What is best OS/Laptop for my 14 year old daughter

[busymummy3]

We are considering a laptop for our 14 year old DD who has just started GCSE'S-in Y9 at present would like something that will last her right through to Uni - if that isnt too impossible!!! Trying to decide what is better Windows(we have windows Vista at the moment on PC) or Mac

"Best" means different things to different people.

Mac OS X is brilliant, easy to use and very secure. So to many that might mean it's the "best". But you can only get it on on Macs, and Apple don't make cheap Macs, so if the machine is going to be roughly treated and probably need replacing sooner rather than later then suddenly it's not such a hot choice.

Windows is flexible, has the most software available for it and the best games. So once again that might appear to be the "best". But you'll be working with an Operating System that just doesn't feel as "nice" as a Mac and having to deal with security worries and making sure that you keep all your security software up to date, and now perhaps that doesn't feel so good.

My rough guide for people is that Mac's are great machines if you don't mind the high initial price and the fact that gaming on them sucks. You get a really good machine that lasts a long time, a friendly Operating System and no security worries.

However for people that want to game or don't want to splash out so much money on a machine then Windows is still a great choice.

Mac's are trendier and most Art and music professionals I know prefer them. However, I bought my DD a Dell with windows and word because all the schools and now college that she is at have used that OS and so emailing teachers work etc has proved much easier as it is all compatible.

My DP insists on using Openoffice and Linux OS which is free but often the school can't open the docs and we have to convert the files!

"My DP insists on using Openoffice and Linux OS which is free but often the school can't open the docs and we have to convert the files!"

Too right!

I cannot understand why when there are perfectly good free products available schools and colleges insist on wasting their money and handing it to Microsoft.

The next time your school announces that it's hard up and has had to cut back on something ask them how much they give to Microsoft every year when it's utterly unnecessary.

Not only is it wasted money but it further forces people into the mindset that Word Processing = "Microsoft Word" and generates the next generation of consumers who keep paying Microsoft even more wasted money.

The best way to get files to schools or colleges is probably to use PDF, that way you can be sure that they will get exactly what you sent them and it will print out correctly, which is something that even Microsoft won't guarantee after spending a fortune on their products.

For many years the British education system went its own way and ignored the fact that the only IT skills that are generally useful in business are in Microsoft Office.

Thankfully that has now changed, and the majority of school leavers are not made even less competitive in the jobs market by lacking familiarity with these essential business tools.

Microsoft make their software available to students at greatly discounted prices, and to educational establishments at even greater discounts.

Now as it happens I am very familiar with the Mac and Linux environments, in fact I have contributed to a number of Open Source software projects. All these things have their place; but their place is not in giving a student the best support in their studies or equipping them for the workplace. For that you need Microsoft Office running on a Windows platform.

Exactly Mranchovy. Like it or not, you are more employable if you have MS Office skills than OpenOffice.

I work for a company who are desperately trying to get everyone converted to Lotus Symphony (based on Openoffice) and frankly its not working. People stick to what they know. We don't want to waste time relearning & rewriting macros for the sake of it. Plus all our customers send us MS Office documents/spreadsheets & presentations. Yes you can convert but often it doesn't work properly.

Personally I do not believe that it is the place for schools to educate people on how to use Microsoft's software. Aside from the abuse of our children's education as a marketing tool for Microsoft you will also end up with the oft repeated situation of parents feeling that they need to buy MS software in order for their children to complete assignments.

My opinion on how schools should technically educate people is that they should provide them with a generic tool set of skills that they can transport and use rather than acting as proxies for Microsoft's marketing department.

If MS Software is to be used, and sometimes it can make financial and technical sense, then there should be an insistence that open document formats be used, formats that you can open and edit using any number of pieces of software rather than forcing parents into the Microsoft world.

I'm not a rabid anti-Microsoft person, I'm a big fan of vast swathes of their software and use it as my first choice. What I have a problem with is schools forcing parents to use Microsoft when there is no good reason why they need to do so.

but it is frustrating for the kids . We do not have Microsoft at the moment we have open office which has been good for school projects when printed off and handed in but if a presentation is involved then my kids cannot use as schools system (whatever it is )is not compatable. Similarly they cannot do work at school load it on a memory stick and finish it at home.
General opinion seems to be go for Windows /Microsoft. How old do they have to be to get student discounts?

They just have to be at school, college or university and you can get the full version of Microsoft Office Professional for £39 from Software4Students for them.

Anybody recommending Open Office should be aware that the project has forked. What this means is that there are different versions of the software being developed by different teams. At the moment they are all pretty similar, but over time they will diverge and won't be compatibile with each other. Some forks may even die.

The main current forks are Libre Office (sponsored by Google and Novell), Lotus Symphony (guess), Star Office (Oracle), and the original OpenOffice.org. So you can take your pick of evil overlord if Microsoft is not good enough for you!

Do you really need to know all this? Only if you want to be a geek. If you just want your kids to get on with thier schoolwork, I'd advise you to stick with a PC and MS Office.

Thanks mranchovy think will be going for MS Office and a laptop (have a desktop PC ) as just want something that will work between school and home.
This Software4Students how do you show they are at school? also am now going to ask recommendations for laptops and what is the difference between a netbook and a laptop?

Yes sorry, when I said a PC I meant something that normally runs Windows, as opposed to a Mac, not something that sits on a desk as opposed to your lap

You fill in the form with the name of the school and the name of the student.

Netbooks are generally smaller (10" screen or less) and have no DVD drive.

I have bought 4 Acers over the past year and been very impressed. The new Intel Core i3/i5 processors are noticably faster, but that means you should get a good deal on older technology.

Mine all have macs , i dmit they are all arty.But they rarely go wrong and to date they have never had a virus. They manage to get virus's on my normal computer !!!! i have just got an ipad AMAZING cant really use it but great apps

Macs being for arty types only and compatibility issues are only true of the 1990's. I use a PC at work and Macs at home and use all manner of documents between the two. Haven't had any sort of issue since about OS9. Those days are long gone.

"The main current forks are Libre Office (sponsored by Google and Novell), Lotus Symphony (guess), Star Office (Oracle), and the original OpenOffice.org. So you can take your pick of evil overlord if Microsoft is not good enough for you!"

All the different forks should still be able to open, work on and share the same documents without any difficulty. So a number of versions is not actually a problem.

And it's nothing to do with Microsoft being an "evil overlord" and everything to do with Schools not wasting their money and not forcing parents to do the same. And there's also a huge argument about how picking up generic technical skills is actually incredibly important. In an odd coincidence of timing the Register has recently published a story that complains about how the UK is fixed in a mindset of using propriety software and how that's damaging our competiveness.

Yes that story is from someone trying to push an Open Source Operating System but the principles still hold true for Word Processing software too. And for the record I'm actually in favour of Windows being the right OS for schools to be using, it's only when it comes to the Word Processing stuff that I believe that the alternatives are actually mature enough to be used.

"If you just want your kids to get on with thier schoolwork, I'd advise you to stick with a PC and MS Office."

Increasing numbers of people are using things like OpenOffice and it's about time that schools were challenged over their IT expenditure and strong arming of parents into forking out money.

This is an interesting place to go to find out about what is happening in education and OSS. There are many schools who don't believe it is right to demand that parents buy Microsoft Office (or more likely use a pirated copy) just to do some poster in Publisher. Teaching ICT in schools is meant to be about teaching skills - whether they be word processing, spreadsheets, blogging, digital media. Not about using one piece of software. The major hassle for schools in recent years was not converting students work from OpenOffice, with was opening .docx files! Rant over. As you were

"There are many schools who don't believe it is right to demand that parents buy Microsoft Office (or more likely use a pirated copy) just to do some poster in Publisher."

Good :) Well not the pirated bit, that's awful.

"Teaching ICT in schools is meant to be about teaching skills - whether they be word processing, spreadsheets, blogging, digital media."

I agree completely.

If you teach the skills and the terms then people can adapt to new software as it comes along much easier than they can if they're just taught to rote click on certain Office buttons to do certain things. They suddenly have a set of skills that can go into the workplace and hopefully pick up any piece of software that they need to use for their job and keep up with things as new things come along.

Teaching someone to be truly computer literate is a much better thing than teaching them to be only literate in MS Office. Versions of MS Office will come and go, generic computer skills and understanding will last people for years.

BadgersPaws Ooohhh yes indeedy. Totally. Becta was kind of moving that way (two steps forward and one step back). Please join us at Open Source Schools. there are some really exciting developments going on . Moodle has helped massively!

"I said a PC I meant something that normally runs Windows, as opposed to a Mac"

easily done - even MacWorld (.co.uk) used "PC" to mean one running Windows in an article I saw yesterday.

regarding the different forks of Open Office s/w I think it is worth saying that LibreOffice.org came as a result of Oracle taking over Sun Microsystems in 2010, and with Sun came the OpenOffice.org name and goodwill.

While Sun may have had a "funding only, hands off" approach (being a major hardware vendor) I think the suspicion was that Oracle (which has been primarily a database developer, but 10+ years ago was talking about thin clients, cloud computing, and using the 'net to hold your data) with it's wish to compete head-on against Microsoft, might carry on with OpenOffice as free, for some time, but then alter licencing.

Of course, I may be wrong, but have been reading about Oracle for plenty of years and still believe they have Microsoft "in their sights" which implies an attack on MS Office to block its place as dominant s/w package in business use.

My use of 'PC' was not a mistake

Ever since 1981 'PC' has been short for a computer based on (a descendent from) the original IBM PC architecture, as opposed to the other architectures available at the time (Tandy's TRS-80, Apple II, Commodore PET, Z80 CP/M etc.) and subsequently (Apple Mac).

A reasonable history is here.