As is the way of things, in the middle of trying to do uni work (if someone could point out why it was a good idea to start studying again, that’d be great) my computer seems to be slowly dying. If I dare to have excel, word and chrome open at the same time, it struggles to even play music (I can’t use Itunes as this eats up all available power and cooks the processor). Even with just Chrome open it cant really do things like watch RedBull TV, and can slow down quite dramatically just in normal use.

It’s 5 years old now, so had a fair enough innings I suppose. Can anyone recommend a replacement for the sort of use outlined above? Battery life isn’t crucial as it’s generally used in the house or library. Doesn’t have to have a particularly large screen, and I’ll be installing Office 2010

On the other hand, the reliability (it’s a Dell btw) has been outstanding, so is it every worth trying some kind of service to get things up to speed again?

Look on the laptopsdirect.co.uk website and there’ll be something there to match your budget.

Lenovo have a good reputation and always look good value.

Cheers

Danny B

currys/pc world refurbished kit is sometimes good. no manuals or disks and you’ll need to create your own boot disks

Re-installing Windows often helps get older PCs back up to speed.
Also, get the cover off to give it a clean out & clean the fan(s). This has helped a few laptops i’ve fixed for mates.
Some extra RAM usually helps too.

Is your laptop on Windows Vista? My other halfs aging laptop was given a fantastic performance boost by sticking Win 7 on it instead of Vista. That and a bit more RAM might be all you need.

Wipe/clean/reinstall and remove any manufacturer bloatware.

After that dell outlet.

Thanks for the suggestions. I do seem to be a Dell fanboi as they just seem to keep going, so Dell outlet might be a good bet. Have also just found out that Argos Outlet (on eBay) do some very cheap kit if willing to go reconditioned…..

I got my Acer from Acer direct for a good price and the service was excellent.

Have had it for 2.5 yrs now and it’s still going fine….
I went for a 17″ laptop and the chassis isn’t exactly rigid so I wouldn’t trust it if it was being lugged around all the time. But for what I use it for, it’s fine.

My parents had an Acer laptop die after about 4 years of light use, but apparently this was down to a known problem with AMD motherboards, so hopefully I won’t see the same issue!

Do you have a local independent computer shop?
There’s a little shop in Peterborough that does re-conditioned laptops and they have some really good deals on. Might be somewhere similar near you?