computing tips

From a lifetime wrangling computers, I've got some broad recommendations - some of them 'the road less travelled'.

spend more on a smartphone than on a laptop

A smartphone is now a fully grown up member of the computer club, and with all it's sensors, cameras and apps can do a truly mind-boggling array of things. If you only get one device, get a smartphone - and pay as much as you can afford for something that will last 4 years or more.

If need the larger screen size and productivity go for a laptop - but in this case my recommendation is to look for 2nd hand refurbished machines. Ex-government machines in particular are actually commerical grade gear rather than the flimsier retail-grade laptops you'll be tempted to buy new on a budget. In many cases refurbished machines are cheaper and actually better!

consider upgrading rather than buying new

If you have something up to about six years old that is annoyingly slow and you're thinking of getting a new machine... first check how far a little upgrading could go.

Add RAM. RAM (memory) is like desktop space. If you have a big desktop, you can reach a lot of things quickly. If your desktop is too small, you need to turn and reach into the filing cabinet - which takes much more time. If your computer has too little RAM it stores 'desktop' stuff in the HDD (hard disk drive) which is just painfully slow. Up to a point, more RAM is a cheap simple way to speed up your computer.
Put in an SSD (solid state drive). An SSD has no moving parts and is very quick compared to the old spinning disk type of drive. Of course you'll need to save files and re-install your operating system for this one...
Upgrade your CPU (central processing unit). This should be the last thing you consider upgrading, as the first two measures will bring a lot of zip into even quite old computers. But if you want to squeeze more speed, it's a possiblity.

try Linux

I'm something of a Linux evangelist, and have now spent more time using Ubuntu (a version of LInux) than I have using Windows (and I started with Windows 95 on a set of floppy disks!).

YES, for many it's something new and comes with a bit of a learning curve... however in my experience:

Linux is free. (Actually you can also install Windows 10 for free if you don't mind occasional nagging to register. You don't have to!)
Installation is simple. In less than an hour I can do a clean install of Ubuntu, browse the web and have a word processor and spreadsheet as good as MS Office, all FREE. I find I need 3 or 4 hours to do likewise with Windows, with more reboots along the way.
No marketing tentacles. You can sign up for an account but it's easy to fly completely under the radar.
You probably don't need antivirus. There's debate on this, but Linux is very secure out of the box.
Linux is more reliable. I reboot Ubuntu machine only once or twice a fortnight; with Windows that seems to happen much more often.
Desktop experience is great. Nowadays you can go a long way on the desktop without having to dive into the command line, it's on a par with Windows in terms of ease of use.
There's heaps of functionality for free. Browser, Office suite, PDF viewer, movie viewer... and plenty of software installable at a click.

There's more... the internet pretty much runs on Linux servers, you can get stripped down versions which happily run on old machines and - in case you didn't know - Android (the operating system on half the phones out there) is a version of Linux. Linux rocks. You just won't find it pre-installed on a laptop in a shop (yet).