New Laptop...

[Mr. H.]

I bought a new (2013) laptop through BestBuy.com. It's a decent machine (Gateway) running Windows 7. It was shipped via a 3rd party in Canada.

Heck for $340 and freeeeeeee shipping I took the opportunity to transition away from my Dell (which was fairly tricked-out) POS. The Dell from Hell would heat up like a firecracker, randomly freeze, and sometimes re-boot itself. My research led me to believe that they knowingly shipped out a batch of fucked up machines... too late to demand recompense.

I uninstalled Norton and installed Microsoft Security Essentials. I am still getting the occasional pop-up.

I had considered Malwarebytes and AdAware but figured I'd try the M.S.E. first.

Now to dump all the shit from laptop A to laptop B. Should be fun and exciting...

So why am I posting this?

Fuck if I know.

Chime in with helpful comments as you so deem.

a) Quick and easy data transfer?
b) Better security?
c) Clean up unneeded software?

Oh- and I've got Office installed on the old laptop. I need it on this new machine. I'm willing to pay Jack. Shit.

 

[shart_attack]

I just got a new HP for my birthday in April, myself.

Have only used the thing like four or five times, because I hate Windows 8.

 

[Synthaholic]

In May, I picked up an awesome $800-$900 Toshiba Satellite at a local pawn shop for $179.

It was riddled with viruses and malware, but I removed it all, and it's good as new.

Pawn shops are great sources for laptops (more so if you live in a college town) because the owners aren't usually the sharpest knives in the drawer regarding technology.

 

[Mr. H.]

Evidently, AdBloc is installed. And doing its job for the most part. Still have a couple of pesky pop ups.

 

[Zoom-boing]

I have a six year old Dell. It no longer charges the battery, I've replaced the plug/cord on it twice, have an extra battery (from a mostly fried Dell that was my daughter's in college), the part that plugs into the computer has always been loose so there's black duct tape helping to hold it in, the bottom right of the frame around the screen is cracked so the screen part of the laptop is pretty damn jiggly. And yet ... I don't want to get another laptop cause I'm too lazy to transfer all mah stuff over!

I also had problems with overheating but when this starts to happen I remove the back panel and clean out all the dust near the fan (youtube it, very easy to do this fix).

As for security, we used to have Norton but it was such a piggy hog, was always running or asking to run something, completely slowed the computer down, blarrrrrg. Switched over to Kaspersky about four years ago (we think Kaspersky and the server at my daugther's school did major screwage to her laptop, nothing we've tried has really fixed it either). Our subscription just expired so I went to Staples to pick up a new disk and they had a great sale on Kaspersky Internet Security. It provides:

• Real-time Internet protection against all viruses and online threats
• Secures online banking and shopping with unique Safe Money technology
• Safeguards your digital identity and privacy
• Identifies suspicious and phishing websites
• Prevents spying via unauthorized access to your webcam
• Alerts you to dangerous public Wi-Fi networks
• Helps you keep your children safe and responsible online
• Hassle-free protection with maximum PC performance

No problems installing, not slowing the computer down, more security. Sweet!

 

[Ernie S.]

I bought a new (2013) laptop through BestBuy.com. It's a decent machine (Gateway) running Windows 7. It was shipped via a 3rd party in Canada.

Heck for $340 and freeeeeeee shipping I took the opportunity to transition away from my Dell (which was fairly tricked-out) POS. The Dell from Hell would heat up like a firecracker, randomly freeze, and sometimes re-boot itself. My research led me to believe that they knowingly shipped out a batch of fucked up machines... too late to demand recompense.

I uninstalled Norton and installed Microsoft Security Essentials. I am still getting the occasional pop-up.

I had considered Malwarebytes and AdAware but figured I'd try the M.S.E. first.

Now to dump all the shit from laptop A to laptop B. Should be fun and exciting...

So why am I posting this?

Fuck if I know.

Chime in with helpful comments as you so deem.

a) Quick and easy data transfer?
b) Better security?
c) Clean up unneeded software?

Oh- and I've got Office installed on the old laptop. I need it on this new machine. I'm willing to pay Jack. Shit.

Hide the icon for Internet Destroyer add Firefox with (BluHell firewall 2.3.0) as your browser and avoid Chrome like a plague.

 

[Ernie S.]

Oh! And dump windows 7 and install Kubuntu Linux.

 

[Ringel05]

Oh! And dump windows 7 and install Kubuntu Linux.

Mint damnit! Mint!!

 

[Ernie S.]

Kubuntu. Unless you want to try Gentoo.

 

[Ernie S.]

I installed Gentoo from a floppy disk. It took 48 hours to compile.

 

[Mad Scientist]

I loved Win 98, Win XP, and Win NT but everything else they've done has turned to sh*t for me so I recently got an Acer ChromeBook.

I originally got it for my Wife but she didn't like it so now it's mine. (She's an Apple Girl!)

I'm tellin' ya' Solid State drives are the sh*t! I can shut it down and start it back up in less than a minute. Not bothered by any pop ups or malware or endless updating. Plenty of free apps at the Chrome Web Store too!

Got a few 32 gig micro thumb drives to store all my crap in and I'm good to go!

 

[Ringel05]

I bought a new (2013) laptop through BestBuy.com. It's a decent machine (Gateway) running Windows 7. It was shipped via a 3rd party in Canada.

Heck for $340 and freeeeeeee shipping I took the opportunity to transition away from my Dell (which was fairly tricked-out) POS. The Dell from Hell would heat up like a firecracker, randomly freeze, and sometimes re-boot itself. My research led me to believe that they knowingly shipped out a batch of fucked up machines... too late to demand recompense.

I uninstalled Norton and installed Microsoft Security Essentials. I am still getting the occasional pop-up.

I had considered Malwarebytes and AdAware but figured I'd try the M.S.E. first.

Now to dump all the shit from laptop A to laptop B. Should be fun and exciting...

So why am I posting this?

Fuck if I know.

Chime in with helpful comments as you so deem.

a) Quick and easy data transfer?
b) Better security?
c) Clean up unneeded software?

Oh- and I've got Office installed on the old laptop. I need it on this new machine. I'm willing to pay Jack. Shit.

No quick and easy data transfer that I know of. Copy all your documents, picts, etc to a thumb drive. Back up your browser settings/favorites and copy to the thumb drive. Do you have a copy of M$ Office? If not you're pretty much screwed when it comes to M$ Office, you'll have to find someone who will pirate a copy of theirs, buy one or use LibreOffice (it's free and is compatible with M$ Office).
Better security (I don't trust M$ Security Essentials), I use Avast and Malwarebytes, for clean up I use CCleaner. All have free versions as well as subscribed versions.

 

[Ringel05]

I installed Gentoo from a floppy disk. It took 48 hours to compile.

How long ago was that??!!

 

[Mad Scientist]

Forget MS Office Mr H. Go with Open Office. It's free and compatible with everything MS.

Apache OpenOffice - The Free and Open Productivity Suite

 

[Mr. H.]

Dandy suggestions, all. Much grassy ass.

 

[Ernie S.]

I installed Gentoo from a floppy disk. It took 48 hours to compile.

How long ago was that??!!

10 years ago, I'd say. I still have the machine but haven't booted it since I moved up here 5 years ago.

 

[Ringel05]

I installed Gentoo from a floppy disk. It took 48 hours to compile.

How long ago was that??!!

10 years ago, I'd say. I still have the machine but haven't booted it since I moved up here 5 years ago.

10 years ago and it still had a floppy drive??!! Musta been an antique.

 

[Ringel05]

Forget MS Office Mr H. Go with Open Office. It's free and compatible with everything MS.

Apache OpenOffice - The Free and Open Productivity Suite

Unfortunately OO is way behind the curve, not to say Apache hasn't finally started to do some serious work on it. LibreOffice has been working on MS Office compatibility for years while OO lingered in virtual limbo. I have OO on my older machines and LO on all my new ones.
H, with either one you can save your work in M$ Office format, no need to do conversions, though LibreOffice is well ahead of OpenOffice in the compatibility arena.

 

[Synthaholic]

Forget MS Office Mr H. Go with Open Office. It's free and compatible with everything MS.

Apache OpenOffice - The Free and Open Productivity Suite

Unfortunately OO is way behind the curve, not to say Apache hasn't finally started to do some serious work on it. LibreOffice has been working on MS Office compatibility for years while OO lingered in virtual limbo. I have OO on my older machines and LO on all my new ones.
H, with either one you can save your work in M$ Office format, no need to do conversions, though LibreOffice is well ahead of OpenOffice in the compatibility arena.

Is that right? Maybe I need to switch to Libre, then, because Apache's Base and Impress do not convert well to Excel and Powerpoint.

 

[Ernie S.]

I installed Gentoo from a floppy disk. It took 48 hours to compile.

How long ago was that??!!

10 years ago, I'd say. I still have the machine but haven't booted it since I moved up here 5 years ago.

10 years ago and it still had a floppy drive??!! Musta been an antique.

I built the machine and was running SUSE and my step son was running Gentoo. He was trying to force me to learn bash and dared me to install Gentoo. I had an old floppy drive and a zip drive laying around so I filled up all the bays. Damed machine has 4 hard drives including a 1 Tb that cost a mint at the time.
Floppy was the only way to install Gentoo then. I did learn a bit though.