from the humongous antennas in Shoreview.
Before we left the Twin Cities, we tried again in a Caribou parking lot. We reread the directions and tried again. We were able to listen to a podcast with a minimum of static. We were still within sight of the Shoreview towers.
Oh, I also found my Best Buy Rewards card. It was in my wallet all along. It is silver-gray, not blue and yellow!
We have three lessons here that we constantly forget. One, read the directions first and understand them. Two, when looking for something in your wallet, make sure you see the face of every card. Will I forget the next time? Does the sun rise every morning? Three, I found one of the lost middle-of-the-night notes. It was in a folder I didn’t check. Sorry, it’s more about billionaires.
I dropped Facebook long ago because what generally happened was a half-sister posted yet another picture of her yard. I ignore Classmates because the great news is that someone who I didn’t know posted something or other.
Well, you may or may not be interested in the “lot” that happened to me last week. If not, go on to something else, If you are curious, I hope to reward you with a few chuckles.
At least twice last week, I woke up with some stupendous ideas for this column, mostly about politics and billionaires. I should have gotten up and written them down, but I preferred trying to go back to sleep. I would remember these great ideas in the morning. Of course, they faded with the rising sun.
Well, a few annoyances happened and they are hard to forget.
My printer started producing broken letters. I twice tried the nozzle cleaning procedure, but the test papers came out even worse. I even replaced the one ink cartridge that was low.
The warranty was about six weeks shy of running out. Oh, well, for a few dollars, it’s hardly worth making a claim.
I looked up a few printers on Best Buy, and of course my model was no longer sold. And of course, none of the current printers used the ink jet cartridges of my model. I selected a model that was similar in functions, took my old printer to be recycled, and at the last minute took the receipt for the old printer.
When I got to Best Buy, I took in the tray that accepted envelopes. I hoped I could use it in the new printer so that I didn’t have to change the paper in a tray.
I looked over the model I had selected and it looked like a good replacement. As I really knew, the old tray wouldn’t fit. I asked a clerk a few questions including how to recycle the old printer. He said to bring it in a cart.
I went to check out, paid for my new printer and some ink cartridges. I couldn’t find my Rewards card but the cashier looked it up. I took my purchases out to the car and brought in my old printer for recycling. I gave the clerk at customer service the old printer and my story. When I gave him the receipt for the old printer, he said that I had a replacement warranty! I could have paid for the new printer with the old printer.
I still couldn’t find my Rewards card, and so he gave me an in-store card for future purchases. I had no idea what I would be using it for in the near future, but as you will read, I soon found a use for some of the credit.
I took the printer home and started to set it up according to the instructions. Things went smoothly except for setting up wi-fi on my modem and on my computers.
Then I tried printing some business cards. The printer broke the card stock apart and jammed. Check instructions. Open back panel. Pull out pieces of card stock, broken along the perforations and crumbled. Also pull out pieces from the front. Put back panel back, but it won’t fit. Just which way does this thing go in? I think it took me ten minutes to do it right.
Print a sheet of business cards and leave for a meeting, finally. This was Thursday.
On Friday, we headed to the Twin Cities. As I often do on trips of an hour or more, I use my iPhone and a low-power FM gadget to play podcasts through the car radio. Except the gadget didn’t work! The power light was on, but the radio frequency lights wouldn’t come on. Nothing I tried would change the situation.
So, we spent two hours barely hearing “To the Best of Our Knowledge” (ttbook.org). I had the iPhone between the seats and we could barely hear the speaker above the road noise. At least we learned more about the operations of Coca Cola than we had known before.
When we got to the Twin Cities, we headed first to the Roseville Best Buy store.
We couldn’t find the same make of FM gadget, but we did find one that was considerably less expensive and automatically found the most open station.
I paid for it with my rewards card and the in-store credit card. I still couldn’t find my rewards card, but I could use the email message on my phone about the rewards credit I received for the printer purchase.
We next stopped at a grocery store. While my wife shopped, I installed the FM gadget. It gave me 88.1 as the frequency and I could hear the podcast scratchily. I reread and reread the instructions, but no matter what I did, I couldn’t get a clear signal.
Because the reception changed as we changed direction, we figured that we were getting interference from the humongous antennas in Shoreview.
Before we left the Twin Cities, we tried again in a Caribou parking lot. We reread the directions and tried again. We were able to listen to a podcast with a minimum of static. We were still within sight of the Shoreview towers.
Oh, I also found my Best Buy Rewards card. It was in my wallet all along. It is silver-gray, not blue and yellow!
We have three lessons here that we constantly forget. One, read the directions first and understand them. Two, when looking for something in your wallet, make sure you see the face of every card. Will I forget the next time? Does the sun rise every morning? Three, I found one of the lost middle-of-the-night notes. It was in a folder I didn’t check. Sorry, it’s more about billionaires.
Thursday, July 30, 2015
Why do I know more than tech support?
Well, not in all cases. Probably more often tech support knows far more than I do about a given problem.
In too many cases, I get advice that is way off-base or misleading.
We are going to “cut the cord” soon and go completely wireless. Among other things, we have to change how we use our wireless printer. Rather than go through our modem/router, we will have to use a cable and switch the cable between computers.
I looked and looked at the manual for where the connections were. I found mention of using USB or Ethernet cables, but I could find no diagram showing where the connections were.
I sent email to tech support of the manufacturer and received a reply in less than 12 hours.
As usual, the flowery answer didn’t really answer the question. On first blush! The answer contained a diagram of the back of the printer. The diagram labeled the connections. Way in the middle of the side farthest from me were a USB port and a LAN port.
The USB port takes a connector different from the flat connector most of us are used to.
What’s a LAN port? I should know the answer but don’t. Look it up: Local Area Network! The cable for a LAN is an Ethernet cable! Smack me upside the head! I knew that! But, the directions never use the two terms together. What are poor non-techies to do with such a gap.
Before I got the answer from tech support, I tried printing with the modem’s phone line disconnected. It worked! Ah ha! The modem is the router, not the Apple Time Machine. So, we have to keep the modem when we “cut the cord”. However, if the modem conks out, then I know how to use the Ethernet cable.
What amazes me is that nobody would hire me in my 60s for this problem solving ability. Now in my 70s, I too often know more than tech support!
What amazes me even more is the people who complain about government inefficiency never consider the rampant inefficiency in too many corporations.
In too many cases, I get advice that is way off-base or misleading.
We are going to “cut the cord” soon and go completely wireless. Among other things, we have to change how we use our wireless printer. Rather than go through our modem/router, we will have to use a cable and switch the cable between computers.
I looked and looked at the manual for where the connections were. I found mention of using USB or Ethernet cables, but I could find no diagram showing where the connections were.
I sent email to tech support of the manufacturer and received a reply in less than 12 hours.
As usual, the flowery answer didn’t really answer the question. On first blush! The answer contained a diagram of the back of the printer. The diagram labeled the connections. Way in the middle of the side farthest from me were a USB port and a LAN port.
The USB port takes a connector different from the flat connector most of us are used to.
What’s a LAN port? I should know the answer but don’t. Look it up: Local Area Network! The cable for a LAN is an Ethernet cable! Smack me upside the head! I knew that! But, the directions never use the two terms together. What are poor non-techies to do with such a gap.
Before I got the answer from tech support, I tried printing with the modem’s phone line disconnected. It worked! Ah ha! The modem is the router, not the Apple Time Machine. So, we have to keep the modem when we “cut the cord”. However, if the modem conks out, then I know how to use the Ethernet cable.
What amazes me is that nobody would hire me in my 60s for this problem solving ability. Now in my 70s, I too often know more than tech support!
What amazes me even more is the people who complain about government inefficiency never consider the rampant inefficiency in too many corporations.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)