I'm a little behind the times. My computer is still running Vista and is about 9 years old. Works fine for my needs (email, finance stuff, some photos- not much, and browsing) but is starting to show its age. From what I understand the font display is different which would explain why some text doesn't appear quite right on my screen. It's an HP purchased in Costco. At the time I think I paid $600 for computer & monitor (it was bundled).

Any recommendations? I don't need anything super powerful, but want to have enough speed and storage space.

In the short term, I finally started using Firefox about 2 years ago, and am wondering if it's still considered superior to IE, which I haven't upgraded in years because I'm using an old ad blocker product that won't work with higher versions. I have IE9 and rarely use it.

Should I switch to IE11 and get ad blocker for IE? I would swear I saw it offered. I have it for Firefox and that is probably the only reason I keep using it - I haven't been thrilled with the updates they've done lately.

On the browser front, stick with Firefox. I still prefer it over Chrome (just can't live without that Bookmarks side-bar). IE is on it's way out in favor of Microsoft Edge, which, while pretty snappy, is quite feature-poor. Firefox has many, many add-ons; there are very few for IE/Edge.

I'll let someone else address the laptop. My needs are more "power user" oriented, so that's the class of computer I've been looking at for replacement of my aging Lenovo T420.

I'm not sure what you mean by the "font display is different". If there's a problem with your installed fonts, you can just reinstall the font(s) you need. That shouldn't require a new computer.

That said, if you want a new computer just choose how much you'd like to spend. For basic email/web/word processing, anything you buy will be just fine. Check out refurb models too - I bought a Thinkpad X201 a couple years ago, refurbished from Newegg, for like $200. Granted, this particular computer was made in 2010 but still has a Core i5 processor. I put a solid state drive in it and it's quite fast enough for web and email, which is what I use it for.

Firefox is better than IE, but I prefer Chrome to both of them. It's faster and has the reputation for being the most secure browser. NEVER use an out of date browser.

If most of your computer usage is Web-based, you might consider making a Chromebook your primary machine to supplement your existing PC.

It's definitely time to upgrade if you're on Vista - see the other thread on Sharon and her saga to upgrade.

Do you want a desktop or laptop? In either case, Costco continues to have good deals and you get the added bonus of just being able to dump it back on them if it's not working like you want.

Otherwise, if you're making the leap to laptop, something like this would hold you for a while:


$450.

On fonts: If they're just displaying oddly in Firefox or IE, try zooming out. Press ctrl and - to zoom out, ctrl and + to zoom in. See if that fixes things for you.

Stick with Firefox going forward - it plus ....... Plus is still superior to anything I've seen out there, and Dodge and I love us some Bookmarks sidebar!

Thanks all. I prefer a desktop (actually a tower) so I can keep the CPU on the floor.

I have checked every video setting on my computer and did a search, it seems that there's an issue with newer fonts being used and Vista. I haven't tried to reload any of them. After one of the MS updates they started looking fuzzy. Zooming to 90% seems to help a bit, but they're still fuzzy-ish. If I drop down much lower my eyes will hurt

I did mean to add that on top of my light use, I do have the full blown MS Office Pro (which my husband gets for like $25 through his job), so it would need to be able to run that as well.

I will check out costco. It sounds like everyone prefers IBM machines, though they're laptops. Since no one mentioned Dell, I suspect I should steer away from those.

Thank you for your advice re: Firefox.

IS adblocker available for IE?

IBM machines? IBM hasn't made PCs for 10 years now. Do you mean "IBM-compatible" (now there's an obsolete term!) or perhaps "Windows" machines? IBM sold their PC and laptop division to Lenovo in 2005.

....... Plus, at least, is available for IE. But I still can't think of a good reason to prefer IE over Firefox.

If you're upgrading a laptop, there's no need for IE. If it's a Chromebook, it's Chrome. If it's a Mac (which at those needs/budget, it likely won't be,) then it isn't IE. And if you're upgrading to a PC, then that means Windows 10 in which case Edge is what it'll be. Yes I know they still have IE, but that's for compatibility reasons more than anything else.

Edge is pretty good and fast. Once they get add-ons/extensions, I can easily see myself switching to it for good

With respect to advice, I would suggest you head to a Best Buy, a Microsoft Store and talk to a sales person. I'm saying this simply because there's so many types of machines now that seeing them in person and talking with someone might be your best bet. On FT, many of us have very technical backgrounds which may cause more confusion than be helpful!

What is the Sharon thread? (Searching for it doesn't return anything.)

This one. Sharon's (SkiAdcock's) thread about her decrepit old Vista laptop and her travails in attempting to get work done from the one wi-fi hotspot that appears to work for her, at a McDonald's miles away from her home.

Hey, at work I've had Dells for years, and I've had HP at home. I don't pay attention to who makes what computer (yes, I call it a machine) unless I need one. Like now

I must be missing something with Firefox. You're all saying how feature rich it is, and I'm having trouble finding those features. Are you talking about different add-ons?

Thanks. Remember that not everyone knows that Skidacock refers to someone named Sharon.

Calling it a "machine" is fine. I was more surprised that you were referring to a machine branded by IBM

A lot of the features aren't immediately obvious; better tab management features, the venerable bookmarks sidebar, the ability to sync your bookmarks, tabs, history and saved passwords across all of your devices (those running Firefox, anyway), it's more secure, and it has the largest number of add-ons of any browser.

Even though you may be only using one computer, you should set up Sync. That will push all of your current bookmarks/favorites, history, add-ns, and (if you want) saved passwords to a Mozilla account that you create. When you get your new computer, sync it to the same account and everything magically appears in Firefox on your new machine.

I've also found Firefox to generally be the most compatible. My cloud-based accounting system will occasionally hiccup in Chrome, and IE just plain does weird things on some sites. Firefox keeps plugging along.

Heh. We lowly "regular users" assume all you Evangelists know each other

Edit: Oops, looks like Sharon has left the Evangelist level far behind, as she's now "A Flyertalk Posting Legend."

Since that's the case, there's no excuse for anyone not knowing who she is