Golactico

I have some experience with cheapo Amazon tablets which may be helpful to the OP. I bought a 9.7inch 'no-brand' for my wife which cost about £190 and had hundreds of brilliant reviews. However, it was a constant source of frustration. It had poor wifi reception from the start and I had to send it back twice for repair. It ended up going wrong beyond economical repair a few months after the 12month warranty expired - a frustrating waste of money. I replaced it with a Samsung Galaxy 2 from Tesco's outlet store on ebay.Although nowhere near top of the range, its a solid, reliable tablet for the stuff my wife wants it for (catch up TV, facebook, ebay etc). I also bought a 9inch cheapy (£85) for my 7 yr old son for Xmas 2012. It's a bit slow when browsing the web, but for what he wants to do - play Minecraft, Angry Birds etc and watch stuff on Youtube - it fits the bill perfectly. Even if it goes belly up tomorrow, I will consider that I've had excellent value out of it as he's on it every day. Finally, I bought a cheap 7inch for myself for about £65, again on the back of hundreds of great reviews. I had it for about a year and was delighted with it to be honest. However, I then upgraded to a Google Nexus (a refurb from ebay - cost about £100) and this opened my eyes to what a decent tablet is like - so much smoother and quicker, with massively better screen resolution. My advice, for what it's worth, is to pay a bit more for a lower-end brand named tablet - there are ebay bargains to be had if you're careful who you buy from. Although they serve a purpose, you definitely get what you pay for with the cheapo models.

Thanks for all who took the time to reply - very much appreciated. The dealer is a one man band and I've now discovered that he's on hols until the end of the month (it would help if he said so on his answerphone message!). From the impression I got of him, I'm fairly confident he'll get in touch on his return. Cruise control isn't really a big deal for me, but if it's sold as being a feature, I feel it should work. More importantly, when I'm looking to sell the car on, it's not a great selling point to have to point out that any item isn't working.

I'm after some opinion from anyone more experienced in buying used cars than me. I bought a car from a dealer about a month ago. The dealer said that he could provide a warranty at extra cost, but advised against this as he said that anything major likely to go wrong is covered by the 'Sale of Goods Act', so I decided against paying extra for a warranty. He was generally keen to emphasise that he would be reasonable in terms of after-sale service. I'm basically really pleased with the car. However, It was only after 3 weeks of having it that I had the chance to take it for a long run. It was then that I discovered that the cruise control doesn't work. The trader's advert did say that it had cruise control. I'm therefore completely within my rights to expect him to sort this out at no charge aren't I? I only ask as I've left two messages for him in the last 24hrs and he's yet to get back to me. There may be legitamate reasons for this, but I want to be sure of my position if I find that I need to get a bit cross with him. Cheers for any input.

Cheers buctootim. I will give it a go tomorrow when I'm a bit more 'with it'. Appreciate the idiot proof 'data erase' warnings!

Hi, I'm hoping someone might be able to give me some advice. I have a Toshiba NB200-10G netbook. OS is Windows XP and there is a Microsoft Product Key sticker on the bottom of the machine. I no longer need this netbook and want to wipe it and restore it to factory settings so that I can sell it. However, with no disc drive on the machine and therefore no Windows discs to install, how do I go about doing this? Not often a good old Google fails to come up trumps but it has on this occasion. I'm sure the solution must be fairly simple. Thanks in advance for any replies.

We're thinking of saving all the hassle and eating out on Christmas day next year. Anyone got any recommendations or places to avoid based on experience from this year?

Some very impressive high pressing in our early attacks, including Hassan's first goal. There might be something in that tactic....

Just curious as to whether anyone knows why this place closed down? The food was really good and it always seemed to do OK for punters. Have they moved perhaps?

I once saw Matt Oakley smoking in O'Neill's (now the White Star) in Oxford Street. I guess the likes of him and Claus were from the last generation of players where smoking was deemed to be in any way tolerable.

Thanks to all for the really helpful replies. I think I'll stick with my current arrangement for now but make sure that I change to a WPA compliant phone before too long. Cheers

I have recently had a replacement BT Homehub 3 installed. Once installed, I found that although all other WiFi devices connected, my Sony Xperia U phone would not. After a bit of Googling, I discovered that this was due to the fact that the new Homehub WiFi security was set to WPA which was 'too secure' to allow my phone to connect. The solution was to reset the router to WEP security, which I have done and now all my devices, including my phone connect to the router with no problems. Although pleased that I've now got everything working, I'm a bit concerned that a lot of websites and forums advise against using WEP as it is an outdated security protocol and is easy to hack. Can anyone more clued up than me advise whether I am exposing myself to any significant risk by using WEP and if so, is there an alternative solution that gives secure WiFi AND connectivity with all of my deviices including my phone?

My 6 yr old is doing a Saints Foundation footy course next week. Has anyone got kids that have done one of these? Although he enjoys playing, my lad isn't massively into football and I'm a bit concerned that a week of six hour days might test his enthusiasm a bit. The leaflet doesn't really give much detail of what the course covers, so I just wondered if anyone can shed any light?

I have just been into the Saints shop in West Quay to buy a small gift and was greeted with the new kit, virtually wall to wall. This was the first opportunity I've had to see it properly. I don't like to be over dramatic about things, but it really is absolutely dreadful. Even allowing for the fact that I'm firmly in the red/white stripes+black shorts camp, it's beyond my worst expectations. Last year's effort at least looked OK, even if it wasn't in keeping with tradition. The gaudy gold is just embarassing.

I think I'm correct in saying that the 7-1 defeat in the second leg was the first game that Keegan didn't play in that season, as he was injured, leading to 'one man team' accusations. Even our goal was an OG I think.

And another round of applause for warsash saint!

I'm not for a moment putting him in the same league, but that goal today had a touch of the Messi about it.

I've only used it a couple of times, but this seems to do what you're asking for in a very easy and straightforward way: DVD in, Choose your conversion format and away you go. takes about half an hour, but does the job, and for free. http://www.winxdvd.com/dvd-ripper/

Thanks Jonny. Such a simple soloution to something that's been bugging me for a while.

I have a tablet running the Android ICS operating system. I used to watch a lot of stuff on Channel 4's 4OD catch up service, but since Flash Player disappeared from the Google Play store, 4OD hasn't worked. The thing I don't get is that I already have Flash installed on my tablet, so why won't 4OD work anymore? From what I can gather, although Adobe have withdrawn support for Flash, existing versions should still function. Does anyone know of a workaround that will enable me to watch 4OD on my tablet? Thanks for any ideas and Merry Christmas.

Not very good in my opinion. Obviously not as bad as our first Ted Bates effort, but the likeness is nowhere near as good as our replacement Ted Bates one. I think I'd struggle to identify it as Ferguson if I didn't already know. (Yes, I know it's supposed to portray him from when he was much younger) http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/20468104

He and Kevin also used to deliver Sandwiches to an office block I worked at in Southampton in the mid 90s. Was a bit bizarre buying my cheese & Pickle sarnies from someone so relatively famous. Shows how the money in football has changed in a relatively short period of time. Somehow I can't imagine that Harry Redknapp is currently hawking butties around the office blocks of Bournemouth. 'What sandwiches have you got left Harry?' 'Well, y'know, I'm down to the bare bones.....'

For anyone interested, I went for this in the end: http://www.amazon.co.uk/A1CS-FUSION5-PREMIUM-TABLET-DUAL-CAMERA/dp/B0081UIKXA A few issues initially with WiFi reception, but basically delighted with it. The after-sale customer service from the company (UK based - A1CS Ltd) was fantastic. I emailed them on one occasion at 10.30 on a Saturday night and got a reply within 10 mins.

Considering that it's likely to revolutionise TV in the UK, particularly for those of us not interested in paying for Sky, I'm quite surprised by how few people seem to have heard of YouView. YouView is a project backed by BBC, ITV, Ch4, BT amonst others, that has been in the pipeline for a few years now and is finally due to launch in the Autumn. In a nutshell, it's the next generation of Freeview box, difference being that it is linked to your broadband, giving you instant access to catch-up TV services, via a backwards accessible program guide. You can also get other paid for and free TV services via the box, which will cost about £200, with no subscription cost (unless you choose the extra services like LoveFilm, Netflix etc). This explains it better than I can: http://www.youview.com/

OP here. Perhaps I should mention that I have in fact used my brother-in-law's ipad. One size rarely fits all. If someone gave me a Porsche, I'd sell it immediately as my Nissan does exactly what I need it to.

Thanks a lot Colin. I see from the other recent Tablet thread that you seem to know what you're talking about, so I will now go ahead and get the Archos Tablet with a bit more confidence. Cheers