All Narfed Up photography and words by Bryan Villarin

This morning, I found out that my computer has shut off without me telling it to. I powered it on, checked the BIOS log and saw that the CPU overheated. Then, I realized that the fan wasn’t spinning.

With my notebook, I searched for the part number found the closest part provider.

I need a Dell 9G180 Cooler for my Dell Optiplex GX240 (SFF). I think I’ll be ordering it from CWC Groups, which is located in Ontario, California.

This is inconvenient because tomorrow is a holiday, which means it should ship Tuesday and arrive Wednesday. I would email them to ask if I could just pick it up, but I wouldn’t be able to until Thursday anyway.

So, I can’t process photos from yesterday’s Flickr meetup because they’re already off my memory cards and on my desktop hard drive. I can process photos I take between now and Wednesday at work. I just won’t be as aggressive so I don’t have too many files to transfer later.

Nice way to kick me while I’m swamped at work. At least I’m too busy to notice, right? Meh. Cry me a river.

[Photo by Bryan Villarin - view on Flickr]

Update 5/27/08 11:15am PDT: I finally opened the computer to replace the cooler with one I borrowed from my office (temporarily). However, there were two problems.

1. The screws had no indentations in them to indicate a Philips or flathead screwdriver. I guess I can use small needle-nose pliers, but what the freak? I didn’t have any, so it’ll have to wait for tonight. However…
2. …some motherboard capacitors in the area around the heatsink were oozing.

This is all in vain and I need a new computer.

Looks like I’ll be out of commission for much longer than I anticipated.

I’m really depressed.

Update 5/29/08 1:40pm PDT: I’m back — sort of. The new fan has been running for 40 minutes. But, I’m moving personal data and copying essential program data/settings files off the Windows partition.

When I get the new computer, it should be simple to get my essential applications installed and setup without a hitch. (Specifically, Hamachi, Lightroom, JungleDisk, and µTorrent.)

This isn’t as much of a hassle because the hard drive isn’t messed up. I just need to figure out when I’m going to cut my losses and order the new computer parts. This Saturday?

At least I’m off work today. =/