Conspiracy Theory

I'm convinced

there is a conspiracy afoot amongst my technology products

over Memorial Day weekend my laptop (and the DH's!) both crashed

the good news is that my Computer Doctor, aka my brother in law, has determined that the issue of my laptop is that the hard drive died, and he will install a new (and much bigger) hard drive and he will be able to retrieve much of my data that was on the old one (that is a HUGE relief)

we're not sure yet what happened to the DH's laptop -- it's still in the diagnostics area

so for now I'm still working on a loaner and being very careful not to leave any files on the desktop

ok, so far so good

but yesterday, when I was trying to print some proof sheets of some new photos I had just taken everything printed out in shades of red

huh?

to be honest, this was a used printer when I got it -- my daughter had just purchased a brand new one for her house, and the one I had then was on it's last leg, so she gave me her old one (which was identical to my old one)

and these were not real expensive printers, designed as "home" printers, and truthfully I use a printer a lot more than the average home user

so this morning I ran all the diagnostics, and did as much "tweaking" to the printer as I could within the software

the prints are at least in the right colors now, but there are still lines through them unless I print in "PHOTO" mode (which uses a lot more ink)

this just means I'm going to have to look into replacing the printer

and I'm thinking about going with another Epson -- but this time not a "home" printer, but one designed for a small business -- and one that has a scanner/copier feature too, since my scanner is also old

time to do research --