Recent content by John Chapman

To be honest I wouldn't give either houseroom. Laptop 2 has an appalling screen resolution 1366 x 768 - you have to be kidding. My phone is better than that. laptop 1 has a SSD so it will be fairly fast to start up BUT it's only 160 GB of which about half will be needed by the OS. You'll quickly...

From your description it sounds like you hold a key for four seconds and the key then gets stuck down. Does this happen with all the keys? If so that sounds like a software fault. Deleting the keyboard driver and restarting may fix it. It's also possible your keyboard has developed a hardware...

Look for the USB drivers and try removing them. As Webworkings said, when you restart they should be re-installed.

They are not too difficult to replace. First try using an external USB keyboard to see if that works. If it does then go ahead and buy a replacement keyboard for your laptop. If an external keyboard doesn't work you probably need a new laptop. You can find instructions online for the replacement...

HP laptops are notorious for overheating. I've had two Pavilions with this problem. The problem is that dust collects inside which blocks the cooling vents. The fan compensates by blowing harder. The problem is much worse if you have a cat. Cat hair gets sucked in and trapped between the fan and...

One good reason for having a battery in a laptop is that the laptop can be moved from room to room without having to switch it off. I run a Dell 1720 laptop 24/7 as a Twitter server and have done so since 2007. It gets moved frequently. It's on it's second battery. I changed it when it was no...

You have the classic signs of an overheating laptop. Use a vacuum cleaner to suck dust out of the air intake/exhaust vents. If you need to, use a short length of stiff monofilament fishing line or thin strimmer line to dislodge it Got a cat? Cat fur is very hard to dislodge and gets trapped...

Save the file on your computer and right click it. Choose properties and at the bottom of the window check the 'Attributes' section. Is there an 'Unblock' option? If so check it and the file can then be used.

I would have suspected overheating also, especially when you say it doesn't shut down when running on battery. It's likely to be a wad of dust caught between the heat exchanger fins and the fan outlet. A second possibility is a non-functioning fan. Do you hear it start running? Can you feel warm...

I've had a number of laptops over the years. Some developed overheating problems, Others were fine. In an extreme case one laptop, which remained on while the lid was closed, actually partially melted the keyboard. Invariably the problem is caused by dust which collects. Sometimes you can...

I've had a number of HP computers. Each looked great initially but wore badly as they aged and looked very scruffy eventually. They also suffered from overheating problems. (Especially so if you have a cat). Dust and fluff gets lodged between the fan outlet and heat exchanger. To remove it...

With a 1366 x 768 display I doubt if you'll have a second drive bay slot. They are usually seen on older 17" laptops. That means any SSD you buy has to replace your existing hard drive. It's likely your existing drive will be fairly full so you need a bigger SSD than your existing hard drive...

I agree - unlikely to be the ribbon cable if it happens when connected to an external display. If the machine is not under warranty the lowest cost option would be to buy a new laptop. You can't replace the graphics card as you can on a desktop machine. The only other suggestion I could make...

An extra note now that Word 2016 is here. Exactly the same problem has re-occurred. A document saved in Word 2013 and then resaved in Word 2016 takes ages to save. I timed a 300 page document, text only but with comments embedded. It took 154 seconds to save in Word 2016. The cure is exactly the...