As
Yogi Berra said, “It's like deja vu all over again”. The feeling
I get each time our Windows PC does something randomly stoopid out of
the blue. Every Windows PC owner knows the accompanying frustration
well, and that lost feeling of trying to solve the problem as the
unwanted “time suck” occurs, sometimes stretching across hours
and days. I recently had two such experiences. Perhaps they sound
familiar to you even if you don't use the exact same software
involved in my problems.
Episode
#1
The
first occurred a little over a week ago when I clicked on the tray
icon for Abobe Lightroom 6 in order to import and edit a single
photograph. Instead of the familiar main dialog of Lightroom I was
greeted with a tiny dialog titled “Server Busy”. It had three
buttons; “Switch Too” which did nothing, “Retry” which did
nothing, and “Cancel” which was disabled. Figuring that perhaps
Lightroom had not closed out properly last time I used it I decided
to restart Windows thus beginning one of the most common “time
sucks” in the Windows world, waiting for the system to start and
become usable. Tick, tick, tick. After the restart I clicked on the
Lightroom tray icon and voila … “Server Busy”.
A
Google search produced a nice little article from Adobe itself about
the server busy problem with a list of four possible solutions. The
first suggestion was to upgrade Lightroom to a newer version. This
was the last thing I wanted to do, especially since the last upgrade
from version 3 to 6 was a battle in and of itself. The second
suggestion was to disable the Windows Superfetch service. I have a
slight advantage over the average PC user when it comes to enabling
and disabling services since a huge chunk of the product I work on
for my job runs as Windows services. So I stopped the Superfetch
service and disabled it, after which Lightroom properly started.
It
would have been nice if that was the end of this particular saga but
it isn't. Although Lightroom was now working properly I noticed
several tasks, like starting Chrome and browsing common web sites
were very sluggish. What I have run into is an all too frequent catch
22 in Windows. There are multiple background tasks such as Superfetch
and Indexing that help a PC run faster yet have bugs and sometimes
use an excessive amount of CPU or cause disk thrashing. You can find
a lot of posts where people turn off these services to solve slowness
problems but you can also find a lot of posts where people turn on
these services to solve slowness problems. In my case I have now
turned Superfetch back on and made sure that Lightroom would start
properly (it did). I have the feeling that I will see the “Server
Busy” dialog sometime in the future and have to revisit this issue.
Tick, tick, tick.
Episode
#2
I
have been using Carbonite to automatically back up files on our
Windows PC for the last five years. About three years ago, when
reports of ransomware attacks started to surface, I realize that the
Carbonite backup could be made worthless if it automatically backed
up maliciously encrypted files. Doing periodic backups to an external
hard drive, something I had done for many years before buying our
current PC, seemed like good insurance. So I did a little research
and decided to use highly rated ShadowProtect by StorageCraft.
A
few days ago I started a full backup before going to bed in much the
same way I have many times over the past three years. In the morning
I discovered that the backup had failed with read error -31,
unexpected end of file. Once again turning to Google it looked like
the first thing to try was running Windows Chkdsk. So I went through
the process of requesting Chkdsk run after a restart and away it
went. Slowly, very slowly. Tick, tick, tick. So slowly that I left it
running and went to work. When I got home from work I fired up
ShadowProtect. Periodically checking on the backup status, the
progress bar was advancing as it always had. Until I came in to check
on it and Windows was at the logic screen. The backup had cause a
blue screen of death. Yes, this was becoming a major “time suck”.
Next
suggested solution was to upgrade to the latest version of Shadow
Protect. Which I did. Tick, tick, tick. Once the new version was
installed I fired up another backup, immediately noticing that it was
progressing along slower than the prior version (new compression
algorithm using more CPU?). Tick, tick, tick. Over three hours later,
blue screen. I opened a case on the StorageCraft web site. It's the
Friday before Christmas. I have the feeling I won't hear back from
them for days. I also have the feeling that when they do get back to
me the next set of suggestions will venture into the “Stoopid
Support Punt Zone” (remove all 3rd party software?).
So
I go back to an old friend and download Acronis TrueImage 2018. Once
installed I initiate a full backup. Tick, tick, tick. It worked!
The
Wait Begins
So
for now life on little Windows PC is back to normal. Looking forward
to hearing from StorageCraft so I can ask for a refund of the $19.99
yearly license fee I just payed less than a month ago. Also looking
forward to the next episode of Windows PC stoopidity, which is
inevitable. Tick, tick, tick.
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