Shaping your next desktop upgrade

Big bang or baby steps

By Phil Mitchell, 3rd November 2010

Video What's the next desktop upgrade going to be? A hardware refresh? A new version of Microsoft Office? Windows 7? Or an upgrade to all three at once?

Is this mega-grade-upgrade a triple threat to the mental health of your users, or a once-in-a-decade opportunity to sort out their desktops for the better?

Andrew Buss of Freeform Dynamics and Intel's Rob Sheppard think the three-in-one approach is potentially a good idea - and that a hardware-plus-Windows refresh might sort out some of the laptop performance problems that have made the working lives of some Reg readers an encrypted, batteryless hell.

In this video, the two of them, plus our regular host with the most, Tim Phillips, discuss these challenges and share some of the insights on how to tackle them received from our beloved Reg readers. You can watch it for free right here ®.

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COMMENTS

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All Reader Comments (6)

Highly Rated

Posted Wednesday 3rd November 2010 15:38 GMT

Dave 124

Windows is Dead

The best upgrade on can do is away from Microsoft products entirely and into the open office / Linux environment. For year we have paid a premium for Microsoft products only to require constant retraining, endure their lack of internal quality control and the almost deliberate back doors for virus writers that all Microsoft products seem to embrace. Have you ever noticed how all MS products run slower over time almost forcing the migration to a newer OS/Office... etc? So skip the white papers from some MS certified hack and investigate the stable, refined and mature world of computing that Red Hat and Unbuntu provide. You may also find that simply upgrading to an open source OS actually out performs the latest MS bloatware running on a machine with twice the horsepower - I tried it and it does!

Posted Thursday 4th November 2010 11:11 GMT

Anonymous Coward

Linux

I too remember that glorious moment when I first tried Linux. I popped a pristine Fedora live/install cd into my laptop and pushed the power button. The machine flared to life and shortly displayed a cute and friendly penguin. Below that were the iconic words, "Kernel Panic."

It was all downhill after that. BTW, the penguin in the icon seems to be missing his horns.

Posted Wednesday 3rd November 2010 23:45 GMT

sage