always getting error messages these days, can't even stay for 1 min on ebay, any help out there?

[piratecat]

My windows xp is froma mate, do you think its becuase its not registered properly to me, that I have these probs?

I wonder becuase I haven't downloaded, or been able to down load any new windows updates for about a year. I have virus stuff set up.

Whenever I go onto ebay , in the last week a box comes up saying about error and do I want to report it bla bla.

Do I need to buy a new pc? I am asking becuase a brand new windows xp would cosr £80, and I do need a new pc within the next 2 yrs or so, becuase this one is nearly 10 yrs old.

??

pretty please help?

?

You really need those Windows Updates. It should let you get the critical ones regardless.

You may be able to patch it up to put off buying a new one. Though 10 years is a long time and they are much better now.

If you had your friends Windows CD you would have the option to do a 'repair' (though I don't have confidence it would fix everything) or to reinstall everything.

The reinstall would be great, but would leave you needing all those updates that you can't easily get.

You might have a little look to see if you can find the actual problem.
If you right click My Computer there is a menu option called 'manage' That opens a window and on the top left there is the 'event viewer'. Open it and click on Applications and then System.
Any little red crosses are things that went wrong and sometimes they give details. They are in date order so after a problem you can go and look and note down what it said.

Also in control panel - internet options. Delete Temporary Internet Files and empty the recycle bin.

hi thanks so much for answering.

I have done as you said. As for the manage thing, there are lots of red x'x next to messages over time, yet I have no idea wat they mean!!

I really can't re install the xp again, thru my friend as not here.

It won't allow me to update windiws any way will it.

I bought my dc a game for xmas which we can't plat as it can't download the drivers, becuase of the non authentification thing.

My pc also has probs supprt ing the graphics too, ie any vids i take on my digital camera, it plays then back out of synch.

it is best to start over with a new pc ,now seeing as I have little knowledge, and my pc is slow, being 9 yrs old.??
thanks for any advice, in advance.

don't leave me now heehee!!

Yeah it really is time to get a new PC and they are a lot cheaper than they used to be. You won't find up to date drivers for the old hardware now and it will just get worse. Anyway you're going to love the difference in speed and reliability.

When you get your new one set up you can copy over anything you want to keep.

I'm the wrong person to advise where to get one though because I always buy the parts and build my own. There was a long thread on MN just recently where someone wanted a new reasonably priced PC. Maybe you can find it, but if not then start one with something like that in the title and there will be lots of suggestions.

Most will come with Windows Vista now, but you might get a bargain if you have one with XP on. Personally I'm putting off having Vista until they get the bugs out of it. XP is just so stable.

Don't worry too much about the speed of the new one. They will all be 5-6 times faster than you have so it's not worth paying extra just to get one that's 7 times faster.

Look for 1GB ram if having XP but preferably 2GB ram if having Vista because it uses an awful lot just for the operating system to run.

Hard drives won't be smaller than 80GB anyway now which is enough for most people unless you expect to have an awful lot of music/photos. Sata hard drives are better, but again not worth paying a fortune for.

You will probably want a flat screen monitor. You can use your old one, but I expect that's getting on a bit and the flat ones are far better.

Graphics cards. Unless you play state of the art games any graphics card they come with will be fine. Many don't have one at all since it's handled on the motherboard.

USB ports. They mostly have them on the front as well as the back. This matters if you're going to be plugging cameras etc into it.

That's all I can think of for now, but others will have suggestions. Maybe the poster from the other week got one after all and can say how good it was.

That's one of the reasons I am reluctant to get a new one(when I can afford one), how DO you transfer stuff over.

A couple of ways.

If you currently connect to the net using a router (a seperate box that your PC plugs into which has other sockets for more PCs) then you plug both old and new computers in and tick a few boxes and 'see' the other computer. Then you just drag the files over.

Some people don't have routers if they only ever had one PC. They have a modem that plugs directly into the computer instead.

There is a way to connect two computers directly using a cable. The setting up is slightly more fiddly, but does work.

If you have a DVD or CD writer on the old one you can 'burn' DVDs/CDs and then put them in the new one to copy.

Another way is to take the hard drive out of the old PC and put it the new one alongside the one that's there.

That sounds scary, but is actually very easy (not on a laptop). When you take the side off a PC there are one or two long flat cables. Each has two plugs on it. One is occupied by the new Hard Drive and perhaps another for the DVD/CD player. You just plug the old hard drive into a spare position and now both appear on the desktop as Drive C: and Drive D:

The latter I do all the time so I am used to it. Getting a router if you don't have one is probably the easy option and is handy in other ways. Especially as they also let you connect via wireless so if you get a laptop now or later you can use it in the garden