“The only time I did that was my first computer (IBM PS/2 Model 60) where I added the math co-processor to it.”
Remember that, though in my case it was the 1st clone available in Orlando Florida, rather than an IBM. Later I upgraded it to a 386, which started me down the road to building & updating/upgrading PC hardware. It’s Loads easier today, with interchangeable parts more readily available, though I wouldn’t suggest trying to upgrade the HP. Assuming the power supply and hard drive are 7 years old, you’d want to replace them rather than risking the time & money you put into an upgrade, while everything else would probably be too old to be compatible with a new parts.
FWIW, if you were going to upgrade from the HP [I know you’re not planning on it], building a replacement is most cost effective at the mid to high range – after some quick calculations on a sticky note I’d say that would probably cost around $600 & up using a 2nd generation Ryzen, which are going for about $100 off. In the low to mid performance range it would be hard to compete with off-the-shelf PCs pricewise, though the parts you’d buy are most likely going to be superior to what they commonly use. Low to mid-range mini-PCs, e.g. the Intel NUCs, are often cheaper on sale [Overstock often advertises good prices] because they eliminate all sorts of stuff you’d pay for in a full size PC, using a wall wart rather than a power supply, no card slots or CPU socket etc. Most inexpensive are used PCs that came off lease – often advertised as remanufactured, there’s really nothing to remanufacture… they clean them up, make sure they work, and sometimes add a fresh copy of win10.
[After I wrote that, but before I posted, came across this article:
Windowscentral[.]com/black-friday-under-600-gaming-pc-build ]
“The current Windows 7 desktop is an HP and I've never had much luck with them getting drivers updated.”
HP, Lenovo, motherboard & graphics card brands etc. will test drivers they get from the companies that make their components, and they’ll make those available, often under their own branding, usually only while a product is being sold in stores. And to reduce customer support costs, PC & laptop brands will often stick code into their Windows installs that prevents you from installing any drivers that don’t come from those brands. My wife’s 2-in-1 is off warranty, and while there were newer, better Intel drivers available, they would not install, nor would Lenovo provide their own, tested versions – to me it was like Lenovo flipping me off. So I downloaded the Intel drivers in a .zip file, expanding those drivers into a new folder, and upgraded through Device Mgr. Now updating Intel drivers works normally.
Intel, AMD, Nvidia, & Realtek continually develop improved drivers, but with most other component manufacturers it’s hit or miss. But Intel & Realtek drivers are sometimes only available through Microsoft [usually via Windows Update], depending on the CPU or chipset, and AMD graphics drivers can be a confusing mess on laptops. About all you can do is get the make & model number of a component or chip or chipset and start searching the component manufacturer’s site & use Google. It’s riskier, but you can also try driver sites &/or driver finding utilities. With laptops & tablets it can be especially bad, since they can use components that were a one-off – made under contract for one or a few models by a company that no longer produces that part or anything similar. For those there will never be an updated, newer driver.
Printers are especially bad about drivers because the major brands see their printer line as vehicles to sell ink or toner. I’ve got an old Brother printer that’s been a real workhorse for years, but the drivers and the printer’s firmware have been Huge hassles. A few times I thought it was dead or in the process of dying, only to have it come back to life after a Windows or PC BIOS update. I bought a replacement a while ago when a great deal came up and am just trying to use up my stockpile of ink. Windows 10 does have a lot of printer drivers available, and more generic WIA drivers, but in my experience, they lack many of the features in the original drivers from the printer manufacturer.
“I've used other Anti-Virus software with mixed results. At one time McAfee took so much overhead that I could NOT access the internet. Others have had an overload of false positives that they refused to fix, even after acknowledging that they were indeed false. MSE (and Defender under Windows 8.1) seems to be doing what I want!”
For the first few years Microsoft too often had to patch some surprising vulnerabilities in win10’s Defender, but it’s gotten better to the point that I might not buy anything else when my current subscriptions run out, though since I buy more than one when they’re on sale at a great price, that’ll be a while. The only hassle I’ve had from McAfee the last several years is that the deals I’ve bought are for new users only, so once a year I have to completely remove & reinstall it. I do get more false positives from McAfee than Defender, but they tend to be for small apps I’m not sure why I bothered with in the 1st place. I run Bitdefender on the 2 PCs my wife & I use, but it’s too much of a load when Windows is starting up on our low powered devices, which is where I use McAfee. Neither Bitdefender nor McAfee has any real customer service IMHO, but when there’s a false positive on something I need, I haven’t had any problem adding it to Bitdefender’s or McAfee’s exception list, so it’s ignore
