Having fannied about for the better part of a year I finally took the plunge and ordered a new laptop (a Dell Inspiron i7 from John Lewis with three year warranty).

So, I’ve not used win10, there’s a setup download thing to go through isn’t there? What should I expect?

Dells ship with bloatware (McAfee ‘free’ period install irrc). What should I get rid of (and how)? What do I need to do to set up the built in security?

And finally, I need an external DVD/cd drive. Any recommendations?

Thanks 😀

Shit: wrong forum…

Windows 10 just the next iteration of Windows, they all just change slightly, you’ll get used to it. Shirely the machine will come with W10 installed, so no need to mess around with any downloads?
Uninstall any obvious dell shite and the MCAfee’s trail, the Windows 10 defender should kick into action automatically. Check within “Setting” ->”Updates & Security” -> “Windows Defender”

AN external drive is an external drive in my experience, don’t buy the cheapest one available and don’t spend a fortune on it either.

Set up is easy, especially if you’ve got a MS Live account (or hotmail account etc) you can still sign up with a local account if you like.

After that it’ll say Hello, then tell you all your files are where you left them and away you go.

You can use decrapifyer if you want, but Dell aren’t too bad for bloat.

Yeah, machine will have w10 installed. Does it not have an update process to bridge the build date to now? Main reason is I have a capped data limit (on 4g…).

Thanks for security info.

I was looking at a Dell one but it doesn’t mention Cd rw….

I have several outlook accounts…. you have to sign up? Still running windows 7 on old machine…

When you put in details of your WiFi then just select the metered connection option and it won’t download updates until you connect to a network which you tell it isn’t metered.

No, you don’t need an ms account to use win 10. That’s only to use OneDrive, email, online photo storage etc

External dvd writers are much of a muchness, just get a known brand, Samsung, pioneer, Sony, whatever.

Just use Windows built in defence, as above uninstall any crap that comes with it via control panel as usual.

There might be a few update cycles to work through but that’s unavoidable.

Windows 10 also has a lot of ‘phone home’ stuff turned on by default, so you need to work thoroughly through all the control panel options and turn all that crap off.
If you Google ‘how to optimise Windows 10’ there’s a few good guides.

Cheers, I’ll keep looking for a dvd/cd drive then 🙂

And I’ll try that google thing too… 😳

And wait for delivery text…

I have several outlook accounts…. you have to sign up?

On initial setup now, it’ll ask for a MS account if it can talk to the Internet, and offer to set up a local account if it can’t.

I just skip that bit, personally.

Struggling with finding a suitable DVD drive, anybody care to offer a recommendation?

Is windows media player no longer ‘shipped’ with W10? Do I need a mp3 ripper/player?

Isn’t it still a good idea to have a non-admin user account, for normal use?

Loads of DVD drives

https://www.ebuyer.com/search?q=dvdrw

Media player with Windows 10:-

How to Rip CDs in Windows 10

Is windows media player no longer ‘shipped’ with W10? Do I need a mp3 ripper/player

Just use VLC, it plays everything and it’s free.

Thanks cp, for some reason I thought they’d stopped it…. I know there’s heaps of dvd drives out there, that’s the problem! Which one though, eh? 😉

Matty : yeah, already use VLC for video playback…. duh 😳

Isn’t it still a good idea to have a non-admin user account, for normal use?

Yes win 10 accounts are not admin by default, you have to right click to run as administrator, assuming your account has admin privelidge.

I know there’s heaps of dvd drives out there, that’s the problem! Which one though, eh

There’s nothing really in it, it’s old technology, they are all pretty much the same.

For removing all the pre-installed stuff it might be easier to create a bootable USB and do a clean install using a Windows 10 image downloaded from Microsoft site (rather than a dell image). I did this the other week on my Dell laptop and seems to be working fine first time. Don’t remember exact details, but there was a utility from MS that did it all, no real knowledge needed.

Bit surprised, ordered my laptop online (from John Lewis) Collect+ late Friday lunchtime.

Got a text saying it’s arrived at the nominated shop approx 48 hours later. On a Sunday. Black Friday weekend. In Ross-shire, i.e. The Scottish Highlands… my flabber has been well and truly gasted!

You might find that W10 shares too much of your data for your comfort (it can be a handy thing too). I use O&O Shut Up 10 on ours
It’s a tiny file (779KB) that sorts the privacy-side nicely
I’ve got a Samsung DVD writer that works well, but any “known” brand will be fine

fraseruk – Member
For removing all the pre-installed stuff it might be easier to create a bootable USB and do a clean install

Dell ships with so little on top it’s not worth it.
Remove McAfee and that was about it for me, leave the support assistent there as it picks up new drivers etc – like updated WiFi ones.

Windows will do a proper update but you can set up a metered connection so that it knows your phone is limited. Just wait until you are in proper wifi for the full update – it also warns you about the big ones.

YMMV. the 8* different language versions of msoffice trial are laborious to remove IME.
* it may not have been 8.

I’ve got an external DVD drive for sale brand new – have PM’d you

I’ve had a look and updated W10 (or ‘plugged’ it in). Didn’t take too long or much data.

macafee seems to have gone with a plan uninstall (made sure it wasn’t activated).

Getting rid of the stupid games and shit was a bit tiresome.

Hopefully switched just about everything ‘off’ in the settings 😆

Thanks to all for advice.