My dad's main computer is an Athlon XP 1400 (I think) and is about 5 years old now. This past year it has been very flaky, resetting itself while you're using programs, crashing etc... I looked at it a few times but tried to avoid formatting as much as I can because I really really hate doing that. It's 3-4 hour job backing up their files, format, install windows, a billion updates and reboots, reinstall all the programs again, all their files, printer, cameras, etc...

At one point we realized the motherboard was a bit loose and could move around. There was also a screw behind the motherboard! If you give the computer a knock it would reboot. I got that fixed, but the computer was still flaky. Last resort is to format. My dad decided to just go out and buy a brand new computer with Vista. We went through a bit of hell getting a wireless card working but were successful in the end. I copied 2.7 GB of data from the old computer onto it,then took the old computer home. It will become my sister's computer in her bedroom.

I'm going to try a bit of an experiment with her. When she gets it back, it will have Kubuntu linux on it. I use Ubuntu at home, the first linux distribution that shocked me because of how usable it was out of the box. Ubuntu uses Gnome which is a bit minimalistic compared to KDE.. so I decided she'll get Kubuntu. I'll load it up with Firefox, an MSN Messenger client, Open Office, Flash 9 plugin, Sun Java 6 JRE, and support to access the windows printer attached to the new computer. I think she'll find it very usable, and maybe my dad will give it a try too. I hope he will realize that linux isn't what he thinks it is. He doesn't realize that after 10 years it has become so usable now that even he could use it. Even if it was usable, he would rather Windows anyway.

Putting linux on my sister's computer will almost guarantee I'll never hear from her about it again. There won't be viruses, worms, she can't really screw it up because she'll use a normal user account, etc... If she does have a problem, it will probably be a hardware problem.