Ok, I'm just going to have a bit of a gripe here.

I'm not very tech savvy when it comes to computers. I know how to turn them on, I know how to use (most) programmes. But what I don't know is how the hell my computer managed to delete half of my music files, specifically targeting the majority of my favourite music that I stupidly bought on iTunes and never backed up onto a DVD/CD. What I did do was back it up onto my external hard drive, and yet it managed to target them too!

I'm blaming Winamp. I had none of this trouble until my beloved oldest brother told me that Winamp was better to work with Windows Vista than iTunes (the only problem I've ever really had with iTunes is that it sometimes takes forever and a day to open). So I uninstalled iTunes and installed Winamp. Then Winamp went a little weird, so I uninstalled it and re-installed it. Worked fine...then it went a little weird. So I uninstalled it and re-installed iTunes. Which was fine until my brother told me where I was going wrong. So I uninstalled iTunes again! and re-installed Winamp. Started feeling like I was going around in circles and was beginning to get a little dizzy. So I took a time out, and went for a cuppa, and when I came back I decided to go with Winamp and upload all my music on it...again! Only this time, nothing happened. No music uploaded, which was very, very strange. At this stage, it was getting late, so I just uninstalled Winamp and shut down the computer. It was 4am, and really, my brain couldn't take it any more.

So this evening, I was helping a very blonde friend (in every sense of the word) to install iTunes on her machine and when I went to give her some of my music...it was gone. All gone. All my favourite stuff that I had gotten from my brother and/or trawled through the iTunes store for. MP3's, MP4's, stuff I'd ripped on older macines, stuff that iTunes had ripped for me...Eric Mongrain...gone. Justin King...gone. Gladiator sound track which I actually have the cd for - gone. Kodo Drums - 3 songs out of 12 remaining. I mean, come on!!! WTF is happening here! I mean, seriously! What the heck is the problem? The only thing I have to tell me what I have lost is the empty folders, some of which have some very obscure labels. I'm just lucky I know what QOTSA stands for. Which is lucky, because I actually have no idea what was in the folder labelled TCFSR. Or NC&TBSWR.

Honestly, what problem does my computer have with Jeff Buckley? Or Muse? And did it really have to delete all 4 albums? And then leave me with a hundred odd Beatles songs? Half of which I don't actually like!

I feel like crying...

Losing a Jeff Buckley collection is very worth crying over. Sorry about your troubles though. Maybe they just got transferred somewhere else. Best of luck anyway.

Every fight is a food fight to a cannibal. - Demetri Martin

Eesh... If you bought the albums from iTunes isn't there a way you can get a backup through your account without paying again?

Damn Spider pig

Unfortunately, the answer to that one is a big fat no. It's my own tough luck that my back-up failed too. I only wish I knew what I'd done wrong. I have to wait for my proper tech support guy (brother-in-law that's actually qualified) to come back from a work trip to Finland to see if he can try to find them. Rats!

:-(

Maz, are you sure the answer is no? Have you contacted them to find out? I lost all my music through my own stupid fault (failed to back up correctly when changing to my new computer), so I emailed them about it, and they let me have a one-off re-download of all the stuff I'd bought that they still had available.

Mrs G
The Garner who cares.

Yeah, do try, they should have your history and be able to let you have the stuff you've already paid for... In fact I have the opposite problem with the applications on my iPhone, some of the free ones I downloaded to try out and deleted after finding out they were crap, I can't get rid of... I delete them from my computer and the phone but when I sync the damn thing they come back because iTunes says I have "bought" them... curses!

Damn Spider pig

I emailed them straight off last night in the middle of my panic attack/mental breakdown (right before my friend made a tactical decision and took her laptop and left the vicinity). They got back to me by this afternoon and it was a categorical no. Which was nice of them.

At least I can go into my purchases and know exactly what I bought and what I *ahem* borrowed, from people. I can get a lot of the things back from friends, go down on my knees and beg my brother to borrow his external hard drive, so it will be ok...eventually...

Put the computer in the freezer.

"If I wanted to read Wuthering Heights, I'd shoot my self."

I'd much rather put the computer in a big hole and bury it...forgive the naivety but what exactly would a freezer acomplish that I can't...I know it's a machine, and therefore might have an affinity to other machines...but honestly?

Damn Spider pig

A parody of Roman's bad advice to Avgi, infuriating him.

Mrs G
The Garner who cares.

Damn...I was really hoping the freezer would turn into some kind of computer-whizz demi-god that would miraculously retrieve my files......now, who is the patron saint of lost things, and I wonder if they could help...I'd pray to Anoia if I could open a drawer and find them in there...hang on, files are kind of like drawers, right?....Oh Anoia....

But, back to seriousness, I've got half the music back on the computer and as soon as the tides are right and my brother stops staying at his girlfriend's and goes back to his island, I will have at least 2/3rds of the lost files back. And then I will back-up on a DVD. No external hard drives this time! I will beat this computer!...and all other technology that has beaten me! Even if it kills me.