Advice about refurbished laptop, please.

Retired_at_55

I'd like to say a huge thank you to everyone who replied. I was looking on eBay again before I read some of the later replies.


I have had an offer accepted on a Dell Latitude E7450 and it is within my budget.



My present laptop is a Toshiba L830 and, despite good help and advice, with my poor technical skills, it had become very slow - seemed to take ages to 'load' and often the little circle kept going round and round for what seemed to be a long time.


I may be able to pass it on to a friend or relative. Thank you all again for your very much appreciated interest, help and advice.


Retired at 55

EveryWhere

Retired_at_55 wrote: »

I'd like to say a huge thank you to everyone who replied. I was looking on eBay again before I read some of the later replies.


I have had an offer accepted on a Dell Latitude E7450 and it is within my budget.



My present laptop is a Toshiba L830 and, despite good help and advice, with my poor technical skills, it had become very slow - seemed to take ages to 'load' and often the little circle kept going round and round for what seemed to be a long time.


I may be able to pass it on to a friend or relative. Thank you all again for your very much appreciated interest, help and advice.


Retired at 55

The model number is underneath. e.g. PSK7YE-00700PEP

It likely just needed the hard drive swapped for an Solid State Drive. Would take a novice all of ten minutes to do.
Then a clean install of Windows 7 using the Recovery DVD.
Better than when new.
I don't know what advice you were given earlier, but it either wasn't good or you just ignored it.

that

Retired_at_55 wrote: »

My present laptop is a Toshiba L830 and, despite good help and advice, with my poor technical skills, it had become very slow - seemed to take ages to 'load' and often the little circle kept going round and round for what seemed to be a long time.

the new PC will be faster. however I agree with what EveryWhere said especially, "I don't know what advice you were given earlier, but it either wasn't good or you just ignored it. "

Believing that the laptop is physically sound, was possibly not worth upgrading to a new one. If someone told you to get a new one, I would probably not go back to them for further advice.:(

[Deleted User]

EveryWhere wrote: »

The model number is underneath. e.g. PSK7YE-00700PEP

It likely just needed the hard drive swapped for an Solid State Drive. Would take a novice all of ten minutes to do.
Then a clean install of Windows 7 using the Recovery DVD.
Better than when new.
I don't know what advice you were given earlier, but it either wasn't good or you just ignored it.

No, it wouldn't take 10 mins for a novice. The advice they have received on here is infinitely better than what you have "advised" in your post.

EveryWhere

camelot1971 wrote: »

No, it wouldn't take 10 mins for a novice. The advice they have received on here is infinitely better than what you have "advised" in your post.

What exactly is the purpose of your sour comment?
Did someone put a bee in your bonnet?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Z5WuCm5nQc

It genuinely takes five minutes to swap drives on that model. Novice might take ten.

My other advice suggested that the £200 Toshiba that he asked about was fine for him, if he was afraid on fitting an SSD himself and also that we should look at the spec of his old machine to compare.

So what, exactly, is the point on which you disagree? Is it that you are having a bad day and have no one at home to take it out on?
Perhaps in your hastiness you jumped to the conclusion that the earlier advice to which I was referring, was on this thread.

Whereas in fact, I was referring to this statement;

My present laptop is a Toshiba L830 and, despite good help and advice, with my poor technical skills, it had become very slow - seemed to take ages to 'load' and often the little circle kept going round and round for what seemed to be a long time.

In other words, his current Toshiba could have been speeded up considerably for very little cost....which is the whole point of this forum.
Not only that, but one of the other contributors to this thread agreed with my statement.
So to whose 'infinitely better advice' were you referring?
You've only succeeded in making yourself look a bit stupid.

Retired_at_55

EveryWhere wrote: »

The model number is underneath. e.g. PSK7YE-00700PEP

It likely just needed the hard drive swapped for an Solid State Drive. Would take a novice all of ten minutes to do.
Then a clean install of Windows 7 using the Recovery DVD.
Better than when new.
I don't know what advice you were given earlier, but it either wasn't good or you just ignored it.

I'm afraid I am rhe problem, EveryWhere, and not the helpful people who have generously tried to help me previously.

I have average intelligence and manage most things normally. A family member once told me that I was just not technically adept - I agree. Please see post #5. I am learning, albeit all too slowly, and I am getting better but, technically, I have a long way to go.

Retired at 55

Retired_at_55

that wrote: »

the new PC will be faster. however I agree with what EveryWhere said especially, "I don't know what advice you were given earlier, but it either wasn't good or you just ignored it. "

Believing that the laptop is physically sound, was possibly not worth upgrading to a new one. If someone told you to get a new one, I would probably not go back to them for further advice.:(

I believe I was given sound advice, that, and I did not ignore it. I tried but I really am so poor, technically, that I 'messed up' - very often I have to admit.

Retired at 55

Retired_at_55

camelot1971 wrote: »

No, it wouldn't take 10 mins for a novice. The advice they have received on here is infinitely better than what you have "advised" in your post.

I really have been given good advice, often, in the past. I just, totally unintentionally, am not good at folling technical instructions although I am working on it and I am getting better slowly - not totally giving up,

Retired at 55

Retired_at_55

There are people like me who are very poor at getting their head round technology. The positive thing, personally, is that the good people on this forum very generously give their time, information, advice and opinions.

I appreciate it - and look forward to the time when I'll hopefully improve - technically. In the meantime I soldier on trying not to let frustration get me down.

Thank you all - truly very much.

Retired at 55

that

Retired_at_55 wrote: »

I believe I was given sound advice, that, and I did not ignore it. I tried but I really am so poor, technically, that I 'messed up' - very often I have to admit.

There is a little bit we have not told you, we left out the elephant in the room. "take ages to 'load' and often the little circle kept going round and round for what seemed to be a long time". Your helper should have immediately thought spyware and crud, not new PC time. If you do not know, and surmised that this is your only way out, well that is fair enough. Only when you mess up do you grow.

Lazy bar-stewards like me would put on malwabytes, cccleaner, and delete cache, spyware and temp files - guess about an 80% fix, and it would run faster, with little physical work.

the next step up would be to wipe the hard disk, as the not so lazy EveryWhere stated.

Finally the peak performance would be a new ssd drive and a software re-install.

Most people know and have performed these steps to varying degrees on their own PC their own PC at home, nearly as common as buttering bread, and that should have been their advice, before recommending a 'new PC'