I really think for $400 or not much more, you can get something decent new or refurbished nowadays. Try some of the small computer stores you see, sometimes they have a distribution deal with Dell. They also make up computers or can refurb yours for a few hundred.
If you transfer all your content to an external drive, you might also try a full system restore of your machine back to factory specs. You’ll lose all data it’s like your machne just came out of the box again. I’ve done it when machines picked up a pernicious virus and there was no other way.
Also, when I bought the cheap machine locally, they were able to transfer over Microsoft Office, and that saved a couple hundred bucks.
> I really think for $400 or not much more, you can get something decent new or refurbished nowadays.
Good advice. About a year ago, I lucked into a deal on a very high end refurbished machine. At a well known auction site and for $425, I got a refurbished Dell server in a tower (no monitor, but it did come with keyboard and mouse. It was nearly 3 years old but had dual quad processors and more memory than any machine ever needs. I put a copy of Vista on it and this is the machine I’m using right now.
Lots of deals, you should be able to get a dandy refurb system for something in the neighborhood of $200.