New (used) laptop - what programs to load?

samwise

samwise

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Well, got myself a Dell Latitude C400 off eBay for a lightweight toy. Came with 256Mb ram, 20Gb hard drive and external DVD/CD-RW.

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Will be upping the ram (max is 1Gb), fitting a wireless b/g module under the keyboad (Intel WM3B2200BGMWWB2 fits and works, apparently, but trying to find it cheap over here - Amazon.com price $26.90, Dabs.co.uk price $82 :eek1 ) and probably a bigger HD at some point.

Have loaded XP Pro on it, and am currently doing all the Windows updates, so while it's chuntering away doing that, what other software would people recommend?

I'm going to load Firefox, Acrobat, an anti-virus software (AVG or Avast), MS Anit-Spyware, a firewall (currently got Sygate on my desktop, so may go with that unless something better and still free is out there) - what else do people recommend?
 
There's a good idea, give Open Office 2 a go instead of installing Office 2003 - I'm not intending to download emails to this machine, the desktop will be re-built as a server and download emails to that. I can remote desktop into it to check emails.
 
Google Earth needs a seriously powerful processor so it may not work on the laptop.

Open Office does work but takes a feckin age to open. I used to run both Microsoft Office and Open Office on my other PC but got so fed up with with length of time it took to initialise when I opened a document that I changed the defaults back to Office.

Maybe it's better on a newer PC?

As for what to load...... Firefox (as you said) and Eudora for email, Zone Alarm for a firewall (all free)

Cheers

Dick
 
guitarman said:
Google Earth needs a seriously powerful processor so it may not work on the laptop.

Open Office does work but takes a feckin age to open. I used to run both Microsoft Office and Open Office on my other PC but got so fed up with with length of time it took to initialise when I opened a document that I changed the defaults back to Office.

Maybe it's better on a newer PC?

As for what to load...... Firefox (as you said) and Eudora for email, Zone Alarm for a firewall (all free)

Cheers

Dick
Click to expand...

Open Office Writer took about 15 seconds to open for the first time today, then under 10 seconds for a later incarnation. Office 2003 may be quicker to open as Word sits in memory all the time :nenau

Got the Zone Alarm suite on 15-day trial at the moment, so will see how it goes before deciding whether to buy it or not.

I used to use Eudora so may have another go at it :thumb
 
you should get spybot, spywareblaster and adaware too .

Avg and windows firewall is good enough.

Gone right off Zonealarm these days

you might also want Last.Fm player and VLC media player.

I've gone off itunes on my laptop cos - again its too big - use winamp5 or VLC

i use my laptop as a wireless media player thru the stereo.

I 've got no office or email

use xp set to run max perf - no visual styles, classic displays etc for speed.
 
Nippy Normans supply Touratech, Wunderlich, Desert Fox and many other makes of accessories.
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