[AlanHo]

One our grand daughters needed a basic laptop for her college work. Windows 10 and MS Office which includes Outlook were a must – and guess who was given the job of finding one for her.

After 2 unsuccessful weeks on Ebay, I found that the son of one of my friends had a 4 year old Windows 7 Acer Aspire i3 500Gb HD 8GB memory laptop in his garage which was previously his works computer and was handed down for his kids to use until it developed a fault and had been replaced by a new Win 10 laptop.

I cheekily offered him £20 for it and he was happy to accept.  It looked in splendid condition barring a few scratches.

I found that the machine was constipated – the hard drive was absolutely full of garbage and every operation took an age to perform. It refused to let me install CCleaner or Malwarebytes it was so full. I deleted most of the rubbish, installed Malwarebytes and CCLeaner and let them do their stuff. It was loaded with malware which was expunged and deleted 173 GB of unwanted files and three pages of register entries.

I then uninstalled loads of software – mostly games – and got it running smoothly and surprisingly quickly.

The first challenge was to upgrade Win 7 to Win 10. But the free upgrade was long ago stopped by Microsoft. However, I discovered that Microsoft have left a door open until December 31st 2017. If you need Win 10 to use its assistive technology, it is still free. (I wear spectacles so that counts but you are not asked to prove anything).
Windows 10 upgrade for assistive technology users

I then had to find a cheap MS Office 2010 Pro and found it here  Home - UniqSoftware
I must confess I was a bit sceptical about it but it was the full programme and the Product key was accepted and activated by Microsoft.

The bottom line is that I paid £20 for the stuffed computer and £28 for MS Office Pro a total of £48.  Windows 10 was free.

I have taken the precaution of taking a full Acronis backup onto one of my spare external drives. I am confident that very shortly I am going to have to unravel some unholy pickle she has got herself into.  She has a tablet and smartphone which take the strain of her social media activities - hence I am hoping the laptop really does get devoted to just college work.

[Surferdude]

Good stuff Alan.

I found, used and referred to on here, the W10 free download for assisted technologies a few weeks ago when upgrading our superfluous W8 laptop.

Worked a treat for me, too.

[CraigB]

Great job Alan

[Shambles]

Good work mate

Personally, I'd have extracted the Win7 product key then flattened the whole system. Rebuilt it with a fresh easily-obtainable Win7 then started the upgrade from there.

[Dazzler]

That's awesome Alan. 

That has got me thinking, in this age of phablets and tablets I',m guessing there are probably lots of good second hand laptops out there. I'm using a quite old Acer 14 inch right now that I prefer over the Tablet for some things. When it dies I will now consider a 2nd hand replacement.

Mind you it is quite sprightly! i5, 8GB of RAM and an SSD drive... Windows 7 Pro.. Just the battery isn't what it used to be and it doesn't like cheap aftermarket batteries. 

[asathorny]

very well done, Alan 

[eye30]

After all your hard work hope she gets all straight A's

[John B]

Good old Grandad      Must admit I feel good when I help the grandkids, but that is getting less & less now they are older. They are far more knowledgable than me on computers and latest electronic technology, in fact one them is going for a degree in computer science at uni, guess I will have to take a back seat now and feel inadequate.    Having stated that, they would be lost if I did not help them with their cars, they have not got a clue   

[beerman]

On another note is Win10 any good?

[Surferdude]

On another note is Win10 any good?

Well I reckon it is. I resisted coming off W7 for as long as possible but I needed a new PC and it got too hard to get a copy of 7 for the new unit.
Had seriously bad experiences with W8.1 on my wife's laptop so had deserves.
However, it's fine.
The only issue I have is with the periodic super large updates, given our really slow internet. And you can't avoid them. They have made updating mandatory.
I've found a way to delay them but eventually you just have to bite the bullet. If you have a reasonable download speed it wouldn't be an issue.

[Surferdude]

I think it's best if you have a new computer which is built for it, but our W8.1 laptop is two years old and seems fine on it.

[beerman]

On another issue it goes to show how consumerism has  made us think that fixing stuff is too expensive and it is cheaper to go out and buy another one.

I have fixed numerous things around the house using google and various help guides/videos.

[Surferdude]

On another issue it goes to show how consumerism has  made us think that fixing stuff is too expensive and it is cheaper to go out and buy another one.

I have fixed numerous things around the house using google and various help guides/videos.

Me too.
I reckon I'm the second biggest cheapskate on the forum. ( Hi Dazz  )

[The Gonz]

I have fixed numerous things around the house using google and various help guides/videos.

Me too.
I reckon I'm the second biggest cheapskate on the forum. ( Hi Dazz  )

We should start a cheapskate section. Dazz can moderate and the rest of us can argue over who's cheapest. Alan can now be inducted after his last majestic effort.

[beerman]

I'm so cheap my kids think 'Reduced to Clear' is a brandname......

[AlanHo]

I bought a pack of tomatoes from the supermarket today - reduced from £1.70 to £0.17. The sell by date was today

Quality didn't matter - they are only wanted for soup.

[Dazzler]

Plenty of bargains out there for the smart ones amonst us. I am not saving for a rainy day, just to spend on other nicer pursuits and things... 

[The Gonz]

One of the tap timers at one of our properties in Adelaide has stopped working reliably. I went to Bunnings to replace the gap with a series of joiners. That tap timer is coming back with me for parts for an interesting timer project - which I haven't thought up yet.

[Dazzler]

One of the tap timers at one of our properties in Adelaide has stopped working reliably. I went to Bunnings to replace the gap with a series of joiners. That tap timer is coming back with me for parts for an interesting timer project - which I haven't thought up yet.

Time how long the diamondback tyres last? 

[Surferdude]

One of the tap timers at one of our properties in Adelaide has stopped working reliably. I went to Bunnings to replace the gap with a series of joiners. That tap timer is coming back with me for parts for an interesting timer project - which I haven't thought up yet.

Time how long the diamondback tyres last? 

That'd work.
They're normally 24 hour timers.   

[The Gonz]

Cheapness again: yesterday the Benq 4:3 17" monitor I use on the Linux box finally packed it in after a few weeks of gremlin activity with it turning on and off randomly.

I toyed with the idea of getting out to Reservoir Swap Meet today but baulked at the $3 entry fee and trader mark up, so I looked at Gumtree and located a 19" HP L1950g for $10 about 7km from home. I'm using it right now.

[Dazzler]

It's a buyer's market out there. $10 wow! 

I have a 23" quite fancy AOC monitor I have no use for, but seeing as I'd be lucky to get $30 or $40 bucks for it, it is just gathering dust in a corner of my office. 

[The Gonz]

Gumtree, Dazz. You're obviously not in a hurry, so make it a seller's market and set your price, along with a high quality, flattering picture of it.

[Dazzler]

Gumtree, Dazz. You're obviously not in a hurry, so make it a seller's market and set your price, along with a high quality, flattering picture of it.

Worth a try I guess, but probably have to make it pick up only. Wouldn't freight very well and expensive! ! 

[The Gonz]

... probably have to make it pick up only. Wouldn't freight very well and expensive! ! 

Yes, all the bargain stuff tends to be pick-up only, which is why I searched based on my postcode +10km.