
In April 2024, we purchased three laptops on sale on Amazon using accumulated rewards points. Why did we purchase three laptops? At the time, we figured we’d be in the US for a long time due to my medical concerns and having a backup we could use for streaming would be ideal.
At the time, we thought we’d like to watch news and podcasts while working online on our laptops. Sure, we could use split screen, but neither of us was interested. However, as it turned out (fortunately), I didn’t need another open heart surgery requiring a long recovery in the US, and we were able to continue our world travels sooner than we thought.

I wish we hadn’t purchased the third laptop, but we may not regret it as we continue on our world travels on cruises and more, beginning in September when we leave South Africa. We’ve found that our laptops usually last two to three years, based on our frequent travel and excessive use.
If one of our laptops crashes while on a cruise or in a remote area, such as here in the bush, we have the backup that is still in its original box. In the past few weeks, when I’ve had issues with my laptop, I thought I’d have to start using the third device.
The biggest issue with my laptop was its slow performance and inability to produce decent sound for streaming. No matter how hard I tried to fix the sound by adding sound boosting software and performing many tasks to upgrade it, it seemed hopeless.

In addition, I was unable to connect either of our two portable Bluetooth speakers. One would work for a while and then create annoying static. The speakers worked fine on Tom’s laptop. It may seem logical that we should use Tom’s laptop to stream shows, but his keyboard is different than mine, and I don’t care to use his computer. I am in charge of setting up all the shows we stream since Tom gets impatient with running into glitches.
This week, we reached a point where we couldn’t stream because I had no sound. It was too much monkeying around trying to watch a show..
I knew what I had to do, but I didn’t want to go through the hours-long process of doing it: I needed to completely reset my laptop to return it to its original Windows 11 configuration. I did that yesterday morning, much to my chagrin, and indeed, it took several hours. That was the reason I didn’t post yesterday morning.

Doing a reset may save my folders and factory-installed apps, but it eliminates all the apps I’ve installed in the past 13 months (and their passwords), of which there were many. This took me no less than five hours to accomplish.
Yesterday afternoon, I was almost completely done and could test using a Bluetooth speaker for sound while streaming. It worked! Last night, we could stream a series with quality sound for the first time in months. What a relief. I knew this process would work and wasn’t surprised by the positive result.
Our goals are to make life as stress-free as possible. Solving a problem such as this only reminded us of how important it is to address problems as quickly as possible so that we can continue our travels with ease and peace of mind.
We’ll be back with more new photos tomorrow.
Be well.
Photo from ten years ago today, May 10, 2015:
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Could this Yellow Candle flower be more exquisite with its white blooms? For more photos, please click here. |