computer help

Arwen's Mom

Arwen's Mom

Mother of Dragons, Breaker of Chains
I know some of you mentioned you really dont like it when people ask for computer help buuuuutt.....

I had an old windows 7 laptop that is close to 10 yrs old and when you turn it on it makes loud grinding noises. Son and Hubby said to back up files and get a new laptop.

Backed files.

Cant afford a new laptop but my son surprised me with one.

I hate windows 10.

Anyway, i connected external drive where my files are backed up and what a surprise but some of them have been changed to a different format and now I cant open them.

what gives?

Any suggestions?

Other than setting all my computer stuff on fire which I am tempted to do.

please explain any tips simply, as complicated computer instructions make me hostile.

Thanks.... whomever helps me will get some cookies next time I see you
 
First - congrats on the new robot and having a good kid...

What comes to mind is that the new laptop does not recognize the file / file type because the files could've been created by a piece of software that was installed on the old machine and that software is not installed on the new machine.

In this case, determine what type of file they are, figure out what software it was you used to create them and install that software on the new machine.


What type of files are unrecognized?
 
Last edited:
what mike said.

also, get a free google drive or dropbox account and use the internet for back-ups of stuff you never want to lose.
 
Mountain Bike Mike said:
First - congrats on the new robot and having a good kid...

What comes to mind is that the new laptop does not recognize the file / file type because the files could've been created by a piece of software that was installed on the old machine and that software is not installed on the new machine.

In this case, determine what type of file they are, figure out what software it was you used to create them and install that software on the new machine.


What type of files are unrecognized?
Click to expand...
mostly documents, spread sheets, and a few edited movies
When the drive was connected to the old one the file names ended in suffixes (dont know what you call them) I recognized, but when attached to the new, they all changed. so how do they get changed? shouldnt they stay the same? its like if I put a chocolate cookie in the jar I dont want to pull out a mint cookie.
the 3 "suffixes" I dont recognize and are not working are wps, xlr, wlmp

the wlmp are the movies I edited with windows movie make which doesnt come on the new one (and that SUCKS with a capital S U C K) so I understand that, but the others were just documents and spreadsheets made with a general writing program that came on the laptop. I am surprised the new one doesnt have anything like that. Dogs are easier to understand. So are bikes. Hubby and I discussed how we can change our lifestyle back to the days before all these electronic gizmos.
 
the suffix (file type) is hidden unless you specify that you want to see it.
when trying to open it, and there is no associated program, it should ask about searching for a program.

google docs/sheets can open many of the older formats. it is free.

wordpad is still on windows 10, you can try opening with that (.rtf files)

libreoffice - could work

i think movie maker is available for free download ???
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/store/p/movie-maker-free-video-editor/9nblggh4wwjr
 
um...not sure what you mean by the "needful" thanks for trying to help though. BUt now I am ready to smash the computer into tiny bits. I did spend quite a bit of time doing searches on microsoft etc trying to find a solution and couldnt thats why I decided to ask for tips here

I will try to take this one item at a time

I tried the movie maker thing Pat suggested. Maybe its just a function of windows 10 but once "downloaded" I couldnt locate it on the computer anywhere. When I clicked the box that popped up to "try it now" it wont even recognize the movie files with the wlmp, in fact I cant find the actual program anywhere on the computer, not in the download file, not in program files, and when I right click on it (which in windows 7 would give you a neat box telling you all you need to know, this one just asks if you would like to pin it to the task bar (oh gee thats helpful) so that didnt work. Righ clicking on the wlmp file to "open" it with other programs, it doesnt even list the one I just "downloaded"

ok, so those little tags are called file extensions, or suffixes, got it, well on the old laptop all those files actually had different extensions and those extensions changed when the external drive was connected to the new computer. Why? who knows, probably because computers hate me as much as I hate them. And they are never hidden on either of my computers.

tried word pad and it didnt work, neither did any other program or "app" on my computer. Only solution I could find on microsoft site was purchasing their "office" program for like 200.

When it does ask to look for a program, I have tried all the one on my comp and none of them work. Oh sure, the doc may open, but its all jibberish.

So looks like I am going back to the old laptop and the new one can kiss my a**
 
Last edited:
@Arwen's Mom Something is not right. The files should not change at all simply by connecting a drive to a different computer or operating system version. What happens when you plug the drive into the old computer again?

Did you go through the steps to uncheck Hide extensions for known file types?
 
the wlmp is not a movie file its a project file you need to use windows movie maker to view it or to convert it to a actual video file.
The other files should be able to open in office or if you don't have office you could try libreoffice (someone already suggested this up above) which is a free office suite. Are you sure the file extensions changed or maybe they where just hidden on your old computer so you never seen the actual extension and when you brought them over to your new one they are showing the extension.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom