OT - Looking for a new computer

[kerensky]

Okay so now that I have a job, I decided it's time to get a new computer. My old one is a Compaq (or as we call them in my house "Comjunks"). I was wondering if anyone had any good suggestions as to a good brand of conmputer to get.

[Fyron]

I'd recommend the kerensky brand. Build your own and get a better computer and spend probably half as much money. Building a computer is a fairly simple procedure these days, once you get all of the parts you need.

[kerensky]

Well, that is what my computer is now. What I really want is to get a new case. My curretn one has hardware issues and runs at 733megs, has 198 megs of memory, and in general only works when it wants to.

[Suicide Junkie]

Are you sure its the hardware?
It might just need some dusting. Pull stuff out, clean it, and reseat it nice and snug.

And if you're using windows, you probably need to format and reinstall it. A typical install of windows ages about as fast as fruit left sitting on the kitchen table. Go for a nice, relatively efficient 98(se) or 2k instead of the other bloated gunk they're pushing these days.

Make a disk image of your clean install for future use in restoring it to working condition, and partition off a section of drive for your personal files so they don't die when windows does.

[Thermodyne]

Dell will give you the most bang for the buck. Building your own would allow you to custom fit it to your specific needs. But unless you are going ultra high end, it will cost more than a dell of the same speed.

733 is slow by the standards of today, 2.8 GHz being the minimum for an office system at the moment. 3.2GHz is about the minimum for a gaming system. If you like AMD then substitute the performance rating for GHz and you will be close. If you build your own, AMD will give you a little more performance for the buck spent.

What are you looking to do with the system?

[Suicide Junkie]

For an office system, you don't need more than 400Mhz, win95, and 64 megs of ram for smooth operation.

Presuming, of course, that you don't lump in gaming above solitare in "office work". And of course, since SE4 runs fine on that system, it is sufficient for a gaming rig as well.

With a decent video card, win98, 700Mhz and a bit more ram, its also good for SE5, and thus is good as a gaming rig well into the next 5 years.

[Thermodyne]

Suicide Junkie said:
For an office system, you don't need more than 400Mhz, win95, and 64 megs of ram for smooth operation.

Presuming, of course, that you don't lump in gaming above solitare in "office work". And of course, since SE4 runs fine on that system, it is sufficient for a gaming rig as well.

With a decent video card, win98, 700Mhz and a bit more ram, its also good for SE5, and thus is good as a gaming rig well into the next 5 years.



Not so my friend. Just got done with an office03 deployment to 600 systems. A) It won’t run on 9x. And since 9x is not getting any new security patches it is no longer considered secure. B) The legacy 2K systems which are 733/128, 1.4GHz/128, and 1.8GHz/128 are not reliable in day to day use with office03. The problem is with the onboard video grabbing a large piece of system ram. This does not leave enough for the users to run multiple windows and carry the load from the AV/Firewall/Antispyware package. We had a mix of Office 97, 2000, XP and 03, and were having all kinds of security issues with access and excel on shared resources. Now we only have XP and 03, but there are still security issues, just not so many as before. We no longer have any 9x systems with the exception of a couple of systems used by blind users, and this is only because of a snafu with the way we were ordering adaptive workstation. We were not letting enough venders bid on them according to the purchasing rules. As soon as these systems are gone, WINs and NetBIOS goes away with them. NetBIOS is required by 9x, but is also no longer considered secure. The minimum system we order now is 2.8GHz with 512megs of ram. I just got the CADD specs for the next year, 3.2GHz, 2Gig’s of Ram and a 256meg Quadro/Fire class Vid card.

From an administration point of view, 98 is a resource hog and a security nightmare. They can’t be administered from the datacenter with GP, and we no longer have to bodies to send out to each system. Users/and malicious third parties can’t be restricted from installing software on them. And anyone can log on locally. This makes 9x worthless in any office that has any proprietary data on their systems. Realistically, a 9x box is nothing more than a glorified typewriter in a modern office.

[Suicide Junkie]

"Just got done with an office03 deployment to 600 systems."

Office 2003? Have there been ANY useful improvements to word and excel since they were numbered by version instead of by year? Not really...

[Thermodyne]

Way to many to list actually. 03 is by far more secure. Access and Excel are much improved and a week with Outlook 03 and you'll never want to go back to an older version. Take a look at the Office 03 web site.

[kerensky]

The computer doesn't need dusting, it just doesn't work right. I use my computer for just about everything from gaming to office programs, so it does need to be pretty versatile. I have looked at dells and did like them, but some of my friends said that they aren't very good. i've never had one so I don't know anything about them.

[Thermodyne]

We have about 400 of them. The SX260's are't very good. But the SX 280's are great and the GX series are really good. When you log onto the Dell site, go to the small business page.

[Atrocities]

FOR SALE:

P75
350 meg HD
2 meg video card (Non 3d accelerated)
14.4 data/fax modeum
16 bit sound card
4 megs Ram
Floppy
Quad speed CDROM
Windows 95

I only want the punny sum of $1700.00 for it.

[Baron Munchausen]

Atrocities said:
FOR SALE:

P75
350 meg HD
2 meg video card (Non 3d accelerated)
14.4 data/fax modeum
16 bit sound card
4 megs Ram
Floppy
Quad speed CDROM
Windows 95

I only want the punny sum of $1700.00 for it.



My god... the oldest/slowest computer I've got is a P180 MMX, with a 1.2 GB HD and an 8 Meg video card (Matrox Millenium 2 which used to cost $300! I got it for $13 on eBay! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif ) And it has 80 Megs of RAM, too. Don't have to bother with an internal modem, got a USR Sportster V.90 external (which I am using to type this message). Got a 4-CD 'switcher' rather than a single drive. I does have a 1.44 Mb floppy and the soundcard is an 16-bit ISA Creative SoundBlaster, though.

[Thermodyne]

That's not a computer, it's hasmat. I just gave away an xp3000 system to make my wife happy.

[Fyron]

Thermodyne said:
Dell will give you the most bang for the buck. Building your own would allow you to custom fit it to your specific needs. But unless you are going ultra high end, it will cost more than a dell of the same speed.

I disagree. Every system I have custom built for the last 3 years, including many on the low end, has cost less than half of equivalent Dell PCs. I always bring a Dell catalogue to computer fairs for a good laugh.

[Thermodyne]

Cataloge price includes software, pull that off and you'll get a lower price. I never push consumer lines from anyone, always go to the business part of the site.

[Kamog]

Only $1700 for all that? What a deal! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

[Thermodyne]

Building a system is not that hard. But you need to be good at it if you are building your main rig. There are always unexpected things that pop up. And mistakes can cost money!

[Kamog]

I don't know why, but Compaq computers seem to crash a lot more often then other brands even when they are running the same operating system and the same programs. A couple of my coworkers have Compaqs and they are constantly getting blue screens of death, start-up problems, and crashes. What is it that's different about them?

[Atrocities]

Compq, HP, Del, Gateway, IBM, etc - made in Mexico by slave wage employees with parts made in Chine by captive no paid imprissioned slaved labor = cheap computers that often fail within days of their one year warrenty. Gotta love it.

[ToddT]

Gee i guess my TRS-8 color computer 2 with 64k ram and an external 300bps modem and 16k 51/2 floppy, must be worth more than 1700.

[Thermodyne]

I've got a dell 530 dually workstation that has been going 24/7 for almost 5 years. I had one of the IDE hard drives fail at a litle short of 3 years. But other than that it has been great. I switched it to SCSI 160's a few months ago. The 160's are second tier now and I got 5 36gig 10k drives $175 http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Buy a cheap system....Get a cheap system. You will seldom get more than you pay for.

[Jack Simth]

You can also go on E-bay and search for misspellings of computer brands/parts; e.g., Compaq: Compack, Kompaq, Kompack. in the appropriet categories. Few people search on misspellings, so those that have them tend not to be bid on. Of course, it's a little bit of a gamble - you don't really know what condition the items are in, or what, precisely, they truly are, but it's an option.

Edit: Ah! Compac is doing pretty decent at the moment.

[Glyn]

Atrocities said:
FOR SALE:

P75
350 meg HD
2 meg video card (Non 3d accelerated)
14.4 data/fax modeum
16 bit sound card
4 megs Ram
Floppy
Quad speed CDROM
Windows 95

I only want the punny sum of $1700.00 for it.




Will you take 200 minerals, 0 organics & 20 radicals?

[Caduceus]

I bought a few books, read a lot on the internet, and built a AMD 3700+ system from the ground up with quality components for about $1400. (Which I know is too much for a lot of people around here.)

I wanted quality parts which had warranties and built it in a quality case - Antec P160 (http://www.antec.com/us/productDetails.php?ProdID=81600)
1 gig of RAM
Radeon X800 XL
DVD+R
On-board sound with an Asus Motherboard (http://usa.asus.com/products/mb/socket939/a8n-e/overview.htm)
WinXP Pro SP2
Zalman fan

I had to replace my Compaq, purchased in 1999, 700 Mhz <256megs of RAM, Win98. It was starting to have recurrent errors that we couldn't solve.

Overall the build went smoothly and I had noone standing over my shoulder helping. A great learning experience for me.