Confused about XP replacement options

littlemoney

Dell are selling windows 7 computers in their business section

grumpycrab

littlemoney wrote: »

Dell are selling windows 7 computers in their business section

I was looking at Dell today and it looks like the business Optiplex desktops are being discounted (or perhaps the RRP is set very high?).

Ignore the "business" heading - home users can buy too (see link). One advantage (apart from Windows 7 Professional - which may be overkill for many) is you can usually get a 3 year warranty.

http://www.dmxdimension.com/dell-uk/optiplex-price-comparison/

Gillor

As Closed said in Post#7.

If you're still concerned install something like Sandboxie or Toolwiz Timefreeze and do all your web browsing in a sandboxed environment.

prowla

You can generally get Windows 7 licence stickers, either on ebay or at a computer fair; the OS software is available for download.

prowla

RumRat wrote: »

Windows 7 will be the same as using Windows 8 with Classic shell. So, you'll probably 'hate' that as well.

Windows 7 is very similar to XP - it's just got improvements in almost every area, whereas Windows 8 is quite radically different (and has no improvements in any area).

RumRat wrote: »

The banks are moving toward W7/8. Until they have, most have purchased extended support packages from MS which will protect them beyond the sunset date to enable the testing of the new systems. It's not advisable to use ATM's as a yardstick to judge if you should wait or not.

The general consensus is that business and banks aren't moving to Windows 8.

henm2

Banks are moving from XP to Windows 7.

At home the best XP replacement option is either Linux Mint 16 XFCE edition or LXLE.Easy to use and secure and complete with all the software most people would need.

ukcarper

If you are using Outlook Express in XP you will have to get use to another E mail program in Windows 7 or 8.

Cycrow

Theres no need to pay for an OS, you can get plenty for free

J_B

Cycrow wrote: »

Theres no need to pay for an OS, you can get plenty for free

I presume you are excluding Windoze here?

esuhl

Cycrow wrote: »

Theres no need to pay for an OS, you can get plenty for free

Most free OSes (Linux, BSD, etc.) require more technical knowledge to maintain than Windows.

Arch Linux is my favourite Linux distro by far, but I wouldn't recommend it to my non-techie parents or other family members.

Unless you're technically literate (and don't mind spending a bit of time understanding and configuring your system), Windows is going to be the best OS to use.

There's no need to pay for an OS... but there's no need for non-techies to struggle with non-Windows OSes either.