Suggestion for a new laptop

Take a look at the specifications of the mb.
My old Lenovo is full : 8GB.
And do never mix any type and manufacturers of RAM.
Could work, but often dont.

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The Linux foundation also has free classes on edX

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Your laptop can go up to 16gb ddr3 RAM and has SATA HDD so it can easily take a SATA ssd.

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Thanks for that info! Wasn’t sure where to start when it comes to searching a SSD. So if it takes 2.5 inch (I think) SSD, then does it mean that any 2.5 inch SATA SSD would work?

Any 2.5" Sata SSD would work, yes.

There are a few other form factors and connection types (M.2, NVMe), but they are unusual, and would most likely only be in laptops that are new enough to have an SSD to start with.

For RAM, you definitely have to order a supported speed and form factor. Lots of places online where you can put in your computer, and they will tell you exactly what to order that is supported.

In many cases you will get more speed if your RAM sticks are the same size - mismatched sizes aren’t that common these days.

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Not something I’m really worried about but would be good for sure. I see a Crucial SSD is $115 for 1 TB. Btw how do you clone something that’s not connected to the laptop anymore?

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Found out that Crucial has a guaranteed compatibility options that would work. So technically I would have a “new” laptop for $202 with more RAM than my current unit. And hard drive replacement doesn’t look too bad until it comes to Windows installation :joy:

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That’s great! Probably better than buying a new laptop by far

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Assuming you have access to a Windows 10 license, that isn’t that hard either.
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10

There are instructions for creating a bootable flash drive there. It can be a bit to get a handle on the first time you do it, but nothing there is actually hard.

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Ok I searched a little and it is definitely weird and not easy :joy:. I read somewhere that changing HDD to SSD doesn’t change installation process of Windows 10. License is linked to the motherboard not the hard drive itself. Will have to research about this more before I go around ordering stuff and removing my hard drive. Also will try to get some pictures from BIOS in case I need something

https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/all/how-can-i-reinstall-windows-10-license-onto-a-new/3f931ea1-cd0d-4c60-99f7-6279fa4b06ce

It came with a kit that connected the SSD to my laptop, installed a bit of software from Samsungs website and it basically made the SSD a bootable drive.
I opened the laptop and swapped the drives and worked first time.
I was daunted at first but thought if the worst happened i would just dump the HDD back in and take it to the tech guys at work.
My HDD was still working, just! If yours isn’t you’ll be starting fresh i guess.

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Yup I guess I would have to do that. Thanks a lot to everyone for all the information! Definitely saved quite a bit of money!!

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laptop questions seem to be answered…

and last , but not the least… a must are the Anker USB-C Hubs (for Data transfers, Monitor) , Power Strips (charge your laptop) , Headsets (for taking calls and music :rofl:) … :smile:

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That is correct. Your computer sees both HDD or SSD as a storage space connected via a SATA connector. Theoretically SATA has 2 versions (6 and 3). They are same in form factor. sata 6 can do 6 Gb/s or 600 MB/s while sata 3 can do half of it.
Any HDD will barely meet these speeds unless they are in RAID so it won’t matter sata 3 or 6.
SSD can however do much more data transfer rate and can fully utilize sata 6 theoretical speeds and that’s why it makes such a huge impact on computer’s responsiveness vs HDD. You don’t have to worry about installation process, it is same irrespective of type of storage. Your windows license code is typically printed on a sticker on back of your laptop.

M.2 sata or M.2 NVMe are different form factor and most likely are not in your laptop. Yours is 2.5" sata.

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Is it inside the laptop? Because I can’t seem to see anything on there except the service tag that Dell put when I sent the laptop back

Is this is a personal laptop that you purchased online or in store? or a corporate laptop?
Personal computers typically has the windows license printed on a sticker at the bottom of laptop. I’ve never seen it put inside of laptop.
Corporate laptops are covered under corporate licenses so they don’t have individual license code so no such information is on the laptop.
What is the service tag. did you check that if it has the code on it?
As the last resort, you can always call Dell or Microsoft to provide you the license code since you purchased the laptop.

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Windows 10 License is digitally assigned on the machine , unless this is an enterprise version. and you can move the license between the machines…

Your Digital License is transferable from one machine to another. The rule is one license per PC. You should be able to activate this digital license to another Windows 10 Pro. You will have to reset the current PC where this license is being used to de-activated the license and remove the device from your Microsoft account.

Windows 10 (at least I have not) see any License codes on laptops…

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Ok I’ll have to call Dell then I guess. It is a personal laptop that I bought from Staples I think. The service tag is basically a serial number that Dell can use to see what is the laptop configuration.
The sticker on the bottom has

  1. “Service Tag(S/N)” which is a 7 character tag with alphabets and numbers
  2. “Express Service Tag” which is 11 character of numbers

I could be wrong but can’t you find it in the bios or in the command prompt??? I’m not sure that they still print them on the bottoms of all laptops bought for consumer use

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Ok so I found this video of someone doing what I have to on my laptop and it was pretty straightforward with media creation thing from Microsoft website.

I also found another video from Dell support for clean install of Windows 10 which uses their proprietary software which first video didn’t

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