“I was so thrilled that USB was working on my system, and by the
prospect of being able to scan and preserve a lot of old family
photos, that I decided then and there to write a column about it.
Unfortunately, I had not taken thorough notes while I cobbled the
thing together. I decided that the best thing to do was reinstall
everything and write down every step. That would allow readers who
were so inclined to do the same thing.”
“Besides, not everything was really working that well. When I
tried to preview an image using XSane, the scanner started
clattering so loudly, I thought it might destroy itself. I hoped a
reinstall would fix that, so I wiped the disk clean and began anew,
notebook in hand. That turned out to be a very big mistake.”
“Actually, the new hardware was a bit problematic before and
after I reinstalled everything. I finally tracked down the problem:
a bad DIMM. It caused the system to lock up at odd times before,
during, and after the reinstall. Since removing it, my system has
not yet been revisited by the “freeze that knows no thaw.” As pesky
as that problem was, it turned out to be the least of my
worries.”