I.T. Help Request for busted old computers

[The Tiger]

I have a few old computers that are collecting dust. I?m only holding on to them because I think there is some data and photos on the hard drive that I want to keep. One is a desktop PC with a SATA hard drive and the other is a very old Macbook Air with an SSD.

I can?t get either to boot up, even in safe mode

1. P.C. First - It has been sitting for 3 years unusable

Based on some advice I purchased a hard drive docking station that has a USB cable. I plugged it into my newer PC and I was able to connect the drive and it reads it. I did a virus scan and it was clean. I had previously set it up for multiple users, me and kids, but each profile is password protected. I don?t remember the passwords. But there isn?t a prompt to enter the password. The drive shows as connected and I see a folder for each user. Properties says each folder is empty. Any advice?

2. Ancient Macbook Air

When you try to turn it on you only see it power up and the screen has a circle with a diagonal slash through it. It won?t do anything else. I went to one of those device repair places and he said without knowing anything more than you do that the hard drive is bad. He said he would identify and remove the bad SSD chips from the circuit board and solder in new ones. I?m no computer expert but how exactly does that fix it? Any advice?

[holiday]

On the first PC, change the permissions on the folders you are unable to view to include Amininstator full access.

[1bulletBarney]

I have 3 OLD windows based laptop pc's. 2 have Windows Vista & one has Windows 10. The Windows 10 takes 3-5 minutes to boot up. I tried to delete programs but the thing really does not respond...

I think the thing to do is take a 4 lb maul hammer and smash these things to pieces...

[sigstroker]

I have a few old computers that are collecting dust. I?m only holding on to them because I think there is some data and photos on the hard drive that I want to keep. One is a desktop PC with a SATA hard drive and the other is a very old Macbook Air with an SSD.

I can?t get either to boot up, even in safe mode

1. P.C. First - It has been sitting for 3 years unusable

Based on some advice I purchased a hard drive docking station that has a USB cable. I plugged it into my newer PC and I was able to connect the drive and it reads it. I did a virus scan and it was clean. I had previously set it up for multiple users, me and kids, but each profile is password protected. I don?t remember the passwords. But there isn?t a prompt to enter the password. The drive shows as connected and I see a folder for each user. Properties says each folder is empty. Any advice?

2. Ancient Macbook Air

When you try to turn it on you only see it power up and the screen has a circle with a diagonal slash through it. It won?t do anything else. I went to one of those device repair places and he said without knowing anything more than you do that the hard drive is bad. He said he would identify and remove the bad SSD chips from the circuit board and solder in new ones. I?m no computer expert but how exactly does that fix it? Any advice?

Replacing any SSD chips is obviously going to wreck data that was in there. If any of the folder definition stuff was on those chips you'll probably have to format the whole thing.

I have 3 OLD windows based laptop pc's. 2 have Windows Vista & one has Windows 10. The Windows 10 takes 3-5 minutes to boot up. I tried to delete programs but the thing really does not respond...

I think the thing to do is take a 4 lb maul hammer and smash these things Bill Gates to pieces...

f y p

[arrix]

I have a few old computers that are collecting dust. I?m only holding on to them because I think there is some data and photos on the hard drive that I want to keep. One is a desktop PC with a SATA hard drive and the other is a very old Macbook Air with an SSD.

I can?t get either to boot up, even in safe mode

1. P.C. First - It has been sitting for 3 years unusable

Based on some advice I purchased a hard drive docking station that has a USB cable. I plugged it into my newer PC and I was able to connect the drive and it reads it. I did a virus scan and it was clean. I had previously set it up for multiple users, me and kids, but each profile is password protected. I don?t remember the passwords. But there isn?t a prompt to enter the password. The drive shows as connected and I see a folder for each user. Properties says each folder is empty. Any advice?

2. Ancient Macbook Air

When you try to turn it on you only see it power up and the screen has a circle with a diagonal slash through it. It won?t do anything else. I went to one of those device repair places and he said without knowing anything more than you do that the hard drive is bad. He said he would identify and remove the bad SSD chips from the circuit board and solder in new ones. I?m no computer expert but how exactly does that fix it? Any advice?

At least for the first computer, you might be able to clone the old drive to a new drive and see if that works. Try Clonezilla for that. https://clonezilla.org/

[bigbossman]

I think the thing to do is take a 4 lb maul hammer and smash these things to pieces...

It's more satisfying to take them out to BLM land and put a few rounds through them. Be sure to clean up after yourself, though.

[Futurecollector]

2. Ancient Macbook Air

When you try to turn it on you only see it power up and the screen has a circle with a diagonal slash through it. It won?t do anything else. I went to one of those device repair places and he said without knowing anything more than you do that the hard drive is bad. He said he would identify and remove the bad SSD chips from the circuit board and solder in new ones. I?m no computer expert but how exactly does that fix it? Any advice?

Is this the symbol you are seeing?

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT210901

If so, you just need to make a bootable drive and reinstall the OS. Some of the older MACos generations have a broken "reboot via internet". Its a super straightforward process to get it back and live. I have an external SSD with all the Mac os's if you are local.

[Iknownot]

I have 3 OLD windows based laptop pc's. 2 have Windows Vista & one has Windows 10. The Windows 10 takes 3-5 minutes to boot up. I tried to delete programs but the thing really does not respond...

I think the thing to do is take a 4 lb maul hammer and smash these things to pieces...

If you don?t mind fiddling a bit there are several free Linux distributions (mint, Ubuntu, etc ) that run really well on 10 year old or newer machines (I wouldn?t bother with older ). You can turn that windows 10 machine into a Linux box and use it for whatever basic internet stuff you want. Watch a couple YouTube vids on install and which is easier to use and decide for yourself.

With regards to 3-5 minutes for win 10 to boot, that’s long even for an older PC. I suspect you have a old fashioned hard drive and it’s starting to fail or you have a corrupt Win 10 install.

I’m not sure it’s worth it to you since Win 10 is oniy going to be supported a bit longer and you won’t be able to install win 11 but just in case, you could probably get a 256 gig SSD for $20 bucks right now. If you don’t mind the $20 you could ditch your HDD and install the SSD with a fresh install of Win 10. I’d bet that fixes things right up.

I’d suggest the SSD swap if you decide to go Liniux as well. HDD is a dying tech for any disc that has the OS on it. IMO at least.

[ibanezfoo]

On the first PC, change the permissions on the folders you are unable to view to include Amininstator full access.

Sort of. You have to take ownership of the folder. Right click -> properties -> security -> advanced -> Change owner to yourself.

[The Tiger]

I appreciate the tips. I will try to fiddle with PC #1 tomorrow. I might have to wait a few days to try the Mac.