TN Computers

To answer this question, we need to explore (among other things) exactly how much `bang for your buck` each option gives us.   We begin with a very rudimentary internet search to find a brand new, mid-high end HP laptop, brand new for the handsome sum of £549, reduced from £699. This model has an up to date Intel i5 processor, 8GB RAM and a 512GB SSD. As we searched for a refurbished laptop we very quickly stumbled across an Acer laptop with an up to date Intel i7 processor, 8GB RAM and a 1TB SSD. This could be had for £390   Finally, we found a preowned Dell laptop from a private seller. It was a slightly lower spec but not by much. The Intel i5 processor was still up to date but only almost as powerful as the HP but it still had 8GB RAM. Where it fell a little behind was with it's 256GB SSD. However, the price? A much more affordable £219.   All of the models had a 14" FHD screen, Windows 11 preinstalled and all of the accessories required, such as chargers etc. includ...

In short, yes. Swapping your old spinning HDD is the single biggest most effective upgrade you can make to your computer or laptop. There are plenty of upgrades that may be beneficial but in 99% of cases, none of them would be as significant as moving to an SSD.  We're so steadfast on that, that unless there is a specific need for it (SSDs are not perfect for all applications) when they fail, we replace all HDDs with SSDs as a matter of course. Buy why I hear you ask? HDD stands for hard disk drive. Imagine an old record player with the record spinning around and the needle moving across the vinyl to play the music. Only this time it's reading data. That's exactly what an HDD looks like inside. The trouble is that data isn't linear like music so quite often the needle has to move around the disk to find what it's looking for. That takes time and that's means you have to sit there, waiting, wondering if your computers jammed or not. You may have heard the term ...

Microsoft Windows has been the go to operating system for 37 years. There have been countless competitors that have come and gone along the way. The most mainstream though are still going strong and although they have a significantly lower market share, much to Microsoft's annoyance, they show no sign of going away and are actually not doing a bad job of slowly starting to erode Microsoft's dominance. If you haven't guessed it by now, we're of course talking about Chrome OS, Mac OS and Linux in all their different varieties. Today we're going to focus on Linux and try to answer the question... is it time you ditched Windows and moved to Linux? The first thing to mention is that Linux is not a single operating system. It is the name given to a collective group of "distros" which are all individual in their own right. The most common are Ubuntu and Mint. For the purposes of today though, we're going to keep it simple and just refer to Linux. So, should y...