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mso489

Lifer
Feb 21, 2013
41,210
60,433
I've complained about my loss of internet including most web sites and email. Being a member of Forums has been a huge blessing. It's lack of encryption has enabled me to have a dependable line to the world. A few other sites like Wikipedia and Pipepedia have remained open for the same reason. I've located a tech group, not only local but not far away, who offers analysis and update and who says a ten-year-old computer may well be salvageable. I take it to them for a consultation. They keep it for three or four days, phone me with their opinion, and either put it back in service or sell me a new one. They don't say, but I surmise the fix is good for three or four years before the old hardware finally becomes unsalvageable. They estimate the fix of the current one will be a few hundred, or a little more. My device will be the stalking horse, and if they do an acceptable job at an acceptable price, I will take my wife's device, or maybe to, to get her better connected. She's not as isolated as I, but needing some serious tweaking. Bottom line, I'll disappear off Forums for a while. A blessed respite for my fellow members. Probably I'll be better behaved and not quite so omnipresent when I resurface. It'll be a day or two before my hiatus begins. Enjoy the blessed silence from my avatar/username!

 

danimalia

Lifer
Sep 2, 2015
4,385
26,440
41
San Francisco Bay Area, USA
Hope you enjoy your time offline and the tech guys are able to help you out.
Have you ever considered a Chromebook? They're relatively inexpensive laptops designed for internet tasks. In my experience, they're really fast, pretty easy to use and perfect for most of what I do. Only downside is if you tend to have to print documents, as you need a cloud enabled printer.

 

mso489

Lifer
Feb 21, 2013
41,210
60,433
jpm' and dani', thank you for your suggestions. I have considered laptops each time I've bought computers for home, and they have great versatility for most users. I am quirky, to say the least, as relates to devices and the digital world in general. I intentionally don't want to transport the device around, so the portability factor doesn't help me. Having it in one place keeps the technical world a little more in its place, from my (unquestionably irrational) point of view. I think my tech troubles are partly mindset. I think decidedly differently from the people who design the hardware and programs. I admire them for being the masters of the age, but I'm kind of a polar opposite. Also, I had a really poor midlife introduction to the digital world. "Are you using Apple or Microsoft?" "Uh, I have a Decmate." Things didn't get much better at work, and when I finally caved and bought a computer for home, I was herded into a massive fraud scheme, free internet for a year, which turned out to be no internet at all, and hours of flim-flam from "customer assistance." An IBM guy, a friend, finally put things right, after months of struggle, in fifteen minutes. To my credit, I had hooked up the computer just fine, following the dumb-person's illustrated instructions. So where most of us take digital tech as a challenge and sometimes a fun game, to tame the electronics to our will, I experience it as a humiliation, fraud, and frustration, even while I use it every day, alas. So perhaps next I will buy a laptop. Anything is possible. But I lack the joy many feel in these tasks. I'm old school. If your rotary phone broke, you called the phone company and they fixed it. You weren't expected to train as a lineman and fit it yourself.

 

puffy

Lifer
Dec 24, 2010
2,511
98
North Carolina
I recently got a new Lap Top.It stays in one place.It works great.Far better than my old computer..I know nothing of high tech devices so I can't recommend anything..I wish you luck in finding something that works for you.

 

mso489

Lifer
Feb 21, 2013
41,210
60,433
Boy, I sure wish I had the knack for things digital. I've known several people fifteen or more years older than me who took to it immediately. It's the skill set of the times.

 

scloyd

Lifer
May 23, 2018
5,941
12,037
I use a Lenovo Chromebook that I purchased in 2015 for less than $200. I use it at my desk, never anywhere else. I like it so much I purchased one for my mother (87 yrs. young) and got rid of her giant tower and monitor. She wasn't crazy about getting rid of the desktop but, after a few days she was fine.
My wife uses a pad, takes it everywhere and loves the portability. To each their own.

 

weezell

Lifer
Oct 12, 2011
13,653
49,163
I bought a refurb tower from wal mart for $80 bucks 2 years ago and its still going strong...

 

timt

Lifer
Jul 19, 2018
2,844
22,729
I've got a 2010 Macbook Pro that won't quit. Anything that doesn't need antivirus software to stay on top of is a plus for me.

 

elbert

Part of the Furniture Now
Mar 10, 2015
604
28
Laptops really have become fit-for-service when it comes to casual desktop-ish computing these days. I would only bother with a tower and monitor set up if I wanted the customization; more ram, larger screen, solid state drive, gaming rig, etc.
For anyone else I say laptop. Also easier to carry to the computer shop!

 

elbert

Part of the Furniture Now
Mar 10, 2015
604
28
Tom,we are waiting for You to return, maximum a 5-day leave is admitted as of now, Greets,P
And if he goes AWOL, the whole Platoon is out with full kit until he's found!

 
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