It was made by HP, which according to this report has the lowest reliability of any of the main manufacturers. And having had another replace-the-motherboard level of failure earlier this year was a) not happy and b) not prepared to go through that process again.
So CC in hand splashed out on a new one (not from HP) and spent the last few days transferring the data across and re-loading programs.
And under a pile of archived CDs and DVDs found an old copy of Virtual Skipper, namely version 2. So loaded it up and had fun thrashing a couple of simulated ACC boats.
I wonder if there is an upgrade path to the most recent?