Should I buy a laptop or a desktop for everyday use?
I'm getting a new computer mainly for email, web browsing, word processing, and some photos. I'm trying to decide between a laptop and a desktop. Laptops are portable but more expensive and harder to upgrade. Desktops are cheaper and more powerful for the money. What should someone like me get?
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4 Answers
Definitely back up your important files before trying any fixes. I learned this the hard way when I lost 3 years of photos trying to fix a simple problem. Get an external hard drive or burn DVDs of your important stuff first.
Check how much free space is on your hard drive. Windows needs at least 15% free to run well — it uses that space for virtual memory and the swap file. If your drive is 95% full, that alone will make everything crawl.
The best resource for this kind of thing is Tom's Hardware forums. Someone has almost certainly had your exact problem and posted a solution. The community there is really knowledgeable and helpful.
Honestly at some point a clean reinstall of Windows fixes more than any amount of tinkering. XP gets crufty after a couple years. Back up your files, find your product key, and do a fresh install. It'll feel like a brand new machine.
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