Old Laptops and Window8

owlfandbg

Just passing on something
I had an old laptop running windows Vista that was unable to upgrade to window 7 . I found that I was able to upgrade it to Windows8 for £99 (basic version). This means I can use it again (as it clears out the operating system) and after a bit of deleting the old os I have in effect a newly set up laptop .
I had previously thought that it would be good only for part exchange- now my kids can use it - rather than the expense of buying another laptop at £300 +
Hope this is useful

kenr

Not a grabbit mate.
Also you could just have installed Linux for FREE on it and it would have run a lot faster.

dreamteamgirl

Yawn, Linux user pokes fun at Windows user... Boring and predictable!!

Am interested in original grabbit tho, did you need much hard drive/ ram to do it? How is it running?

Zanderman

Thanks for the post owlfandbg - though do note that you've placed it in the grabbit forum, and this really isn't the best place for it!

Interesting concept though. As dreamteamgirl says above, if you can tell us what the specifications of your resurrected laptop are that would be very useful - there are lots of old laptops about and most of them probably can't run Windows 8 so it would be good to know processor speed, ram etc.

As for Linux, mentioned by kenr, well that would do the job nicely too. The best Linux alternative to Win 8, with its tablet aspirations, might be Ubuntu 12.10, which has similar capabilities (i.e. designed for keyboard or tablet). Get it free at http://www.ubuntu.com/ubuntu

owlfandbg

I'm not sure of the spec but it is about 5 years old and has 130gB of disk and an AMD processor.
It appears to be running just fine. I will check the spec and post it for you later.
Oh and which forum would you suggest- there appear to be hundreds - none of which are quite right for this.

owlfandbg

It is a dell inspiron 1501 with a AMD turionx2 pocessor (whatever that means).

I went to the mircosoft windows 8 upgrade website. There is a 'check your PC for compatibillity' link
from there it was a doddle Except that I has to remove the old OS aterwards (via a system tool)

Mista_C

you can install Windows 7 on the Inspiron 1501, you just need to find an alternative source of drivers than the Dell website.

owlfandbg

Thanks - but it didn't need all the drivers and other stuff for this. It just worked. Besides I was after a basic machine to browse/do emails etc so this so far fits the bill

NiftyDigits

owlfandbg wrote: »

Thanks - but it didn't need all the drivers and other stuff for this. It just worked. Besides I was after a basic machine to browse/do emails etc so this so far fits the bill

Ermmmm....why didn't you just re-install Vista? That would not have cost you anything and you would still have a 'newly set up machine'.

nox118

NiftyDigits wrote: »

Ermmmm....why didn't you just re-install Vista? That would not have cost you anything and you would still have a 'newly set up machine'.

That would just be self inflicted torture. Good to know windows 8 will work ok with older machines.

owlfandbg

NiftyDigits wrote: »

Ermmmm....why didn't you just re-install Vista? That would not have cost you anything and you would still have a 'newly set up machine'.

I don't have the disks - they don't provide them when you buy some laptops and I didn't take a backup at the time (silly I know but not uncommon). So I had nothing to restore from.