Buying a laptop

kah22

A laptop is on my medium term shopping list, there is no big rush. It's a long time since I had one, I've relied on my iPad. They're a few things I'd like to sort out in my mind.

I still have a CD copy of an older Office, with recent PC's and the newer Office are we talking about a yearly licence  or can I still use the old copy of Office?

To be honest I just want it as much as I need it. I don't really need the most up to date machine one from Amazon Warehouse or last years model would be more than sufficient. So when might I see reduction, before or after Christmas, or where am I likely to see them?

Thanks for taking the time reading this

SiliconChip

It should be OK to use the CD version but you'd need to tell us what version of Office it is to be sure. Bear in mind that very few laptops come with a CD/DVD player these days so it's likely that you'd need to budget for an external USB drive - the one I bought in 2020 was only £15.98, so it shouldn't be a large additional cost.

kah22

To be honest I'm m not to sure of the version, and to be honest it's in the house but I'm no to sure of that either. 🤭

geordiejon

tbh there are plenty of free office programs out there, i have just noticed softmaker have got a new free suite out called freeoffice, been using this program for years with no problems.

cerebus

Libreoffice is a very good free alternative word esque program if you can't find that cd 

Nowadays you don't really need to buy a program or a subscription as there are so many very good free alternatives that do the same job 

As this is mse have you considered a second hand laptop? Pretty much anything from the last 10 years is plenty good enough to do everyday tasks such as email, surfing , office stuff, music , even pic and video editing 

As prices fluctuate all year nowadays and black Friday deals usually aren't worth the paper they are wrote on , I would recommend downloading a price checker app onto your ipad and keeping an eye on prices that way, then you will know if you are getting a good deal  or not 

debitcardmayhem

One thing to remember many laptops don’t have cd/dvd drives.

kah22

cerebus said:

Libreoffice is a very good free alternative word esque program if you can't find that cd 

Nowadays you don't really need to buy a program or a subscription as there are so many very good free alternatives that do the same job 

As this is mse have you considered a second hand laptop? Pretty much anything from the last 10 years is plenty good enough to do everyday tasks such as email, surfing , office stuff, music , even pic and video editing 

As prices fluctuate all year nowadays and black Friday deals usually aren't worth the paper they are wrote on , I would recommend downloading a price checker app onto your ipad and keeping an eye on prices that way, then you will know if you are getting a good deal  or not 

Good idea

For an ordinary home computer: a small amount of office work, one or two educational programs, YouTube, and the occasional video, Netflix - that type of thing what spec would you suggest.  I would want a reasonably sized screen

READY4

kah22 said:

cerebus said:

Libreoffice is a very good free alternative word esque program if you can't find that cd 

Nowadays you don't really need to buy a program or a subscription as there are so many very good free alternatives that do the same job 

As this is mse have you considered a second hand laptop? Pretty much anything from the last 10 years is plenty good enough to do everyday tasks such as email, surfing , office stuff, music , even pic and video editing 

As prices fluctuate all year nowadays and black Friday deals usually aren't worth the paper they are wrote on , I would recommend downloading a price checker app onto your ipad and keeping an eye on prices that way, then you will know if you are getting a good deal  or not 

Good idea

For an ordinary home computer: a small amount of office work, one or two educational programs, YouTube, and the occasional video, Netflix - that type of thing what spec would you suggest.  I would want a reasonably sized screen

I bought a laptop in 2019, extended it's warranty to a Three Year On-site....it still sits in it's box unused. Instead an older laptop from 2010 still working. Ask the question and state your budget when you are ready to buy. 

DigSunPap

I made the change from a standard laptop to a Macbook in 2016 and it is still going strong today. Of course they are more expensive but it depends what the primary use of the laptop will be - and I don't think Macs are made with CD trays anymore so perhaps something else would work better

DigSunPap

DigSunPap said:

I made the change from a standard laptop to a Macbook in 2016 and it is still going strong today. Of course they are more expensive but it depends what the primary use of the laptop will be - and I don't think Macs are made with CD trays anymore so perhaps something else would work better

My friend from work this week has told me that she bought a new laptop last week and that it has been great for her. She sent me the link so I thought it would be worth dropping in here if you are still looking - good price too!

https://www.currys.co.uk/products/hp-15sfq2571sa-15.6-laptop-intel-core-i3-128-gb-ssd-silver-10250741.html

Am-I-Paranoid

If you don't need any gaming capacity, then a Lenovo E14 is a great buy. 14", compact and really robust. It feels more like the Office Thinkpads than home PCs - it looks a little boring, but I've still got Thinkpads from 2007 and 2012 that are in daily use even now! For gaming, look at Lenovo LOQ for great value - not as robust as Thinkpads, but phenomenal value.

Your request for advice seems to be mostly focussed on Office though....

In theory, the route Microsoft want you to go is a Microsoft 365 subscription (formerly called Office365). This is £60/year for the basic license or £80 for a family license.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/microsoft-365/buy/compare-all-microsoft-365-products

Thank said, I prefer a one-off fee: I've always bought the "recycled" corporate office licenses. This is where a company has a group license, but buys hardware that comes bundled with MS Office license keys - they are legally entitled to resell those.

I bought Microsoft Windows 10 Professional (going with "no OS" reduced the cost of the laptop by £200) and Microsoft Office 2021 Pro-Plus (includes Outlook, MS Access, Powerpoint and all the base stuff like Word, Excel, Notes, etc).

I could have saved a bit with the regular Office 2021, instead of ProPlus, but I wanted the option of MS Access.

They were ~£30 per key from Amazon - one-off fee, no need to purchase ever again, but for Office, you won't get anything more than security patches, not continual product upgrades.

I did upgrade the Windows 10 to Win11pro later as there were driver issues on some of the hardware as it was too new for win10 and that's a free upgrade path.

Pros:
One-off fee.
Include MS Access and a few other apps not in MS365.
Independent from OneDrive (I needed to keep Dropbox).
Still gives you access to Office.com (login using your Live/Outlook/Hotmail account) and use online Word/Excel on your phone.

Cons / Be warned:
They say it doesn't get continuous product updates, but it definitely gets the security patches for O365 Excel, etc.
Windows: once that Windows key is used once, it will be linked to the BIOS UID on the laptop (not transferable)
Office: The key is NOT re-usable once used and it's not linked to the PC, so IF you ever need to completely wipe the laptop and re-install (e.g. new harddrive, etc), you will need to re-buy MSOffice - fair enough as it stops people re-selling already used keys.
Cloud: this approach does NOT come with any cloud storage - the subscription options give you 1Tb/6Tb of Onedrive, but I already had everything setup on Google Drive (free) + Dropbox (subscription). MS365/OneDrive would be cheaper, but it isn't supported by my home CCTV system, so that wasn't a lure for me.