posted on July 21, 2008 01:42:02 PM
Oh, darn glassgrl too late. I would have bought that in a heartbeat.
Well anyway, here is what's happened. I bought a Toshiba Satellite laptop L305-S5875 at Best Buy for 679.00
It has Vista & I hate, hate, hate Vista. Paid for it & then talked to the Geek Squad about insalling XP home, which I thought could be done, they said that it was absolutely impossible change it to XP home. I said I wanted to return it was told there would be a 15% restocking fee, so I kept it.
Went home & Googled switching Vista to XP & it can be done, so much for the stupid Geek squad. What you have to do is download the XP drivers at toshiba.ca
Then you have to remove the Vista drivers & install the XP's. It's that simple...if you know how.
Then I found out this isn't easy if you don't know what your doing. The most difficult part is letting the computer know you have changed the drivers. I knew I couldn't do this so I went to Staples & asked if they could do it. Yes, they can for 400.00 & 200.00 for XP. So now I'm looking at 600.00 more. This was on Friday & they couldn't do it until Monday & it would take 72 hours, so I took the computer home & said I would be back on Monday. I was actually willing to pay this to get XP Home.
Now comes the good part. My son calls me everyday on the way home from work & I was telling him what I just told you, this was on Friday. He said he could get me XP Home & it wouldn't cost me anything. He has a computer in the office & has Vista & likes it, he has a notebook at home with XP. Two Christmases ago I gave both my sons a Gateway laptop & he will trade me his Gateway for my Toshiba. I cancelled with Staples & will make the switch with him. He's happy & I'm happy & I've saved 600.00
He lives in MD, I'm in PA & he will be coming up mid August so until then I have Vista & have no problem waiting.
I couldn't stand being without a computer & kind of rushed into buying another & I'm lucky it worked out like it did, but would have jumped on the one you sent the link to.
It was so nice of you to do that for me.
One other thing, wished I had of bought my computer at Staples, they would accept a return for a full refund....no restocking fee. Then I could have returned it.
By the way, Staples would have fixed my old one for about 400.00, but was too late for that too because I had already bought at one at Best. I hate Best.
Thanks LB your such a good friend for looking after me & I sure need it when it comes to computers.
posted on July 21, 2008 03:30:06 PM
from my computer expert:
greg - one more question - I did get the new HD installed. didn't get the info transferred though
anyway - is it true you can disable the sata or whatever and install xp over vista? I tried dual booting but never could do it. I dislike Vista horribly or would rather wipe it clean and install just XP. I've read you can do it if you do something to the driver in the boot (I'm too tired to look it up just now).
If that's true I'd be up to buying a new lap top.
(from Greg - who owns his own business in computer repair and recovery)
You can run XP on most anything.
A couple of caveats however.
Are there drivers for the hardware for XP. In some cases I've seen there are not. You can probably still get it to work, using generic drivers, but that's not a job for the timid.
Next, do you have a license for XP. Vista Business and higher include down-grade rights so you can install and run XP instead. Vista Home does not. Most retail laptops are Visa Home, so you'd have to have an XP retail disk or some other way of running/activating XP on the PC.
If you buy a business class laptop from Lenovo, Dell etc, you can usually still get them to install XP Pro on the box even though it will be licensed as a Vista machine. (Downgrade rights again...) 'Cept it comes with XP pre-installed.
-Greg
OTOH I guess you could just also *buy* or borrow or Bitorrent {gasp} a business class of Vista and downgrade as has been discussed here before. That must have been what Staples was going to charge you so much to do MOL.
posted on July 21, 2008 04:50:47 PM
Well hell, I knew all that, could have done it myself. I thought it would be more complicated.
How lucky you are to know Greg. You could do it with just a little help, you really know computers.
Me, all I know & do is use it for the Internet & email.
My only expert is Google.
Staples sells Dell & HP computers & if you want XP they send them to the manufactures & have them install it. Don't know the cost, didn't ask.
If you bring in any other they call Mohamed, their mobile tech from Dover, DE. His price is, as I said, 400.00 & you buy the XP.
