Sonic

You will need to provide more details on your computer model, operating system, and version of Sonic (which is a burning program), as well as the names of any specific other programs you are unsure of. Some are trialware, some are games associated with adware, and some are just plain junk.

Thanks all. Among the junk I've got rid of so far is Symantec/Norton and their wretched security centre, so some progress!

From what's been said I'm not sure whether to try Sonic or load Nero from an old disk. What do you recommend?

Q.

Depends on what version of Nero you have.  If it's a relatively new version, e.g. V6, then you will have full features. 

I would leave the new PC as it's shipped for a while, until you make sure it's all working properly.  I've seen too many cases of people customizing their PC at the beginning and then having problems and no one knows if it's a PC hardware problem or something to do with the software - either what was removed or what was added. 

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@fireberd wrote:

I would leave the new PC as it's shipped for a while, until you make sure it's all working properly.  I've seen too many cases of people customizing their PC at the beginning and then having problems and no one knows if it's a PC hardware problem or something to do with the software - either what was removed or what was added. 

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It's a difficult one though; I agree with the idea of being sure it all works and that it won't have to go back to Dell to be fixed, but of course I need it to do stuff and there are so many customisations to apply before I'm comfortable using the machine. It takes days just sorting the desktop/Opera/mail/Usenet basics out! No time to waste checking out crippled apps like PowerDVD-DX which seems incapable of playing a file from disk! Best dump the rubbish ASAP and replace with trusted versions of favourite apps.

I seriously thought about restoring/installing a clean version of XP from the supplied disk.

Q.