Recommend some computer software for my parents!

Cafe Society
1

My parents recently purchased a laptop as their first computer in… well… ever. After getting all the necessary peripherals, there is still about $200 in the budget for software.

When I ask what they want to be able to do with their computer, the answer I get is “Oh, I don’t know. It would be nice to maybe make a small spreadsheet or watch some history videos. We’d also like to be able to play some find-it games”.

So I’ve narrowed it down to an encyclopedia of some sort, a typing program, microsoft office (already have), and a couple simple games off of Bigfish. My mother cooks a lot, so an interactive cookbook type program might interest her. Can anyone recommend some fun software along these lines?

They won’t have an internet connection, FWIW.

2

Try Snapfiles or FileHippo and look around at the freeware there.

There are almost always free alternatives, such as EAC for ripping music. Avidemux or VirtualDub for editing movies. These are powerful programs but they aren’t exactly user friendly.

So look for freeware, or shareware, but really half the fun of the computer is letting the folks just play with it. Perhaps you could get them a gift card for Micro Computer or Best Buy and let them buy the software as the need arises.

Heck the three best games I got and play all the time, Scrabble, The Game of Life and Sorry I got off of packages of Cheerios :slight_smile:

3

Those “find it games” can get pretty expensive, in and of themselves.