Laptop convertion

[Sixpence]

I have an old laptop that I'd like to convert so I can use it when travelling at sea , currently loaded with windoze 98 and a load of other stuff I'd quite happily dump to free up space on it , but what software is most useful when travelling , and more importantly , is it available as freeware

 

[Csail]

Transas Navigator... if the spec is good enough.

 

[bendyone]

Clean out the drive with a format, depending on the spec load in win 98, put on Seaclear for charting, firefox for the net and tunderbird for email. Connection for GPRS via the mobile and you got all you need for no money.

 

[Csail]

Can you expand on that? ie. how to get them and more of what they do.

 

[graham42]

bendyone

id second that, tho you need xp pro to be safe from crashing.

there`s plenty of copys of c-maps out there, if you know how to open them. works well with maxsea too

 

[bendyone]

Seaclear
Firefox
Thunderbird

The above link used to get the programs, With seaclear you scan your own charts and link to a GPS. The phone conection software is downloaded from your phone manufactures site.

 

[bendyone]

He's looking for Free software. Windows 98 or XP depends on the age and spec of the laptop. I have found windows98 to be OK provided you dont expect it to do too much ie just run a couple of programs at a time.

 

[Sixpence]

Transas looks good but it's not exactly cheap

Bendy - Good ideas James but I'm not looking for any internet stuff when on the boat , it's navigational and stuff like that that I'm after more , so stuff that helps when on board and away from the internet is good if you have any freebie links /forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif Seaclear is good , any more ?

 

[Magic]

If you intend on connecting this to the Internet in any way I would strongly advise against using Windows 98. It's just not secure enough.

That said if you decided to go the Windows 98 route and you have the oringinal media, I would suggest that you do a complete reinstall.

 

[Sixpence]

Not intending to use it for the internet at all , so anything I download will be saved on disc from this lappy and installed from that disc onto the old lappy . I do have a Win 98 installation disc somewhere so I could just overwrite everything else if needs be

 

[moodycruiser]

.... make sure you can get the drivers for the video etc, before you wipe off your operating system.

 

[Guest]

[ QUOTE ]
Not intending to use it for the internet at all , so anything I download will be saved on disc from this lappy and installed from that disc onto the old lappy . I do have a Win 98 installation disc somewhere so I could just overwrite everything else if needs be

[/ QUOTE ]

First before you do anything ... go on web and download the total restore cd disc that is relevant for your notebook - or if not available - then the driver library that should be on manufacters site. Burn those to a cd.... complete ! Unzipped / unrar'd whichever compression they use.

Then and only then do you start formatting your HDD .. of course having at hand the start up discs ? or CD.

To do it well is a time consuming job if the original restore disc / CD is not there ... that usually has the full set-up routine organised for that machine.

For Seaclear etc. - Win98 is excellent and will run without problems. If you use 98se - then you get USB support as well. (OK not as good as XP's support of course ...) But if machine is a pure on-board nav box - 98se is fine.

As you wont be connecting to internet etc. - then no firewall / AV needed of course - which all helps to keep speed up and also reduces crashes ! Just make sure all is virus checked before transfer to this NB ...

Dave - you know where I am - if you need more in way of charting / gps - ask me !!

 

[PIGLETSDREAM]

I have a very old Toshiba Sattelite Pro with no battery running directly on 12volts. Windows 98 with CCX old version(get back off leave and sort me out Danny please) Sea pro lite and another plotting programme I cant remember. Works better on the boat that it ever did as a work machine.