Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Weaver]

> I have a laptop and doesn't seem fragile to me, have dropped a couple of times and still working fine.  I agree that they are less easily repaired if components fail.

I should have explained myself better. I meant that the spinning, mechanical hard disk is the weak link. Moving a laptop while the hard disk is spinning, intentionally or unintentionally, if you do it enough times, means that you will one day lose everything. If you use a laptop only on a stable surface and don't shove it around or pick it up while it's running then it's probably reason to say that you probably don't need to be _too_ concerned.

There are solutions to this (aside from the obvious 'buy a desktop instead').

A laptop with a motion/sensor (or accelerometer) in it can detect motion and shut down the hard disk quickly. This is why I only Lenovo Thinkpads for my customers. I think Apple offer this too? In my experience this works well provided you don't do anything to foolish.

The ultimate is to get a non-mechanical 'hard disk', all solid state. But these have their disadvantages, horrendous cost principally.

One tip about space saving for desktop PCs is to mount them on a wall shelf near or above your desk, or hang them on a bracket hanging off the underside of the desktop underneath.

[grumpy old man]

Walter

It has to be a windows, would prefer XP as she is used to this, but 7 should be close enough, anything else would not be good idea.

Weaver

I note your point about hard disc, will look at the availability of motion sensors.

gom.

[kitz]

Heh - I seem to be going against the train of thought of others here.   I trying to persaude my dad to get a laptop to replace his now aging PC that I built several years ago.

Reasons
 ~ Mum moans at how long he spends in the spare bedroom, and kind of feels left out.
 ~ With a laptop he can take it from room to room, he can even use it in the lounge whilst shes watching TV.
 ~ It will free up a fair bit of space in the spare room, which will make mum much happier.
 ~ Finally - It will be much easier for me..  if theres something he wants doing or fixing, then I can collect it, and bring it back here to work on.  Rather than doing it there and it taking me 6 times longer to do anything because I have to explain every step of what Im doing (95% of it will never go in anyhow bless him ) 

Ive taken my lappy round there hes had no problems with the keyboard.. but obviously a separate mouse will be essential.

It will probably be plusnet.

The plusnet supplied router will probably be fine..  its only if shes geeky or has problems with her line, then a separate router may be called for.

[HPsauce]

I can collect it

Do you go there by bus?
(even if you did a modern small desktop CPU would happily fit in a strong reusable supermarket bag)
I bet you've got all the peripherals - monitor etc. at home - for a desktop. 

[HPsauce]

One tip about space saving for desktop PCs is to mount them on a wall shelf near or above your desk, or hang them on a bracket hanging off the underside of the desktop underneath.

Definitely. My desk has 2 levels, with a fairly deep upper shelf just 6" above the main desk surface. I think it was originally some sort of CAD/draughtsman workstation. Works very well.
My CPU,  scanner and desk light (and a lot of rubbish) sit on the upper level - very handy.
Flat monitor, keyboard and mouse on lower level plus working papers.
Printer is a couple of feet away on a storage unit next to the filing cabinet - just a push of the feet and a short roll of my office chair.

I've also got a "computer desk" in the office (next to my main desk) which has 2 CPU's and a laser printer on the lower shelves, multifunction flat-screen monitor (mainly used as a Freeview TV TBH) keyboard, mouse etc on the desktop and CD storage etc alongside and above. Too much "stuff"!

[Weaver]

Another habit that I've started to get into, put two wall-shelves up, one about four inches below the other. With a PC on the top shelf, the lower shelf is a place to put mains, switches routers, anti-surge units all kinds of gubbins.

[kitz]

>> I bet you've got all the peripherals - monitor etc. at home - for a desktop.

I used to have - in fact I use to have a spare monitor with KVM set up so I could easily hotswap PC's over with a box that I used as a  play machine for RH.

But over the years, my own hardware has declined.  I dont build these days, theres not much saving to be made so no-one really wants a self build machine done anymore.  I used to have about 5-6 machines.  Ive now only got the one :/

Right now I dont even have my PC room, although Im hoping that will be rectified pretty soon and I can move everything back in.   But the design will be for me and more of a work environment rather than one where Im surrounded by PCs.
My own circumstances have changed a lot, therefore I need to make things easier for me. Not lugging desktops around is one of them.

I couldnt work from a lappy - I cant because of what I do,Personally Im a desktop person, and need my workspace.
(Its one of the reasons I cant really do anything much on the site right now). 

But a desktop is overkill for the amount of time my parents use theirs.  Ive even took my lappy round there and let dad use it,  he's just as happy with it as long as he has the mouse.   In fact more so he can take and use it in the lounge, or in the back room.. or back in the spare room.  He'd use a lappy far more than he would the desktop.