ArcToolbox - A collection of tools for manipulating, converting, creating, analyzing and editing GIS data. Some overlap with basic functions in ArcCatalog, but with many unique utilities. The tools provided vary with licensing level. In all honesty, the device had not received much attention since the last report due to other commitments, so this was all the more annoying as usage hours were very low for such a fault to develop – it’s not like it had been taxed to within an inch of its life.

Low storage: Small and cheap laptops, especially Chromebooks, have little storage. These laptops are best for working on documents stored in cloud services such as Google Drive and Microsoft OneDrive. If you have a large collection of photos and videos, you might need to keep them on an external USB hard drive. Don't buy a Chromebook with less than 32GB, and avoid Windows laptops with less than 64GB.

ArcCatalog - Software for GIS data (and metadata) browsing, creation and conversion to other formats. Similar to Windows Explorer, but with GIS-specific utilities and functions. The functions available vary with licensing level. Processor: Intel Atom and older Intel Celeron processors (look out for model number starting with N3 and N40, such as N3060 or N4020, as these are old and slow). Auto-stitch - a superb, automatic image stitcher for creating 1D and 2D panoramas. Developed at the University of British Columbia, it is very simple to use. A free, fully functional Windows demonstration version is available.

Stereonet software - Allmendinger's Stereonet is a popular choice that is free to the academic community Chromebooks are also worth a look. In fact, your child might already use one at school, as these are popular among educational institutions. Read our guide to the best Chromebooks for more. GeoMapper provides the visual user-interface that allows a geologist to implement mapping using intuitive, self-explanatory buttons that are touched using a stylus (Brimhall et al, 2006) Office Productivity Software Cheerful designs: Some budget laptops have more colourful, slightly rugged designs. While this won’t ever make or break a laptop buying decision, it can be a nice bonus.False economy is rife in the wor ld of laptops. We run you through the best cheap models we've found, and explain where you can compromise. We'd recommend a smaller, 11-inch screen (to make the laptop easy and safe to carry around). Avoid big, heavy laptops that a child will struggle to carry. Move - produced by Midland Valley Inc., is a program that is great for rapid construction of 2D deformation models I suspect that some of the amateur radio applications I use are a bit old and are developed by hobby coders. This being Windows 11, and a little less tolerant of old and badly written apps, I do believe that one of these is to blame. This could be an issue if it turns out to be one of my favourite programs. But, that’s the risk we take with running hobby software on the very latest OS; you can’t maintain compatibility forever in to the dim and distant past. GeoPad 110 supporting my other activities