You need to change your Windows Defaults. This option is found in the Control Panel. You can choose which program to open files with by default. It sounds to me like all your files have a Windows Media Player Default setting on.
This depends on how you want to "connect" them. If you install and configure Samba on the laptop, it can share files with Windows. If you are not interested in sharing files, but just want to control the laptop from within Windows, install an SSH server on the laptop, and connect to it from Windows using puTTY.
Windows laptop computer refers to the operating system in the computer. This operating system is where your virtual memory, task, and files are stored.
Windows does not allow files with the same name to exist in the same folder. In order to make a copy of a file on the laptop, you select the file and choose Cut. If the files have the same name, but one is newer than the other, the new file will automatically overwrite the older file. If the files are exactly the same and have the same modification dates, Windows will not prompt you about replacing the file.
No. The disk that came with the Dell laptop does not contain all the files that a full Windows XP installation disk comes with. Instead it will contain the files needed to install Windows XP on your Dell laptop. As Windows XP installs it will detect the hardware that your computer is constructed from (including the motherboard and processor) and install files that are specifically for that hardware. Your HP computer will have different hardware to the Dell, so the installation that is suitable for the Dell will not work properly on the HP.
Well, rebooting is the same as restarting, so you will not lose your files (its like shutting down and switching the laptop on again). If you mean it in the sense of installing a clean copy of Windows or whatever, yes it will (that ususally isn't called rebooting).
With Windows Live Cloud Computing, you can access your files wherever you are because the files aren't on your computer's hard drive. They are stored at Microsoft's secure server. If you are on a business trip, you can retrieve files that you created on your home computer. Even if you don't have a laptop with you, you can access your files from someone else's computer or from your smart phone.
You can connect the laptop hard drive directly to your desktop and get your files back.
It depends what you are doing with the laptop, but in general, I would say no if you are going to be sharing files and such on a network. Look into Windows XP Embedded -- a stripped down version of XP. This is not a difinitive answer, though. I'd need more information for that.
You can get a contagious files off your laptop either by deleting it ir installing an antivirus.
The program used to store files on windows is called: Windows Explorer.
The boot files are in C://Windows/system32
my opinion back up important files then format the laptop, install a fresh Operating system such as xp, vista, windows 7 even Linux which ever you prefer. if you do not know how to do this then Google it there are many tutorials out there.