| Author |
Message |
    
compsy
Citizen
Username: Compsy
Post Number: 134
Registered: 1-2002
| | Posted on Tuesday, August 3, 2004 - 7:23 am: |     |
Not sure if this is correct place to post this, but I figured you techie's would read this section (Dave, Jamie, et.al) and might take pity on me....
I just received my Gateway Solo 3450 Laptop back from Gateway with a new hard drive. I have a complete copy (date and programs) of my old hard drive which I fortunately dumped onto a portable hard drive before sending the machine to be checked out by Gateway, but I don't want to re-create the mess that my old drive was.
Any advice on re-loading programs and data carefully? Would this be a good time to upgrade to Windows XP? Old machine was running ME with a Pentium chip from 3 years ago (don't recall speed), 192 RAM and a 30 gig hard drive that's wide open, now. I'd always been reluctant to do that because of compatibility problems with old programs that friends said they had doing such an upgrade.
At this point, I can't even get online or on my home network with the laptop, but I'm not sure how much to try doing with ME wizards, how much to "lift" off the portable hard drive, etc....
And the idea of jettisoning ME is very appealing, especially after having read the related post farther down the list here....
Thanks for advice... |
Brian O'Leary
Citizen
Username: Brianoleary
Post Number: 2252
Registered: 3-2002
| | Posted on Tuesday, August 3, 2004 - 6:51 pm: | |
I'd upgrade to XP Home and the accompanying Office package (I think Microsoft is offering a lower-priced "student" option these days that does not include some of the components available in the full version). Then, copy the documents only onto the new drive. If you have programs other than the Office suite that you want to load, check their compatibility with XP before you reload them.
If this is too daunting, copy everything back and then buy a Macintosh  |
Joan
Citizen
Username: Joancrystal
Post Number: 3436
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Wednesday, August 4, 2004 - 5:09 pm: | |
compsy:
You have to start with the operating system and work from there. Nothing else will run until you have an operating system in place.
From what I have read ME is just about the worst version of windows that microsoft ever came up with. If you have the opportunity to upgrade at this point I would.
Once you have the new operating system in place, you can begin adding your applications programs by installing them one at a time. Unless they are really old, most of them should self install from their CDs. Some may require activation which the programs will do themselves as soon as you install ISP software. If they don't, they will offer you directions as to how to do this. Many programs will stop working after a certain time if they are not activated. Make sure each program is running before you go on to the next one.
You may also have to down load drivers for an peripherals you are using such as an optical mouse, printer, or scanner.
Good luck. |
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