Actually, I think I prefer computers to cars. No getting covered in oil and grease, taking all the skin off your knuckles, finally getting everything back together and wondering just where the heck that spring/washer/widget still lying on the workbench should have gone.
I either hated working on cars because I was useless at it, or I was useless at it because I hated it. I can't afford one at the moment, and have to say I just don't miss them. Mind you, I killed the last one through under-use.
And yes, all those wires disappearing into the engine now, from expensive looking electronic modules. Very reliable, but definitely not owner-maintainable. Remember when spluttering to a halt could sometimes be cured by borrowing the lady friend's nail file and cleaning up the electric fuel pump points/distributor points?
Back to those blessed computer thingies. The trouble is that we tend to rely on them for all sorts of things, such as socialising on the internet, getting information and probably most crucially from a break-down standpoint, all sorts of data we'd rather not lose - documents, photographs, videos, music and what have you.
Because the things (giving credit where it's due) just work most of the time, we become complacent. It's only when we lose everything in a hard drive mishap that the horrible feeling dawns that perhaps one needs to go a little deeper into the workings of the beastly things - unless one can afford the services of a computer administrator
Even if data have been backed up and we only have the hassle of reinstalling the operating system and years of updates, then discovering that expensive software we used to rely on can't be reinstalled because we've lost the activations codes/installation files are no longer available/our installation discs have deteriorated/whatever, the idea of getting the hang of making images suddenly makes a certain sense.
I wonder why operating system makers don't, as a matter of course, include imaging software. It could have "Simple" and "Advanced" modes. Most of us would use "Simple" - and the user interface would use simple text (clickable) to choose, "Make an image of everything, from which I can restore my computer to its state right now," "Only back data up," "Only back the operating system up". That would lead to a simple GUI showing your external drive/s and allowing you to click on one as the destination for your image - perhaps with the ability to create a suitable folder if you so wish. You would then press "Start" and wander off to do something more interesting.
On completing the image, it would say, "If you want to make a bootable rescue disc, insert a blank CD and press "Start."
As it is, we have to choose between making ourselves vulnerable by trying to ignore any complications beyond day to day use, and having to spend time and bad temper ploughing through convoluted solutions which, frankly, offer far more than most of us need.
Remember when "They" said that computers would become as simple to operate as mobile telephones? As far as I can see, all that's happened is that mobile telephones have become as irritating and confusing to use as computers.
Bah, humbug.
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