Some weeks ago I installed @steem-plus which is a perfect addon to steemit!
That was what @psionic-tremors also thought when she saw me using it.

Her words were: "I want a voting slider too!!!" which can be translated to "Install it on my PC right now!!!"

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By the way: you might find some sarcasm in this post 😇.

And here the story begins ... with my promise this is no big deal

I went over to @psionic-tremors' 10 years old Windows XP PC which needs about 7 minutes to start up and gets no support from whatever software developer anymore. But she never wanted to upgrade to Windows 7 or 10 because of all the additional software that needs to be reinstalled and might be forgotten with the new installation.
She has one of these fancy housings with which you can start up the PC by just touching instead of pressing the power button. That actually never really worked. So I literally dived down to connect these two small pins on the motherboard with a screwdriver to start it up.
One beer (or 7 minutes) later I could start to install the addon.
@psionic-tremors normally uses Firefox Mozilla as a browser. Therefore I first needed to install a plugin that lets you install Chrome plugins on Mozilla.
Believe it or not - that did not work.

Next option: use Chome browser. It's also not updated anymore since years (Google won't let you on XP) but there was hope.
The installation was done without any problems - all fine!
We could see parts of @steem-plus working and wanted to log in to use all features of course.
No error occurred and we landed on the @steem-plus blog.
Checking the functionality we found out @psionic-tremors was still not logged in. Another try ... but without success.

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Remembering the order "I want a voting slider too!!!" I was desperate to find a solution and told her about all the advantages a new and clean install would have:

• better security
• less blue screens (I would never say "no more" as long as we're talking about Microsoft)
• she would finally be able to watch videos on Dlife and Dtube
• and - most important - @steem-plus would finally work!

YES!!! I could convince her to upgrade the system!

I bought a Windows 10 key for 145 euro online on the MS homepage. Having a spare 750GB 2.5" SATA disk I prepared a bootable USB stick (8BG as adviced by Microsoft) with the Media Creation Tool.
You might wonder what I wanted to do with a SATA HDD in a 10 years old PC ... well, 10 years ago this system was state of the art - almost the best you could get. So SATA connectors were available.

After disconnecting all internal drives, connecting the 750GB disk and setting up the BIOS to boot from the USB stick, I restarted the PC.
It was late in the evening already and I got questions like "All ok? Does it work already?" ... I was sweating blood.

THIS HAD TO WORK! Quickly!

The PC started to boot from the USB stick ... one would say "nothing exciting" ... but the pressure was high. I made this promise that it's no big deal.
And there it was: an error message! A file could not be found 😳

OK - I'll do this stick preparation with the Media Creation Tool once again. The good thing about MS software and tools is: they are cleverly programmed!
I prepared the stick on the same laptop as I did minutes before and guess what ... it downloads the Windows 10 version completely again to prepare the stick for the second time 😡.

Second try ... same error. File not found. Not directly when booting of course ... but after waiting some time.

What other options do I have? Well, perhaps the USB stick is corrupt - let's try another one.
Nope - the MediaCreation Tool could not make it a bootable Windows 10 installation device. I'm getting nervous. Can't I keep my promise?

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My final option that day/night: I have an external 3.5" 1.5TB HDD - a little bit oversized for a 4.3GB Windows 10 installation image but who cares?
And this really worked. The Media Creation Tool created a bootable 32GB partition and I could install Windows 10 on the system.
The installation worked fine and after installing all updates (some hours later though) I started to install Chrome and tried @steem-plus.
All worked fine ... except: the system was very unstable and resetting without error message spontaneously.
This had nothing to do with @steem-plus! It was the hardware somehow.

It was 01:30 AM already and I had to admit that there would not be any @steem-plus available this evening.
But I could assure all would be as it was before because I connected the old hard drives again and set the BIOS back to what it was.
Time to go to bed ... less than 5 hours left until the alarm would wake me up again to get to work.

There was disappointment observable in @psionic-tremors' face but also relief that all was set back to what it was and she could work with the PC the next day.

The next day I received a Whatsapp ... the PC was no starting up anymore but continuously resetting.
Panic! - What should or could I do? I was at work ...

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After some restarts and some warm words from @psionic-tremors (yes, she talks to her hardware when not functioning well), the PC worked again - not stable, but just ok to work with carefully.
You can imagine what I was told ... "Never change a running system.", etc. Arguments like "But you wanted @steem-plus so badly, didn't you?" simply do not count in such situations.

At work, I started to look for an SSD online but at shops where I could pick it up the same day. I found and bought a Samsung EVO 850 500GB SSD for 115 euro (it was a special offer because EVO 860 just was introduced).
Why? Because I thought the 750GB 2.5" HDD might be defective - it's an old one also.

I don't want to bore you with the same story again. The results with the new SSD where exactly the same as with the 750GB 2.5" HDD. I could install everything but the system kept being unstable. Not starting up at all or resetting from time to time.

It could be the power supply but also the motherboard. I was desperate.
How could installing a Chrome plugin cost me hours of sleep and nerves?
And again I want to address: it has nothing to do with the plugin! @steem-plus is perfect! It was this totally overdated hard- and software that caused the trouble.

What next?

I was out of options, desperate and did not know what to do.
My next step was to search a suitable new power supply hoping it's not the motherboard that makes the trouble. Of course again online but to be picked up in a store the same day after work.
After some phone calls, I could not find anything suitable.

Then there was this PC shop selling second-hand PCs

I made an appointment for the same evening to pick up one of these second-hand PCs.
199 euro including an HDD and Windows 10 installation which I did not need. I just spent 260 euro for Windows 10 and a 500GB SSD.
Arriving at the shop I tried to get some discount because they could keep the HDD with the Windows installation. But the owner of the shop was not available.
So I paid the 199 euro and drove home.

The same evening I installed Windows 10 on the SSD, Chrome and the @steem-plus plugin!!!

Finally! All works fine!

While I'm writing this post I'm copying the data from the three hard drive of the old system with a USB adapter to the 1.5TB USB HDD which also takes hours but I want to spare you the details. Just keep in mind that "I need my music and photos." keeps pushing me to finalize this ASAP 🤣.

Now we have a happy @psionic-tremors and a new PC .

This is my story of trying to install a Chrome plugin on a much too old PC ...

If you are interested in @steem-plus and all the wonderful options, I would advise you to read more about it here.
It's the perfect addon for steemians and works perfectly!

Steem on!