Same thing happened to me in June. New hard drive was $150, same day service. Sadly, I lost all my data. I have some of my photos on flash drives

If you have Amazon Prime you already have a place to backup your photos.

Oh, SS isn't much more $$ than spinny any more.

I do have Prime and my Echo Show will show my photos right now..even with the hard drive gone. So, I'm thinking I should be able to download the photos on the new hard drive when I get it tomorrow. (from the Amazon Cloud)

Love RAID.

mdadm --manage /dev/md0 --fail /dev/sdc
mdadm --manage /dev/md0 --remove /dev/sdc

Power off, replace drive

mdadm --manage /dev/md0 --add /dev/sdc

Go for coffee. Motherboard dies? No worries.... software RAID. Plug in drives to new machine and power on, everything should come up just fine if you keep same drive positions (ie, /dev/sda stays as /dev/sda in new machine). Managing and mounting by UUID is a good way to help this.

Laptops are considered "disposable data" since I use mine so infrequently. When I do need to use it (traveling), I simply rsync various important settings and data directories over and then manually copy back anything needed on return.

Work stuff? We're back to the mdadm but on steroids at the enterprise level, personal stuff on local cloud-like array and code email etc on a server somewhere. I can nuke my work machine and be back up and running about an hour after a replacement is delivered.

Just back home with the Dell computer. Started it up and all my bookmarks and passwords were saved...just had to click on the cookie boxes for the first time.

Went to photo file....empty :mad:

Went to Amazon and signed in....all the photos are on their photo file site now...no problem...that'll work.
If I weren't a Prime member...they wouldn't have been saved.
Non-members can still have it done...but there is a monthly fee.

[QUOTE=stevej37;11779569] By swapping to SS, your computer will probably feel like it had a super charger and a turbo charger added.

Not based on my experience, but based on what I've heard, the SS will probably NOT last 12 years.

Steve, I'd highly recommend getting one or better yet, 2 external HD to backup your photos and/or anything else that you don't want to lose.

I got a couple of these - https://smile.amazon.com/Passport-Portable-External-Drive-Black/dp/B07VP5X239/
In addition to backing up to our NAS drive.

That's great news. We've lost some photos in the past, not too many, but losing any sucks.

^^^ It will make paying the $125 (or $139) yearly Prime fee easier.

I actually have no complaint with the fee....I stream Prime Movies all the time.

I'll have to look into that. I've got Prime (for years now), and a bunch of pics. Having another level of backup isn't a bad idea.

On the left side of their home page is a drop-down marked 'All' for Amazon Photos.
I can't remember if I had to sign up. The pics might be there already...not sure.

I do know that you need the app for mobile use.

Raining here...good chance to try this new SSHD out.
Impressively fast....maybe part of that was the age of my old one.

Over-all, I'm very happy with it.

I’ve been using Amazon prime to store all of my pictures when it mentioned a while back. Unfortunately, my pictures were lost 15+ years ago.

The day that he replaced my HD...I ordered a replacement battery from Amazon for $30. The 12 year old one would only last maybe 5 minutes before needing to be plugged in.

It arrived today....I should have done this years ago.
Now my Dell is just as good (or better) than it was new. It's just like getting your car engine rebuilt. :)

Before I replaced the battery...a few minutes of use and I could hear the cooling fan running.
Now...it's silent. I'm almost wondering if something is wrong.

Could a laptop battery make that much difference?

Could be. Drawing too much current to charge.

I bought a usb to sata/ide drive adapter from amazon and used it to plug desktop and laptop drives into my laptop, looking for data on old computers before I trashed them. Worked well for $20, maybe that will read your old drive data?

^^^ I'm not sure I could do that...I'm not that savvy with computers. He did send the old hd back with me.
I found all my photos on Amazon because they were stored on their cloud because of being a Prime member.
The new battery is something I should have done years ago.