I need a little help pleeease!

[Morticia]

Hi!

 

My ex built this homemade Mac :pirate2: for me last year but now he's gone.

 

I haven't used it much and don't know a lot about it but I have a lot of video stuff I worked on last year saved up on the drive that I don't want to lose. I don't have anyway to back it up because it doesn't have a cd or dvd drive.

 

I am pretty sure it needs an update because it keeps asking me to do an update from apple but my ex warned me never to do that or it would trash the whole thing!

 

So, how do I update this thing without trashing it?

 

And where can I find some girly themes for it? It's sooooo plain and boring and guyish looking.

I want to change it up a little and the only thing I can figure out how to do is change the wallpaper! I could add themes when it was a windows pc but now I don't know..

 

 

Thank you!

[sarahbau]

You can backup to an external USB or FireWire (if your computer has it) drive. You could alternatively get a thumb drive if you don't have that much to backup, but I doubt you'd get much video on there. You don't necessarily need to update. If it's running fine, no reason to risk breaking it I say.

 

As for "girly" themes, I'm not sure where to get those. I've always liked the standard look of OS X. You can try ShapeShifter though. It might have some themes, but most of the ones I've seen are more utilitarian than the standard Aqua theme.

 

- Sarah

[Morticia]

You can backup to an external USB or FireWire (if your computer has it) drive. You could alternatively get a thumb drive if you don't have that much to backup, but I doubt you'd get much video on there. You don't necessarily need to update. If it's running fine, no reason to risk breaking it I say.

 

As for "girly" themes, I'm not sure where to get those. I've always liked the standard look of OS X. You can try ShapeShifter though. It might have some themes, but most of the ones I've seen are more utilitarian than the standard Aqua theme.

 

- Sarah

 

Hi Sarah!

 

Thank you so much for answering, I'm sooo up in arms. I've had this thing sitting in the corner for a few months, I was sort of depressed and didn't want to mess with it.

I kind of forgot what he showed me about it.

What I was hoping to do is sort of brighten it up a little, you know? It's like all grey and bland and yuky. Everything on it looks more like a workbench in the garage than like a desktop on a computer! It's grungy and depressing. I want to change all the colors up to some nice pastels and some hot pink and some nice icons! I can put wallpaper on it easy enough but that's all I've figured out how to do with it you know?

 

Last year I was editing some videos on it so the hard drive is like really, really full, (I think it's got a 320gig drive in it, at least that's what I paid for) and Mr. dummy :pirate2: took the DVD burner out when he left. It doesn't have firewire either, he took that too. No way the stuff will fit on a thumb drive. It has a USB port but it take like 4 years to download pictures from my camera. I have no idea what that's about! I think he messed it up just to be a jerk. Oh well.. I'm so afraid to mess it up, I don't want to lose my stuff and I'm scared to trash it, I don't think I could set this thing up. It took him like a week to do it and he was cursing the whole time and I mean a lot. It must have been hard to do.

 

I know it's not a real Mac, it's an old PC he converted for me because I got sick of stupid windows crashing like 20 times a day and ruining my stuff. I hate windows.

But one thing I did figure out in windows was how to use some program, I forget the name, to change stuff up to the way I like it. I just don't know what I'm doing yet with this thing.

I'm not too much a dumby so I think I will like this if I can ever get used to it.

 

This thing keeps telling me updates are available and it want's to download them but I always tell it no but it always comes back and asks me again next time. It's kind of annoying you know? I think it needs updates or fixing or something because some stuff isn't working right anymore after he did one update. It worked before he did then it quit and thats when he told me to never do that again. Stuff like it won't play quicktime stuff anymore and it doesn't work right when I try to edit videos now. I have no idea what to do. Oh, and iTunes is funny too, it's acting crazy too.

 

I know something is wrong but I don't know what to do and I'm afraid to try to do anything, I'm afraid I'll really break it! It just makes me want to go back to bed and cry.

 

I guess I shouldn't have let him mess with my PC. Now I'm like lost..

Can I even fix this thing? Or is it hopeless? I think I should just turn it off and forget about it. Maybe someday I'll figure out how to get my stuff off of it and I can get someone to reinstall the thing the right way so I can use it.

 

Thanks much dear!

 

P.S. I just remembered, how do I set my gender in the stupid profile here?

It keeps setting it to "don't ask" or something stupid no matter what I try.

Do they have something against girls here?

TTFN!!

[sarahbau]

I'd definitely suggest backing up if it's stuff you want to keep. You can get a DVD burner pretty cheap (around $30 for a good one from NewEgg), or you could get another hard drive. They're getting pretty cheap as well. I think my 500GB drive was only about $130. As for your quicktime problems, maybe someone else can help with that. I'm not sure what it could be.

 

Here are a bunch of themes for ShapeShifter - http://interfacelift.com/themes-mac/

[Morticia]

I'd definitely suggest backing up if it's stuff you want to keep. You can get a DVD burner pretty cheap (around $30 for a good one from NewEgg), or you could get another hard drive. They're getting pretty cheap as well. I think my 500GB drive was only about $130. As for your quicktime problems, maybe someone else can help with that. I'm not sure what it could be.

 

Here are a bunch of themes for ShapeShifter - http://interfacelift.com/themes-mac/

 

Oh thank you so much Sarah! :pirate2:

 

I'm really so lost and depressed over this whole thing. I wish I could afford a real Mac, life would be soooo much eaiser! What I think I need to do is have someone make me another Mac in a real PC, this one is in a little itty bitty Dell case that's about the size of a purse!

 

I watched him build it and there's like no room inside of it for anything. I don't think you can put anything else in it. He had to cut a hole in the case to put a cooling fan for the new video card so it would do the neat graphics. It gets really, really hot, it blows out hotter than a hair dryer! It's so hot is worries me! Can you believe that?

 

If I remember right, he had to take the DVD out to make room for the fan, maybe that's why he took it with him. I don't know but it's not in there or anywhere I can find. I don't think a regular DVD will even fit in there it's so tiny. I have an old windows 95 pc that you could put FOUR of these things inside it! Oh and he told me to take that pc and drop it in a pond so I guess it's useless. I don't think it works at all anymore, I can't remember.

 

Well, I guess for now I'll try those themes and wait a little before I decide what else to do with this thing. Maybe I can find some instructions here to fix it. I'm not really much good at this but maybe if I slow down and take my time I can figure it out.

 

Thanks again so much Sarah!

 

TTFN!