It is not the time it takes that worries me because they are minimal, it’s the fact that it does it at all, it’s a trick.
What’s new in Windows 10…? Me!
I hope I don’t regret this…
Just purchased a new 14" HP laptop from AO…
For you techy types…256Gb SSB 8Gb RAM with a 8th generation i5 Intel core processor…Any good chaps?..
Should be fast
That’s the same specifications as my Desktop computer, apart from the age of the hardware of course. It’s all about 5 years now. I hope you get the same good performance and reliability out of your new Laptop computer.
Edit: Spelling error.
Thanks Ray and Mart, I’ve been having trouble following links on the forum, this old netbook is so slow. And trying to run a video off my dash cam is virtually impossible so I hope the new laptop will be up to the job.
Just one problem though, I wanted to purchase ‘Office 360’ at the same time. I think it comes with a free trial but they were doing a special offer on it at AO so I added it on, but when I read that the £39 was an annual subscription I’ve cancelled it. Is it not possible to just buy a copy?
If not, I’ve still got a disk with microsoft office student, and I’ll load that instead…
I have found MS Office 2016 very clunky, even on a relatively powerful desktop PC.
I tried the free MS Office Online on my laptop PC and that was even clunkier.
I’ve never been a fan of Google Docs so I started looking for a free PC solution elsewhere. Apache OpenOffice and LibreOffice were obvious candidates, but I settled for SoftMaker FreeOffice - simple but effective:
SoftMaker FreeOffice offers effortless editing of Microsoft Word, Excel and PowerPoint files. It can also export files in EPUB and PDF export.
You don’t get every feature in the free version – tabbed browsing and the thesaurus are saved for the paid-for product, for example – but all the basics of everyday office work are covered very well indeed.
I’m not sure of the status of the latest MS Office but think it’s all subscription now. There are lots of special offers for full versions of MS Office (search using the term ‘ms office’) but people seem to get varying results as regards licencing from what I read.
If you didn’t have that Home & Student version, it might be worth thinking about one of those offers. Either that or install Libre Office or OpenOffice (or other). Since you have got MS Office Home & Student though, it could be best to use that. It’s what I’m using. It runs OK for me and caters for everything I need to do.
Thanks Omah and Mart, the thing that worries me is that I have files on Excel and Word going back to the nineties (first formed on windows 98) I would be a wee bit miffed if I couldn’t open them. My first knock back was when windows 7 would not allow me to open files on Works. So using Vista on my desktop I converted them all to excel. I thought that once all my files had been converted to digital they would survive forever…It seems now that it’s not the case…
At least when I used to enter all my running into a ledger they could always be accessed…There’s a lot to be said for pen and paper…
The softmaker free office looks good Omah, or the Libre Office also, I’ll sample the free trial that comes with the laptop, but they can stick that annual subscription malarky. Although I don’t mind paying a ‘one off’ payment for the right office software. It also comes with a free trial of the Mcafee? security programme, so with that and the regular upgrades suffered on windows 10, plus IE there is going to be a lot of cleaning out to be done first before I let it loose on any my important stuff…
I wouldn’t dream of buying MS Office, should my present installation become unusable.
Libre Office is free. Why not take a look? It is similar to MS Office in many ways.
I have some ancient files created in Lotus which, of course, is now long gone.
Libre Office opens them!
My brother has some fairly old Excel files that he opens in Libre Office but says that, although they can be opened and read, the cells look squashed up. I don’t know if that would be the case with other MS Office alternatives.
McAfee? Opinions vary a lot on AV programs and I’ve never tried McAfee. Maybe keep it until the trial is up to see how it behaves. Give yourself some research and thinking time.
The trouble with AV programs is that they get so deep into the system that it’s hard to remove all traces of them if you ever want to change to a different one. Even after using the removal tools that most AV software sellers provide, it’s still often possible to find Registry entries that have been made by the program.
That said, McAfee doesn’t do so badly in AV tests these days and you might decide to keep it …it would cost though.
Some don’t put faith in comparison sites but here’s the AV-Comparatives test results for various AV programs:
http://www.av-comparatives.org/comparison/
…and AV-Test:
I’m afraid I don’t know much about that as I haven’t tried spreadsheets in LibreOffice. Is there no way of enlarging the cells, or the whole image on the screen. I can do that with some programmes (eg, Photoshop) using Ctrl +
I have a distinct dislike of McAfee, having found it sneaking in with such things as Malwarebytes updates. I wouldn’t touch it with a bargepole.
I don’t know for sure if my brother has tried Control+ JBR but he’s been into computers for very long time, so he probably would have done.
I used Libre Office for quite a while and found documents created in MS Word with tables in them weren’t faithfully reproduced. Table size, positioning and text placement were all a bit out. That was a few years ago though and maybe this would be better in the latest versions.
Yes, of course.
I haven’t used Libre Office very much, so my experience is very limited.
Just had a text and email from AO to telling me that ‘Sabrimnt’ will be delivering my order this afternoon…:-D…Yes I know, an unusual name…
Thanks JB and Mart, but I’m still worried that any other office software might not open my spreadsheets and databases satisfactorily, I really do have a lot these, and because I know my way around Excel and Word, I can usually knock up a database or spreadsheet in next to no time. I would hate to have to waste time re educating myself with strange new software. I will report in due course my progress with the new laptop…
I know that I’m going to get scolded by all you tech savvy guys when I say that after deleting ‘Norton’ from both of my computers, I have run the last five years without a security system installed at all, other than Windows Firewall and Windows Defender, and had no problems…Like you have said Mart, I found it embedded in just about everything I do, and I hate the constant messages. I consider it invasive, time wasting and fear mongering…
I quite understand your reluctance to use something you find unfamiliar. I found the same when I was looking for alternatives to Photoshop Elements, so shelled out £60 for a new version.
As for Norton, that software has (or perhaps had?) a lot of criticism for taking over systems and refusing to be uninstalled.
I, too, rely on Windows Defender and the inbuilt firewall. I avoid patently risky web sites and, touch wood (my head), have remained perfectly safe so far.
On the other hand, I also use Malwarebytes (free!) and CCleaner (free!) which I’m sure help.
Thanks JB, glad to report that new laptop has arrived and I’ve done some preliminary work on it to make it useful to me without all of the rubbish that they send pre loaded nowadays.
I’ve deleted Macafee, and 0ther things that I will never use. I have managed to silence Cortana but seem unable to uninstall her…I’ve also deleted the trial version of office 360. In an attempt to take advantage of the one month free trial they required my credit/Debit card details…Not bloody likely…
I seem unable to stop updates also, it states in the conditions that you must accept them, so that’s work in progress. Apart from wanting to know more information about me than Mrs Fox does, so far I’m liking windows 10, but it’s early days yet.
It didn’t like me using google chrome for my default browser either…
Very sensible. I can’t uninstall Cortana either; I just ignore her!
I have got round that for several weeks by lying that I am on a metered connection. I keep receiving messages that they are unable to update my system, which I also ignore.
No, they seem to want us to use Edge. Yes, you guessed it: I ignore that too!
I have used Chrome for quite some time now and have no problems.
Do you think it can still monitor our computers when they are shut down JB?
Getting started on windows 10 is more thorough than any operating system I’ve ever used before. It seems to think for itself…:shock:
It wouldn’t surprise me!