Q I am a photographer and want to scan some slides. What is the best way of doing this?

A There are a number of 35mm film and slide scanners on the market which would probably suit your needs very well. They provide high-quality scans and can be relatively inexpensive at the lower end of the market (especially when compared to professional camera equipment). You can read a good article on the relative merits of different models and the kind of thing you should be looking for at www.magiccookie. com/photography/scanners.html Q I currently own an old 486 machine which runs Windows 3.11. I know it's antiquated but it does what I want. Everyone says I should upgrade it for something newer but I'm not sure why I should. Any advice?

A If the machine does everything that you want and you are happy with it, then by all means keeps it. There is a bit of an obsession in computing to always have the latest bit of kit or software but, in reality, most of the time it is because we want it, not because we need it. My advice is to stick with your machine as long as you find it useful. It is important to recognize when it no longer meets your needs, though, and not to try to soldier on when the advantages of upgrading outweigh the advantages of sticking with what you know and are used to.

Q I want to install a joystick. How much will it cost and can I get one which doesn't require a degree in computer science to install?

A There are a couple of options open to you. If your sound card has a game port (most of them do), then you could connect to this and it should be detected and installed with no problems (famous last words). The other option is to connect a joystick using USB (Universal Serial Bus). This is only available on newer machines but has the advantage that you can remove it quickly and easily and the drivers tend to be very simple to install. As for the cost, it is basically down to how much you want to spend. Joysticks cost from between £20 at the lower end (you'll be replacing it within a couple of months!) to £90.

QI run a fishing club and I would like to produce a newsletter for it. Can you suggest a package we could use?

A Provided your machine is a Pentium class PC and you have a great deal of hard disk space, I would recommend Microsoft Publisher. It is ideal for your needs, has the advantage of being very easy to use and is relatively inexpensive. A more professional package would be Adobe PageMaker or Quark Express but these are very expensive and you'd be unlikely to use their full functionality.