On 19/09/2014 21:15, Tim Lamb wrote:

Right, if you have all finished stressing about Scotland.... back to my
computer problems.

As has been pointed out, Towers with Windows 7/32bit are readily
available on the refurbished market.

What problems am I likely to run into attempting to transfer software
for which I do not have installation discs. Clonezilla was suggested.

Much depends on the software in question...

MS have got their act together on this recently, and so long as you have
the key code that came with the software (or can extract it from the
installed version*) they will let you download and install it again in
many cases with the slight inconvenience of needing (or having to
create) a Microsoft account.

(Magical Jellybean and Produkey will between them do all versions of
office up to 2010)

Other manufacturers may also have legally downloadable versions.

After that, illegally acquiring and ISO of the install CD is probably
the next easiest for other titles.

To actually transfer from an existing install to another is somewhat
more geeky - it can be done but can get complicated and need tools to
sniff file and registry accesses to work out what dependencies the
application has.

Also, will such m/cs have licensed software such that MS will continue
upgrading/fixing?

They will usually have windows since that will be licensed to the
machine and not the owner. Other applications are less likely to be legit.


--
Cheers,

John.

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