I apologise in advance. I didn't know where to put the post, in online, agony or gossip. I decided on here, if its not in the right place, I'm sorry and move where appropraite? Its on quite a pathetic subject matter aswell, which will probably make half of wince.

The thing is, I'm getting a new laptop, after just starting university, I need a better one and decent printer. My current one (the one I am on at the moment) I'm giving to mother when I get my new one. She currently shares, a slower, older, worse laptop than mine with my younger brother.

Part one, I have collected a huge collection from Itunes music. I mean, paid from Itunes, uploaded and downloaded. I'm scared because when I bought this laptop, I lost all the music from my itunes, whilst switching computers. What can I do to keep it the same? How do I transfer my itunes over to the new laptop when I get it.

Anyways I'm not out, theres reasons for it, the main being, my hatred for labels, being 'bisexual' would probably offend my family more than coming out as gay. But on my laptop, I go on internet sites (gay) i.e this one. and porn sites and downloaded things, I wouldn't be comfortable on other people finding out.
I've wrote erotic fiction on microsoft word.

Although I've saved everything to pen, and deleted the appropraite from the computer, I can't help feeling a little anxious, that when my mother gets my laptop she'll find something. I was just wondering is there anything I do to make sure she wont find out, and how to do it. As you have probably guessed I am not the most technical of people.

Thanks for reading and if you give any advise, for advising

I'd ask the mods to move this to techno gossip.

I'm up there with the main agony uncles.

But I'm more "Dear Deirdre" than Bill Gates.

The geeks would answer this much better.

Proby should have posted in Techno...

Seems there are two areas at issue here ...one being the iTunes thing and the other the Gay stuff ...As for the latter did you actually download stuff ..as in save video or pictures to your hard drive on the laptop ..if so and you want to keep that stuff then copy it to a DVD and then delete it from Hard Drive ...if you simply went to sites and looked at them then you want to delete your History and Temporary Internet Files ...Assuming you are using Windows then Tools/Internet Options/Browsing History should get you started .Bookmarks as well should be deleted

The other way is to do a fresh install of your Operating System ( Windows?) if you have the disc that came with the Laptop and doing that you can format the Hard Drive which will wipe everyhting from the drive and you start again .

I cant help much with iTunes and music you bought ...do you use it on your phone?...I have iTunes for my iPhone but don't use it for music ...is it ALL on your phone ...are you able to setup iTunes on your new laptop then sync the music back to it on iTunes from your phone ....is it allowed to change computers .I remember looking at my iTunes and saw something about this PC being linked to my iTunes but dunno if you can add other PC's or what happens if you change to another PC ...Apple Support website might helep ..there is loads of stuff on there ....or hopefully someone else will be along in here that knows more.

Have a look through here ..you might find the answer re iTunes

http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&n...l0l0l0l0l0ll0l0

You'd do well to follow Molley's suggestions. In addition, do you have anti-virus software? If so, open it and check whether it has a 'shredding' facility (this will shred your files like a paper shredder shreds paper).

As for your iTunes... there's plenty of advice and instructions on the Apple website, which should sort you out.

http://filehippo.com/download_ccleaner/

^ that thing is brilliant for wiping allasorts and there is a function for wiping the free space on drives with asbout 35 passes so people cant easily try restoring what you delete.

If you install it watch for the default setting of installing the Google Toolbar which seems to be in almost everything nowadays ..Just uncheck the box if you don't want it .

What I've settled on is, deleting my account.
Setting a new admin on up, it should work.


According to Itunes, If I'm reading right. The hundreds of pounds i've invested into my music over the last three and half years, is going to be lost.
Which is disgusting, because I can't afford to start again. At all. I don't know what I'm going to do.

Moving your music is easy-
Clicky

No, DON'T delete your account! I don't think you are reading it right. Before you delete, get in touch with iTunes Store Customer Support. I've used them a couple of times, and on both occasions I've had personal responses and they've been brilliant. Try it.

Read Skiffers CLICKY LINK...all the info you need is there

On iTunes - see previous links.

On deleting stuff, a couple of options:
1) [Easiest Option] You can just delete/transfer whatever files you want to your new computer, and clear your internet history/temporary files (should be in options menu somewhere). Check your recent document links are clean. You might be able to get programs which automatically do this for you (see link provided previously?)
2) [Paranoid Option] In addition to the above, you can also write over "empty space" on the hard drive. This basically prevents deleted stuff being retrieved. If you think your mum/younger brother is particularly tech savvy and has a reason to try and retrieve files you've deleted, then you might consider this. Otherwise, in practice its actually a lot of hassle to retrieve deleted information. Its probably beyond the ability of the average person who is not technologically inclined.
3) [Cleanest option] Transfer whatever stuff you want to your new computer, and then format your laptop and do a clean install. I'd probably do this as a courtesy whenever I'm handing over a computer anyway - they get a fresh install to work with, and any personally identifiable information/history will get wiped. It doesn't stop people from trying to retrieve deleted files, but I see that risk as fairly low anyway.