Bought three years ago and used only with CD Roms for work, now want to use for internet surfing/facebook etc. for my teenage son. I know it does not have a lot of memory, which he probably won't need, and I have spent three days downloading the recommended drivers etc from the Dell Website,and also all of the Windows XP updates and can not get my wireless key number entered. Do I need to buy a wireless adapter of some kind? A friend recommended a linksys, but when I looked it up at Office Depot, the reviews were horrible, saying it didn't work on this model with XP and that the software was not able to be removed from the computer.
If anyone can help me out here, I would appreciate it!! Thanks so much!!
Dell laptops are generally pretty easy to add memory to...just open the panel on the back/bottom. You should go to the Dell website and enter your service tag to get the appropriate drivers.docs, and other manuals. Dell is fairly well keyed that way to put everything you need right up front at your fingertips. You need to know what the maximums are for the gear(get this off the spec sheets.) Maxing out an older machine's memory is a best thing as a PC creates virtual mem and paging based on the amount of memory in the computer and that is important when you have many apps etc open at once. Downloads go faster too. As to hooking up wireless you have to do things differently than with a desktop unit, or if you plan to use the laptop as part of your home Comcast etc always-on cable link or link via dialup which is very much slower. I have a "picky micky" card adapter frm Linksys which has worked great for me wrt300n router and wpc300n - got it off EBAY and it came with a driver/comm CD which was a breezer to loadup and use. Again check the specs before anything else.
A note about wireless computing - many places such as internet cafes and public libraries have wi fi links that have the encrypting disabled. The Linksys monitor goes looking for available wi fi hookups and the type such as G - or N, which is the latest standard, but the gear is designed to be backward compatible so that bit is only and matter of speed for the most part. You just choose which setup (router) you want to link thru and the montior software does the rest. There are several books that explain the parts of a wireless network and how it all functions. Try to get one with a lot of pics as that explains as words sometimes don't do as well. The encrypting is to keep out those that you don't want to tie-in and the keys(password) are how that is done. XP and beyond can be real pains in the touchas - but I have moved form machine to machine without any trouble. Any software can be removed if you want it bad enough. Simply wipe the drive and reinstall everything but the offending SW...Many find that befuddling but with good copies and backups before and after a major change makes it an easypeasy - just takes a bit of time most machines can be re-done in a day or so depending on how much stuff is on there and how dilligent you are about your bkps which is where most folks suck the weewa at and they don't have to. It like insurance - you hope you won't need it but you buy it anyways....;) ;) ;)
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