Dell Inspiron 600 went out and says that I have a windows config problem. Took it to two different shops, they said it is either hard drive issue that means new hard drive, or it is my operating system. In either event, they have to go in and replace all the operating system, minimum $150 for that or with hard drive, over $200. Both suggested that since it is almost 6 years old, for the price, get a new one with 2 gig memory, 150g or more hard drive, faster processor.
This was my home computer and all we did was occassionally load photos to send in email, and I might email myself a WORD document to modify at home and then send to a client. 80% of the time I checked email and got on this website.
I went to Best Buy and Office Depot and Best Buy is hard sell on the protection and stuff. $399 computer went over $600 quickly. Id be satisfied with last year's model if I could find one. I need at home Microsoft Word, maybe, just maybe, Excel, and I can download Acrobat reader and that's it. Oh, and wireless connectivity to my router. Dont really play cd's on it, but if it came with CD burner, great.
One thing shocked me, they say they dont give you all the Microsoft Office stuff anymore, it is a trial version. My dad says Open Office has compatible programs and if I can use that (freeware I think) to open a Word document, modify it and send it back to me so at the office, i can save it in Word, fantastic.
So, suggest me something.
Laptop, went out, need new one, help?
Sam,
You are experiencing the key drawback of a laptop vs a desktop pc -- you can't swap bad components very easily - and as you are realizing, some you can't swap out at all.
I bought my wife a 'budget' laptop for her birthday last year -- a HP something-or-other for under $400 CDN. A new model had just been announced and was shipping, so the current year's model was cheap, cheap, cheap. It's not bad -- but I have to admit that it's got the worst ever keyboard that I have ever used. On that front, I am a hard-nosed ThinkPad & Lenovo fan. We have had as many as 5 laptops in our family at one point in time, and the HP purchase for my wife is the only time I didn't get a Lenovo G-series or Thinkpad. Working for IBM, I will add that I do have a bias, but even for light-load work, the Thinkpad is unbelievably good. It's rock-solid, fast, and comes in a bunch of different flavours/configurations to fit most budgets (note I say most, not all).
The Toshiba Satellite series is pretty good, as is the Sony Viao line. With the intricacies of Win7, you'll probably need more power and hard drive capacity than you think.
Another option would be to look at a netbook -- that is if you really only do light-weight work at home. Some of these little Atom-based units are quite good -- but the keyboards take some time getting used to and they don't pack near the computing speed of full-fledged laptops.
Someone might suggest a tablet PC, but I don't know that would do it for you. Mind you -- on the tablet/netbook front, there is the new Dell Inspiron Duo - with a clever flip screen to use it as a tablet or full-blown netbook. It's pretty genius, and early reviews indicate that it's not a bad unit all-in-all. Even still -- by the sounds of things, if you were leaning this way, you might want to wait until they work out a of the few kinks like adding an ethernet port, HDMI interface, SD slot, etc. to the unit rather than the expansion dock. 6 years on your previous Dell is very good life for a laptop that's not a Thinkpad.
Insofar as Open Office is concerned -- while there are some slightly different ways of doing things, it works fine -- as does the new Lotus Symphony. Both are free downloads, and are MS Office compatible. OO has provided us with seamless transition between office suites. I run MS Office and Symphony for work - and everyone else runs Open Office (except #2 son who runs MS Office as he got a great deal when we got his Thinkpad 3 years ago). We run at each others files all the time - editing, formatting, etc. -- and it all transitions across the platforms just fine.
Whatever you do -- I would recommend you get yourself some external storage options -- external hard drives are very inexpensive -- whether they be small portable "zip" drives or larger external drives -- you can get 1TB of memory for around $100 or less -- and 2TB for as little as around $120. It's the smart option to keep your data more secure/safe - although it is not fool-proof. We have 4 such drives at home with a total of about 3TB of data coverage. You think that's alot -- a good friend of mine mirrors 4TB of data across 13TB of hard drive capacity - in his house!. Admittedly, he's very focused on loss of data -- but then again, he is a retired national security expert so knows how easy it is for stuff to get corrupted/lost.
Hope this helps more than it confuses.
You are experiencing the key drawback of a laptop vs a desktop pc -- you can't swap bad components very easily - and as you are realizing, some you can't swap out at all.
I bought my wife a 'budget' laptop for her birthday last year -- a HP something-or-other for under $400 CDN. A new model had just been announced and was shipping, so the current year's model was cheap, cheap, cheap. It's not bad -- but I have to admit that it's got the worst ever keyboard that I have ever used. On that front, I am a hard-nosed ThinkPad & Lenovo fan. We have had as many as 5 laptops in our family at one point in time, and the HP purchase for my wife is the only time I didn't get a Lenovo G-series or Thinkpad. Working for IBM, I will add that I do have a bias, but even for light-load work, the Thinkpad is unbelievably good. It's rock-solid, fast, and comes in a bunch of different flavours/configurations to fit most budgets (note I say most, not all).
The Toshiba Satellite series is pretty good, as is the Sony Viao line. With the intricacies of Win7, you'll probably need more power and hard drive capacity than you think.
Another option would be to look at a netbook -- that is if you really only do light-weight work at home. Some of these little Atom-based units are quite good -- but the keyboards take some time getting used to and they don't pack near the computing speed of full-fledged laptops.
Someone might suggest a tablet PC, but I don't know that would do it for you. Mind you -- on the tablet/netbook front, there is the new Dell Inspiron Duo - with a clever flip screen to use it as a tablet or full-blown netbook. It's pretty genius, and early reviews indicate that it's not a bad unit all-in-all. Even still -- by the sounds of things, if you were leaning this way, you might want to wait until they work out a of the few kinks like adding an ethernet port, HDMI interface, SD slot, etc. to the unit rather than the expansion dock. 6 years on your previous Dell is very good life for a laptop that's not a Thinkpad.
Insofar as Open Office is concerned -- while there are some slightly different ways of doing things, it works fine -- as does the new Lotus Symphony. Both are free downloads, and are MS Office compatible. OO has provided us with seamless transition between office suites. I run MS Office and Symphony for work - and everyone else runs Open Office (except #2 son who runs MS Office as he got a great deal when we got his Thinkpad 3 years ago). We run at each others files all the time - editing, formatting, etc. -- and it all transitions across the platforms just fine.
Whatever you do -- I would recommend you get yourself some external storage options -- external hard drives are very inexpensive -- whether they be small portable "zip" drives or larger external drives -- you can get 1TB of memory for around $100 or less -- and 2TB for as little as around $120. It's the smart option to keep your data more secure/safe - although it is not fool-proof. We have 4 such drives at home with a total of about 3TB of data coverage. You think that's alot -- a good friend of mine mirrors 4TB of data across 13TB of hard drive capacity - in his house!. Admittedly, he's very focused on loss of data -- but then again, he is a retired national security expert so knows how easy it is for stuff to get corrupted/lost.
Hope this helps more than it confuses.
Sam, have you considered an iPad? Cheaper than many laptops, and you can easily do the things you are describing if you have wifi at home. The new ones are thinner and lighter. Apps foe $9.99 each will allow you to open Word, Excel or PowerPoint docs.
EDIT: Just read all of Wendell's post. I guess I'm that "someone."
EDIT: Just read all of Wendell's post. I guess I'm that "someone."
Jim
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Rob
Sam, since you're already a Dell owner, consider Dell Outlet: http://www.dell.com/outlet
That's where Dell sells refurbished and scratch & dent items like desktops, printers, laptops, and servers. I have personally bought three laptops from Dell Outlet. In each case I got a significantly reduced price and longer warranty than if I bought the same laptop through Dell's regular site.
My wife and I bought a Dell Vostro 3700 from Dell Outlet just one month ago. We got it for $540 with a 2-yr in-home-service warranty and free shipping. Before doing the final checkout at Dell Outlet we did enter in a code that got us 15% off. You can find the Outlet codes very easily by just searching Bing, Yahoo, or Google for Dell Outlet codes/coupons.
That same laptop bought brand new from Dell would have been around $750.
Just an FYI when buying laptops from Dell. If you prefer the shiny (glossy) screens, go with any Home or Home Office laptop. If you're like me and you hate shiny screens, go with the matte screens. All Business and Education laptops have matte screens.
That's where Dell sells refurbished and scratch & dent items like desktops, printers, laptops, and servers. I have personally bought three laptops from Dell Outlet. In each case I got a significantly reduced price and longer warranty than if I bought the same laptop through Dell's regular site.
My wife and I bought a Dell Vostro 3700 from Dell Outlet just one month ago. We got it for $540 with a 2-yr in-home-service warranty and free shipping. Before doing the final checkout at Dell Outlet we did enter in a code that got us 15% off. You can find the Outlet codes very easily by just searching Bing, Yahoo, or Google for Dell Outlet codes/coupons.
That same laptop bought brand new from Dell would have been around $750.
Just an FYI when buying laptops from Dell. If you prefer the shiny (glossy) screens, go with any Home or Home Office laptop. If you're like me and you hate shiny screens, go with the matte screens. All Business and Education laptops have matte screens.
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Sam
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Rob, I dont know anything about glossy or matte. My office computer is a dell with a flat screen and is over 7 years old. If you have any preferences, just pm me with them. Again, 50 gig hard drive is plenty. 2 gig memory is more than my laptop had or my office (it has 1 gig).
I do excel at work (maybe twice a month to keep ledger cards on escrow accounts), Microsoft Word, a couple of bankruptcy programs and then Adobe Acrobat. I can get Adobe reader for free off the internet so really, email, low level word processing and photos.
And I am not wedded to Dell.
I do excel at work (maybe twice a month to keep ledger cards on escrow accounts), Microsoft Word, a couple of bankruptcy programs and then Adobe Acrobat. I can get Adobe reader for free off the internet so really, email, low level word processing and photos.
And I am not wedded to Dell.
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Rob
You can determine what you have very easily regarding matte vs. glossy. Glossy screens reflect light and matte screens do not. If you can see yourself or your office or furniture in your monitor, then it's glossy. If not, it's matte. Here's a good side-by-side picture of glossy vs. matte: http://notioninksadam.blogspot.com/2010 ... ch_25.html
Environments with lots of light make it very hard to work with glossy screens. Thus, for most businesses, matte screens are the go-to option.
Since that laptop of yours is 7 years old I assume it was running Windows XP. Windows XP does just fine with 1GB of RAM. Windows 7 will run with 1GB, but not very well. You'll want at minimum 2GB or more. Our new Vostro has 3GB and it's very zippy. Judging by what you're going to do with this laptop I see you don't need any extreme powerhouse machine. Just a regular business laptop. That will be easy to do.
Environments with lots of light make it very hard to work with glossy screens. Thus, for most businesses, matte screens are the go-to option.
Since that laptop of yours is 7 years old I assume it was running Windows XP. Windows XP does just fine with 1GB of RAM. Windows 7 will run with 1GB, but not very well. You'll want at minimum 2GB or more. Our new Vostro has 3GB and it's very zippy. Judging by what you're going to do with this laptop I see you don't need any extreme powerhouse machine. Just a regular business laptop. That will be easy to do.
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Rob
This may be a completely stupid question - if so, please disregard. But I noticed in your original post you don't mention anything about moving the computer around - is there a specific reason you want another laptop? If it's going to sit in the same place all the time, you can get far more bang for your buck with a desktop (even with a reasonable monitor).
Regards,
Mike
Mike
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Sam
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No, good question. Number one, it is a smaller desk and so laptop helps in that regard. #2, I can bring my office computer home if I get a desktop, but would have to figure out the costs of having someone transfer the Data (Word docs, excel data, outlook data, and then programs such as adobe and a bankruptcy program) to the new computer. That is an option and my wife likes that one best since she hops on the computer once a week maybe for 15 mins. She texts a bunch and can get on the computer anytime at work, so for the 4 hours from when she gets home to bed time during the week, she cares nothing about internet.
Having a laptop allows me to at least take something with me on vacation when we are at the beach and in a hotel room (and not at someone's house) and check email or SMF when she is showering or whatever down time we have.
Having a laptop allows me to at least take something with me on vacation when we are at the beach and in a hotel room (and not at someone's house) and check email or SMF when she is showering or whatever down time we have.
As a follow-up to Wendell's post, then, bad experience has taught me to prepare as much as possible ahead of time for when you'll be forced to transfer that data to a new computer (i.e. work hard drive goes out, storm blows computer up, forced to hawk work computer to feed shaving AD). The switch will have to happen someday - might as well be prepared! Dropbox and Carbonite are two excellent options.
Thus endeth the tangential and unsolicited suggestion.
Thus endeth the tangential and unsolicited suggestion.
Regards,
Mike
Mike
Wasn't it Bill Gates who once said that 64mb of RAM would be more than anyone would ever need?Sam wrote: ... 50 gig hard drive is plenty. 2 gig memory is more than my laptop had or my office (it has 1 gig). ...
Of course I am being cheeky.Sam -- if you don't need any power, then consider picking up a used machine. What is your budget on this spend, if you don't mind my asking?
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Sam
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Yeah, I was thinking refurbed. $300 is what I would like to come in under, software included. I can get new ones for $399 that have 3 gig RAM. FOr $399, I think it comes with about 60 or more hard drive storage, a web cam built in, 15 inch or so screen, 3 gig memory, decent enough processor, cd/dvd rom with burners, wireless connectivity. Dont need broadband, dont really run programs at the same time unless I am working on a Word doc from email. Maybe read a PDF at home.
If I go with the desktop for office, then I want at least 4 gig Ram, still 60 gig is enough memory for word processing mostly, but at the prices, Ill get over 100, so that will go to about $550 or so with a 17 inch screen or so. Then data and program transfer, I am thinking $150
If I go with the desktop for office, then I want at least 4 gig Ram, still 60 gig is enough memory for word processing mostly, but at the prices, Ill get over 100, so that will go to about $550 or so with a 17 inch screen or so. Then data and program transfer, I am thinking $150
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fallingwickets
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Actually he said 64Kb would be enough for anyone!jww wrote:Wasn't it Bill Gates who once said that 64mb of RAM would be more than anyone would ever need?Sam wrote: ... 50 gig hard drive is plenty. 2 gig memory is more than my laptop had or my office (it has 1 gig). ...
Sam -- if you don't need any power, then consider picking up a used machine. What is your budget on this spend, if you don't mind my asking?
Chris
"Je n'ai pas besoin de cette hypothèse."
Pierre-Simon de Laplace
Pierre-Simon de Laplace
Right - and we all know how prophetic that statement turned out to be.drmoss_ca wrote:Actually he said 64Kb would be enough for anyone!jww wrote:Wasn't it Bill Gates who once said that 64mb of RAM would be more than anyone would ever need?Sam wrote: ... 50 gig hard drive is plenty. 2 gig memory is more than my laptop had or my office (it has 1 gig). ...
Sam -- if you don't need any power, then consider picking up a used machine. What is your budget on this spend, if you don't mind my asking?
Chris
Oh to be a computer geek with all that money <<sigh>>.
But then, I digress --- Sam, I don't know that you can actually get a used laptop with 60GB anymore .... but scrounge around, you are sure to find something. We have a local shop around the corner that sells laptops for as little as $100 CDN -- interesting concept - they refurb anything and sell it cheap. Not sure what kind of reliability you get though.
Sam,
Since your laptop is in the "nothing to lose" category, have you considered putting linux on it? Linux is free in almost all of its forms, is an OS that while not windows, does many of the same things (and again, did I mention, FREE?) if you have a friend with a computer they could burn you a disk of it.
That way you could boot from your CD...if the computer works with it, it isn't your hard drive...and you found out without buying a new copy of windows.
You also should be able to get to most of your old files that way too.
If it *doesn't* work, well, then it's your hard drive, but you didn't blow 200 plus on a copy of windows to find out.
In the mean time you could shop for something new, or if the linux fixes it, you could either leave Linux on the machine or break down and spring for a new copy of windows.
Seems wrong that you would have to first BUY a new copy of the OS from a retailer before they can find out if your hard drive is out. Especially when you can try it out with a free version.
Just a thought.
John P.
Since your laptop is in the "nothing to lose" category, have you considered putting linux on it? Linux is free in almost all of its forms, is an OS that while not windows, does many of the same things (and again, did I mention, FREE?) if you have a friend with a computer they could burn you a disk of it.
That way you could boot from your CD...if the computer works with it, it isn't your hard drive...and you found out without buying a new copy of windows.
You also should be able to get to most of your old files that way too.
If it *doesn't* work, well, then it's your hard drive, but you didn't blow 200 plus on a copy of windows to find out.
In the mean time you could shop for something new, or if the linux fixes it, you could either leave Linux on the machine or break down and spring for a new copy of windows.
Seems wrong that you would have to first BUY a new copy of the OS from a retailer before they can find out if your hard drive is out. Especially when you can try it out with a free version.
Just a thought.
John P.
Before you buy, just look at the Apple store. More expensive, but kick virus protection to the curb. They're thinner lighter, and in a dark room you can see your keys to type because they are black with white back lit letters.
I've had PCs until this one, and I'll never go back. You'll spend less time learning how to use an Apple than you do right now on updating your virus protection and running spybots etc.
Look before you leap!
I've had PCs until this one, and I'll never go back. You'll spend less time learning how to use an Apple than you do right now on updating your virus protection and running spybots etc.
Look before you leap!
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Sam
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John, if you have a link to what I need to download, please send it.
I guess the plan would be this?:
download and burn cd of Linux
take to laptop, and try to install
if it works, then get a copy of Explorer off internet and install it to laptop
find firefox and download that
find open office for my Word-compatible program
download avg virus protection and spybot malware
download acrobat reader
enjoy computer
I guess the plan would be this?:
download and burn cd of Linux
take to laptop, and try to install
if it works, then get a copy of Explorer off internet and install it to laptop
find firefox and download that
find open office for my Word-compatible program
download avg virus protection and spybot malware
download acrobat reader
enjoy computer