I agree right now if you can keep your old pc working for you and wait till windows 7 comes out you will be avoiding having to purchase any upgrades. It will be out in about a year. If you have any friends that have pc knowledge likely they could easily help you install a new hard drive and some RAM, these are things I do myself but my first time I was pretty anxious. I also agree that the desktop is generally the best option unless you travel a lot and would need a laptop for that. My sister just asked me the same question and I talked her into a desktop pretty quickly, if you have not used a laptop try asking a friend with one to let you try it out for an hour or so, feel how the keyboard feels, see how you like the touch pad instead of a mouse, etc. If you have any problems seeing also consider the smaller screen of a laptop. I have pretty severe hand problems so using a smaller keyboard would be very difficult. Sitting in a chair with the laptop on your lap would require some type of laptop desk so you do not block the air flow. As stated updating and replacing parts in a laptop is much more difficult. One thing you could definitely do also rather than install a new hard drive in your pc is buy a stand alone usb backup hard drive and move all your thousands of pictures and music and other files and data to that hard drive and free up your hard drive in the pc, if you did that and got rid of any old programs you no longer need, clean out any junk files and folders, empty the recycle bin, defrag the hard drive you may find you have plenty of room on that 80Gig hard drive. I have been seeing some incredible prices lately on usb hard drives so you could easily find a nice size one for around $50, and you could use that stand alone hard drive with any new computer you buy in the future. Plus no one would have to install it for you, you just plug it into your usb port and then you can access it from your pc just like your other hard drive. Add some RAM to what ever belarc says is your limit for that pc or at least 2 gig and I bet you would be surprised. RAM is cheap. I just bought a 1gig stick for one of my computers and it was less than $20 shipped. If your current pc is a desktop I would also highly suggest turning it off unplug it and open the side panel up and clean out all the dust bunnies, that can really affect the performance of a pc. Cleaning the computer and its components ecost has some very good prices right now this search is for under $50 units but it gives you some ideas. well now you have lots of options and ways to go and up to you to make that big decision. Here is a link that might be useful: usb hard drives

Owbist...do you also think maybe the reason there aren't so many questions any more is that people are getting more computer savvy (sort of hard to put into words). But..I, as a senior citizen, had a LOT of questions when I got into the world of computers..as time has gone on, I've learned a lot (mostly from reading at this site) and don't have nearly as many questions as I used to have. I still come here from time to time with a question, but not nearly as often as I used to. Others of my generation are about the same as me or never got into learning about computers at all. My children didn't grow up with computers but they had the first video game things that came out and they are computer literate. "Their" children have been using computers since they were in kindergarten. I was just mulling this over...does this make sense to why maybe there aren't so many questions...along with the fact that computers are getting more dependable? I've had a lot of panic times with my computer and this site has been like an old friend. My kids and grandkids don't panic like I did (and still do at times) Snidely...I understand what you have said, but I still might buy from my local repair shop. They will answer any question I might have via e-mail and give me a discount for having purchased my computer from them...and I they are also my internet provider. Just some thoughts from a senior computer user...thanks for listening :o)

since you have already done what you decided to do I would most definitely set her up as Administrator on the pc and set up a user name and hard password for the pc so that anyone there can not access it they would have to know her name and password to enter the pc. Other wise they can just sit at her pc and do anything and that leads to infections and she does not need that. Be sure you load some of the good free antivirus programs on it like AVAST which does work on 98 and malwarebytes free, make sure she knows how to update and run scans. I would also put spywareblaster free on there and show her how to hit the update button once a week on it and then hit the enable all protection no scans to run it just runs in the back ground. I would also install firefox on it and have her use that instead of IE.

call your telephone people or internet server. They can walk you through it. Our phone company will send out their telephone guy and he'll help you. It is most likly an easy fix. Our server has a program that I use. The only mail I get is people I have on my "allways allow list" Otherwise it all goes into my "spam" folder. Then I check it for other email I want or just delete it. not sure if I explained it verywell but I'd first call your telephone co.