the file vanishes!

[audaxrex]

....I hope someone can shed some light on what may be not a Word
problem. Simply, I was typing away in Word 2002 when the computer made
a small noise and - my file disappeared. Word stayed open but the doc
was gone.
This happened on a new Acer Aspire N270 Netbook with a 1gb Atom
processor and 160gb HD. The Word isn't the one it came with on trial
but one I installed.
At the time the battery wasn't installed. I'm told that if you run
it with the adapter and house current while the battery is fully
charged, the life of the Li-on battery is reduced. However, I don't
think this was a power fluctuation because nothing flickered or
wavered etc.
I reopened the original doc. It was still there. Then I I went
looking for a temp version of the file and fooled with the 'recover
file' line in the document-type space and eventually found something
with the file name preceeded with a squiggle. When I opened it, I got
my own name repeated three times.
Should I not have reopened the original before hunting up the temp?
The autosave was on and set for ten minutes. I wasn't sure if it had
saved anything on the original doc or not. I did loose work, tho.
Any idea what happened? is my hard drive acting up? I don't see
this happening to others when I search but my worry is that this might
happen again. And yes I am doing a LOT of saving... thanks for reading
this far, folks, and fire away - dax

 

[Terry Farrell]

The noise suggests a Windows Error beep. If the file had previously not been
saved, it is now gone forever.

BTW, you have been told utter twaddle about the battery. The battery
management system ensures that it cannot be over-charged and the power
supply automatically regulates by demand.

What is true is that earlier type NiCad Batteries didn't like being stored
in a fully charged condition: they needed to go through cycles of totally
draining and fully recharging to maintain their peak condition.

Metal Hydride batteries didn't like inactivity, so it was good to disconnect
from the mains and use the batteries say once a week or once a fortnight at
minimum.

Modern Lithium-ion batteries don't like to be fully discharged and left for
any length of time in that state. So it is best to keep them plugged in with
a trickle charge and used regularly. Keeping them plugged in (fully charged)
does not drain any more power from your laptop power supply that running
with them unplugged. But note that after a year, your Li-Ion battery will
probably only have 80% of its original capacity and its life expectancy may
be as short as 2 years or as long as 3 years. That's Li-ion batteries
characteristics.

 

[audaxrex]

The noise suggests a Windows Error beep. If the file had previously not been
saved, it is now gone forever.

BTW, you have been told utter twaddle about the battery. The battery
management system ensures that it cannot be over-charged and the power
supply automatically regulates by demand.

What is true is that earlier type NiCad Batteries didn't like being stored
in a fully charged condition: they needed to go through cycles of totally
draining and fully recharging to maintain their peak condition.

Metal Hydride batteries didn't like inactivity, so it was good to disconnect
from the mains and use the batteries say once a week or once a fortnight at
minimum.

Modern Lithium-ion batteries don't like to be fully discharged and left for
any length of time in that state. So it is best to keep them plugged in with
a trickle charge and used regularly. Keeping them plugged in (fully charged)
does not drain any more power from your laptop power supply that running
with them unplugged. But note that after a year, your Li-Ion battery will
probably only have 80% of its original capacity and its life expectancy may
be as short as 2 years or as long as 3 years. That's Li-ion batteries
characteristics.

thank you, Terry. I should also have mentioned that when I was first
loading it up a month ago, I withdrew a USB key without closing it.
Word was open at the time, and the docs I was loading vanished
utterly. I wonder if I created an error on the hard disk?
Thanks for the battery info. You hear SO many different things. dax

 

[Terry Farrell]

Ah! Never work Word with any type of removable media. It is the number 1 way
to lose/corrupt documents and mess up Word. Always copy to/from the local
HDD before working a document in Word.

You may have left something strange on the HDD or you may have left some bad
temp files still affecting Word. See
http://www.gmayor.com/what_to_do_when_word_crashes.htm for a guide to
cleaning out then temp files. Then run a full SCANDISK to see if there is a
problem on the HDD.

 

[audaxrex]

Ah! Never work Word with any type of removable media. It is the number 1 way
to lose/corrupt documents and mess up Word. Always copy to/from the local
HDD before working a document in Word.

You may have left something strange on the HDD or you may have left some bad
temp files still affecting Word. Seehttp://www.gmayor.com/what_to_do_when_word_crashes.htmfor a guide to
cleaning out then temp files. Then run a full SCANDISK to see if there isa
problem on the HDD.

thanks for the link, Terry. useful stuff indeed - dax