Great news, or how I inadvertently revived my Painter software after attending what I thought was its funeral.

I know there are some of you who enjoy the incredible images you have grown to expect here at Dada's. (So, okay, I'm prone to hyperbole, no one really notices the graphics.) However, in that I enjoy creating some of my own illustrations here on Dada's (often more than their accompanying text), I am happy to report I have managed to revive the program I use to create them with (Painter VI).

250GB external easy to install hard-drive

In that the PC is getting older now, I shopped for an external hard-drive to back-up files I do not want to lose. When first shopping for an external hard-drive, I saw a couple of 100+ GB HD's for around $79. Then last week I discovered this smaller, larger capacy (250GB) HD by Western Digital for $60, so I bought one.

Back in the 90's, I installed a second internal hard drive on my PC. It was a little unnerving for me inside the box with all those wires and cables, but I managed it. My, how things have changed! This little Western Digital just plugged into a USB port and "Presto! Bingo!" was up and running. No software to install. The PC immediately recognized the new hardware. This is how I imagine 'plug and play' to be years ago but never found it to be as easy as it was promoted to be -- until I added this little gizmo.

Which brings me to my lost Painter program which died a couple weeks after an update to some other software. A System Restore did nothing. Nor did unstalling/reinstalling Painter. Then I got the idea to install Painter on the new back-up hard drive. I wasn't sure it would work , coming through the old PC, but it did!

So far, I've been impressed with the friendliness of the new peripheral. It means I'll still be able to "paint" new graphics for Dada's, something you've all come to expect and enjoy. (OK, OK, I'm prone to hyperbole. Sorry.)