Computing questions and answers

Letters are filling the box this week, many from parents looking to buy the right laptop for a college student. Let's get right to the pile.

Q. I share your newly found I guess opinion of Windows Vista and I am trying to find a laptop for my son who is leaving for college with XP on it. I read in your column that Dell is selling computers with Windows XP as an option. However, when I went to the Dell Web site, I did not see that option in this list of options when I place an order. How can I get XP?

A. Dell offers Windows XP Professional but only on certain models in certain configurations. If you select the "Small Business" option and not the "Home" option on the Dell Web site, you may find more model options with XP, as the decision was primarily made to placate business customers, some of whom were not ready to switch to Vista. You also can call Dell directly and ask for the XP option but often the online prices are lower. When I visited the site I found the option available on the Latitude, XPS and Precision models. (The latter would be too much for a college student... the XPS would be perfect if he's a gamer.) In your shoes I would visit the site and hit LIVE CHAT and ask for online help.

Q. Is there a good cheap program out there just to view photographs? I don't want to edit them very much, I am just tired of the Photoshop Starter thing I have on my PC trying to sell me something every time I view a picture.

A. Absolutely. Is free cheap enough for you? My favorite is Irfanview, which is 100 percent free and lovely. You can download it for free at www.irfanview.com. It will let you view photos, manipulate them within reason, resize them and even do some editing if you wish. I love it. I am assuming you meant view it on your PC. If you meant view it on the Web, I remain a fan of the online site Smugmug, if for nothing else than their customer service. I am a firm believer in backing up digital photos because we don't have negatives any more (because we don't have film) and sites like Smugmug are the perfect place for this. You can take your photos, dump them to your hard drive and dump a copy online, either public or private. When your hard drive heads south (and it will) you will always have a copy. When you're at Aunt Flo's house and you want to show her your cat, your photos are always with you, assuming Flo has a PC or you have a Web-enabled phone.

Q. Do you recommend a replacement for AVG now that it's not free any more?

A. Once again, AVG Anti-Virus Free Edition remains free. It just replaced 7.5 with 8.0 and it is driving everyone nuts to upgrade. The company is trying to encourage everyone to try its paid product, which I can respect, but in doing so it is alienating a lot of people. If you go to "free.grisoft.com" and carefully follow the prompts you will find the download for the free version.

(James Derk is owner of CyberDads, a computer repair firm and a tech columnist for Scripps Howard News Service. His e-mail address is jim(at)cyberdads.com)