Could Really Do With Some Dell Insight Please

tuttifrutti wrote in post #19063832
Again, thanks so much, everyone, for your input. It really has been a huge help.

I've looked at other laptops for photo editing, and this Dell one always seems to be somewhere near the top in recommendations, within my price range

Something that crossed my mind, not relating to the actual thread itself, but when I get the laptop, I remember many years ago when I last bought a Windows one, you had to use a hard drive and make a copy of the operating system, just in case something ever went wrong with it, and it needed rebuilding.

Is that sort of thing required these days - what do you need to do, or don't you and maybe operating systems are cheap enough to be re-installed these days?

Cheers

None of is this "required" but making backups of your Windows and personal programs and data is always a good thing. I would also suggest you make a restoration (or recover) copy of the Windows 10 installation and put it on a USB stick. Windows recommends an 8 GB stick for the procedure but for some reason my copy would not fit on 8 GB so I would use a 16 GB to start. The procedure can be found at https://www.computerwo​rld.com …f-win10-version-1909.html.

Note: be patient when you do this process, there is a lot of waiting going on while the stick gets formatted, written to etc.

That's exactly what I meant - thanks John

Computers are pretty reliable these days, so you might never have a system failure. Also, I suspect Dell laptops have a built-in Windows recovery partition that will restore everything to factory if needed. Nevertheless, I always make a backup of my whole disk in the form of a disk image. I use Macrium Reflect free for this.

The purpose is to be able to quickly restore the operating system and software if something goes wrong. For me, this is not a data backup, because I back up my working data (photo files, financial/personal/tra​vel documents, work files, etc.) separately following a different system. Your method might vary.

First I install the main software that I need, and configure each to my liking, and also tweak Windows 10 to set the privacy settings and eliminate the main annoyances. This takes a few days. After this is done and preferably before putting massive amounts of data on the laptop, I create the image. It gets stored on an external hard drive. I include a text file with it describing the backup volume so I'll know what it is later. Macrium will also make a booting "Rescue" USB stick for you so you can start the computer if the operating system fails. It will allow you to restore the system from the backup volume.

I've never actually needed to restore a dead computer this way, but have used Macrium disk images a few times to migrate my operating system to a different drive, such as when upgrading to a bigger SSD.

Thanks very much for this Archbald. I will do all of this at my earliest when I get it.

I noticed someone mentioned about saving programs - I thought that in the olden days, if you swapped over laptops, then you had to download all the software you had on your original laptop, onto a new one from the software sellers website, most times having to pay for it again. Is that not the case anymore?

tuttifrutti wrote in post #19063832
Something that crossed my mind, not relating to the actual thread itself, but when I get the laptop, I remember many years ago when I last bought a Windows one, you had to use a hard drive and make a copy of the operating system, just in case something ever went wrong with it, and it needed rebuilding.

Is that sort of thing required these days - what do you need to do, or don't you and maybe operating systems are cheap enough to be re-installed these days?

Cheers

Dell will let you download, at any time, a customized recovery image for your particular system.

tuttifrutti wrote in post #19064295
Thanks very much for this Archbald. I will do all of this at my earliest when I get it.

I noticed someone mentioned about saving programs - I thought that in the olden days, if you swapped over laptops, then you had to download all the software you had on your original laptop, onto a new one from the software sellers website, most times having to pay for it again. Is that not the case anymore?

There isn't any concrete answer. If for instance you purchased and installed Photoshop Elements 12 back in 2013 and installed it on a Windows 7 machine, you may be faced with several issues. One, Elements 12 may not be compatible with Windows 10. Hence, even if you have the disk or disks, it may not install. If you know the details, the Product ID for instance, you might be able to contact Adobe Tech Support and talk your way into getting the current product for some nominal charge. Similar circumstances may exist with Microsoft Products like Word, Excel and PowerPoint.

Good advice there John.

I did actually experience issues with the Office programs on my Mac last year. My missus borrowed it and clicked the update button. Of course, after that, I could only read docs as once updated, it put in place something that meant you had to move up to their subscription based model.

I only use these programs for basic needs, so just use the free programs via online Outlook.

I cannot see me being able to talk Adobe into letting me pay a small fee to get Lightroom 6 onto a new laptop though

tuttifrutti wrote in post #19064962
I cannot see me being able to talk Adobe into letting me pay a small fee to get Lightroom 6 onto a new laptop though

All you have to do is TALK to them.

https://www.talkphotog​raphy.co.uk …ing-their-muscles.711052/

tuttifrutti wrote in post #19064962
I did actually experience issues with the Office programs on my Mac last year. My missus borrowed it and clicked the update button. Of course, after that, I could only read docs as once updated, it put in place something that meant you had to move up to their subscription based model.

I think MS has or soon will discontinue standalone versions of Office, Office 2019 being the last. They discontinued what is called the Home Use Program on this side of the pond last November. The Program enabled employees of eligible companies to get Office 2019 for a very attractive price, $25 as I recall. I didn’t need 2019 as I’m using Office 2016 acquired through the Home Use Program, but I paid for the 2019 installation media in case I need it.

john crossley wrote in post #19065001
All you have to do is TALK to them.

https://www.talkphotog​raphy.co.uk …ing-their-muscles.711052/

That's interesting thanks John - i'll definately will be contacting them and see where it takes me

John from PA wrote in post #19065021
I think MS has or soon will discontinue standalone versions of Office, Office 2019 being the last. They discontinued what is called the Home Use Program on this side of the pond last November. The Program enabled employees of eligible companies to get Office 2019 for a very attractive price, $25 as I recall. I didn’t need 2019 as I’m using Office 2016 acquired through the Home Use Program, but I paid for the 2019 installation media in case I need it.

Lol. I'm still using Office 2003 (on Win 10). It does everything I want and need.

Archibald wrote in post #19065094
Lol. I'm still using Office 2003 (on Win 10). It does everything I want and need.

Nothing wrong with that but you might want to insure you have the "final" security updates. See https://www.catalog.up​date.microsoft.com/Sea​rch.aspx?q=office+2003 for a list.

John from PA wrote in post #19065172
Nothing wrong with that but you might want to insure you have the "final" security updates. See https://www.catalog.up​date.microsoft.com/Sea​rch.aspx?q=office+2003 for a list.

Unbelievable, all those security updates. I must say I don't understand how programmers can leave so many vulnerabilities in their programs, especially after all the headlines over the years. Anyway, I suppose the necessary updates have been applied automatically, and in these 17 years I don't believe I have ever had a security issue with my Office 2003.

Archibald wrote in post #19065184
Unbelievable, all those security updates. I must say I don't understand how programmers can leave so many vulnerabilities in their programs, especially after all the headlines over the years. Anyway, I suppose the necessary updates have been applied automatically, and in these 17 years I don't believe I have ever had a security issue with my Office 2003.

According to my recorrds, Office 2003 never was included in the Microsoft fix that enabled utomatic updates. And even then, because some people were quite vocal about automatic updates, the auto update was disabled, instead of being enabled by default (Office 2013 for instance).

Your choice of course as to what you want to do with the updates in the Catalog listing but as a minimum I’d look in the software installed on your PC (Add/Remoove software) scroll down and expand the Microsoft section, and see what if any updates from the catalog are listed. Then install anything worthwhile. What’s worthwhile? I just had a client with a hacked Outlook 2016 installation. Was it due to a situation where he was lacking an update? I’m not sure since he had taken things into his own hands and likely made the situation worse.