The hard drive in my laptop died two weeks ago. I have experienced first had just how much of my daily life revolves around having a working machine on which I’ve stored most of the evidence of my intellectual life.
If I had not recently started to do backups, I would have been lost. I don’t know what I would have done as I would have lost years of work and materials that I’ve saved from my life.
So, create a backup your machines early and often. Become obsessed with backups.
I have not felt so disconnected with myself since my old Newton died. I have never managed to include a PDA in my life since that loss.
My purchase of a support contract proved itself to have been a great investment as well.
The patron gods of computing smiled on me this day. Now, I have to come to grips with the fallout from the last two weeks, but nothing nearly as horrible as it could have been.