computer research... round two...

[BlueStarLizzard]

so, i may break down and get something other then a mac.

 

thus...

which is better, Vista or Win 7?

processor? i was looking at gateway and dell, and theirs a bunch of diffrent processors.. should i just look at speed or is one particularly better then another?

so far, the gates to hell are looking like the better option. cheaper with more options and more stuff overall.

[AJ Dual]

Win 7 by a mile. It's not even funny how much better/less resource hogging/stable it is than Vista.

Processor? If this is going to be mainly an internet/email machine, light gaming, no 3D FPS games etc. Most anything will do, as long as it's not some micro low power processor like the Intel Atom that's often found in netbooks.  I'd worry more about spending money on RAM and HDD space.

Generally when spec'ing systems with Dell's menus on their websites, If a better processor is just $50 more, I get it, if it's $100 more I spend that money on the RAM, HDD, or video card instead.

Dell is generally decent. My inspirion "cheap" (for four years ago) laptop is still trucking along. Gateway, I've heard no complaints of them, but IIRC didn't they get bought by Dell or somebody? I forget.

As usual with computers, "middle of the road" is better than "high end" was just a year or two ago.  Generally speaking, unless you have some very specific gaming or graphics needs, most anything that's not the bare-bones cheapest will do everything you want with aplomb.

[BrokenPaw]

If your choices are only between Vista and 7, then go with 7.

I used to be a Gateway adherent, way back in the day (even had a cat named "Gateway", because he was white with black cow spots), but I hear more negative stuff about them now than I do about Dell.  My company IT department buys exclusively Dell kit, which may or may not mean anything in particular.

I prefer AMD processors over Intel.  For a long time, there was a heck of a lot more bang for the buck.  I don't know if that's still the case, however.

Avoid buying total top-of-the-line stuff; there's a significant price premium for the "latest and greatest", that is out of proportion with the level of performance increase.

If you're not in a real hurry, one way to get a pretty good deal is to watch woot.com every day until a deal comes up for the type of system you want.  They won't be bleeding-edge, then likely won't be Dell, and often they'll be factory refurbs, but some of the deals are amazing.  Just bought BrokenKid a really nice lappy for $600 that way.

-BP

[AJ Dual]

One thing though, AMD's Athalons in laptops run REALLY hot.

Which is kind of a pain, if you're well.. you know, actually trying to use it on your LAP.   Mrs. Dual's Toshiba with an Athalon 64x in it runs very, very hot. She had to buy an additional cooling base/USB powered fan to use it for any length of time, when using Photoshop or any major Flash content on it. Not a big deal for her, since she bought a rather large 17" screen model and it's more of a semi-portable desktop replacement for her than a true laptop-laptop. But if you were actually trying to surf curled up in bed with it, or on the couch, things might get interesting fast.

[BlueStarLizzard]

if i could afford top of the line, i would be buying a mac.  

i broke down because it seems like you can get a decent pC in the $500/$600 range, compared to the bottem line in mac at $1000.

but i want to make sure, that when i get a hold of the money, i buy the best i can in my price range, and spend the money in the right spots.  

[BlueStarLizzard]

One thing though, AMD's Athalons in laptops run REALLY hot.

Which is kind of a pain, if you're well.. you know, actually trying to use it on your LAP.   Mrs. Dual's Toshiba with an Athalon 64x in it runs very, very hot. She had to buy an additional cooling base/USB powered fan to use it for any length of time, when using Photoshop or any major Flash content on it. Not a big deal for her, since she bought a rather large 17" screen model and it's more of a semi-portable desktop replacement for her than a true laptop-laptop. But if you were actually trying to surf curled up in bed with it, or on the couch, things might get interesting fast.

*chuckle* my mac would get insane hot sometimes (usually in the summer when i was running sims, itunes and 50 million other things)

i would raid the fridge for frozen peas and set it on the hot spot for a bit. 

[AZRedhawk44]

AJ's spot-on.  Start with a $600 online special and do the following until you run out of money you're willing to spend, or reach all your performance goals:

Get at least 2GB of RAM, but preferably 4GB.

If you get 4GB, then make certain you get the Windows 7 64-bit version of the operating system.

Get a bigger or faster hard drive.  Laptop drives are typically 5400RPM.  If you can get a 7200RPM drive that is larger than your current one, for an acceptable upgrade price, you'll notice the performance difference.

Upgrade the CPU just a skosh.

Mobility upgrades:  Higher quality wi-fi card, or a modem (if you think you need one), or some other connectivity upgrade.  I wish my netbook had bluetooth.

[BlueStarLizzard]

question, dell has a option for a wireless card with a built in router (its like $40 added to price)

what is that and how would i use it?

[Bogie]

Uh... Stupid question time here...
 
1) What are you planning on using this gizmo for? Editing video? Lots of Photoshop? CAD renderings? Hard core gaming?
 
Or Teh Interwebz, with occasional video viewing, etc?
 
Or are you looking for something that'll do some internet browsing, forum stuff, a bit of word processing, etc?
 
2) What is your budget? What percentage of that budget are you willing to push toward "having the latest and greatest, which will be worth a third of the price in a year?"
 
I've bought $120 (delivered) systems that have worked great in business environments - I think the last one was a P4 with two gigs, a legal install of Mickeysoft Orifice 2003 or whatever it is, and Windows XP Pro...
 
Which leaves a LOT of money to fix the bandwidth bottleneck - and the computer is still faster than the data stream.
 
But if you're buying a new system, get Windows 7... And a lot of RAM and hard drive.
 

[sanglant]

if you do anything that would benefit from it, amd has a 6 core processor out now.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103851 2.8
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103849 3.2

[BlueStarLizzard]

mostly the basic computing, but i really really like Sims. so i want something that can handle Sims 2 and hope hope hope Sims 3.

i already know i want a nice size memory, becuase i like collecting music on my computer.

[Phantom Warrior]

question, dell has a option for a wireless card with a built in router (its like $40 added to price)

what is that and how would i use it?

I'm not exactly sure what you mean by this.  Can you post a model number or something?  Skimming Dell's website it probably means they are offering to sell you a wireless router in addition to the laptop.  You can hook the wireless router up to your Internet connection and then access it wirelessly from the laptop.

Any laptop with a basic 802.11g wireless card can access wireless Internet in a coffee shop or something. 

Regarding hard drive space I would recommend 150-250 gigabytes (GB) unless you have a TON of songs (multiple thousands) or are planning to to start collecting movies on your hard drive.  For the average music user a normal sized hard drive is fine.  You don't need to get a 500 GB or 1TB hard drive.  For perspective, my ~1200 song mp3 collection is 5 GB.

[BlueStarLizzard]

my music is about 2000 and keeps growing.

and yes, now that i look at it again, you seem to be correct. basically it would be a waste of $40

[lee n. field]

which is better, Vista or Win 7?

Win 7.

At this point in time I'd get 64 bit, to be able to beat the 4GB RAM barrier when necessary.

Budget extra cpu and ram for your antivirus.   

Gateway, I've heard no complaints of them, but IIRC didn't they get bought by Dell or somebody? I forget.

Part of Acer, I'm pretty sure.

question, dell has a option for a wireless card with a built in router (its like $40 added to price)

Huh?  Does not compute.

[roo_ster]

Can you install your own operating system?

If so, business laptops off-lease or refurbished are great bang/buck.

[sanglant]

250 GB 45bucks
320 GB 48
500 GB 56
750 GB 70
   1 TB 75

i really can't see a reason to buy less than 500GBs and with the bigger drive you can set your partitions to leave the end of the drive as a media partition and speed up disk access. as in partitioning a 1TB drive to 300GB or so and leaving the rest or the drive blank.(or putting a partition for stuff you don't access very often)

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/short-stroking-hdd,2157.html

[geronimotwo]

while we are taliking computers, is there a link that explains how the different components and speeds interact/equate.  ie memory speed,  frontside bus, processor cache, dedicated/onboard graphics.  i would like to find a desktop able to download movies without glitches.

[Bogie]

i already know i want a nice size memory, becuase i like collecting music on my computer.

"memory" is different from "hard drive space."
 
You can buy HUGE external hard drives, which is what I'd recommend.
 
Because you also want to use it as a backup.
 
I think I paid $600 for the Duo machine I'm running now. Added RAM up to four gigs, and I've got a coupla-three terabytes of hard drive space. Have a LOT of music...
 

[AZRedhawk44]

Can you install your own operating system?

If so, business laptops off-lease or refurbished are great bang/buck.

250 GB 45bucks
320 GB 48
500 GB 56
750 GB 70
   1 TB 75

i really can't see a reason to buy less than 500GBs and with the bigger drive you can set your partitions to leave the end of the drive as a media partition and speed up disk access. as in partitioning a 1TB drive to 300GB or so and leaving the rest or the drive blank.(or putting a partition for stuff you don't access very often)

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/short-stroking-hdd,2157.html

while we are taliking computers, is there a link that explains how the different components and speeds interact/equate.  ie memory speed,  frontside bus, processor cache, dedicated/onboard graphics.  i would like to find a desktop able to download movies without glitches.

Come on, guys.  Don't scare the Mac user away from our platform.

Just help her get a decent, inexpensive laptop.  She can learn the other stuff after she comes back to the adult side of the keyboard.

[Balog]

I'll second getting an external hard drive. You can get a 2T for like $130ish bucks these days. Why pay way more for way less just so it's internal to the lappy?

I'd also suggest looking at ubuntu. I'm not a technical computer person by any stretch but I managed to install and use it with no problems. And the $ saved on an OS can upgrade ye olde components a lot.

[BlueStarLizzard]

Come on, guys.  Don't scare the Mac user away from our platform.

Just help her get a decent, inexpensive laptop.  She can learn the other stuff after she comes back to the adult side of the keyboard.

 

[BrokenPaw]

BSL,

Either AZ's just joshing, or he's being a reprobate and deserves a thumping.  Either way, don't let it get to you.

I'm a software engineer of 16 years' experience.  I started with an original IBM PC, and DOS 2.0, back in '84.  Since then, I've used every flavor of DOS and Windows, and a relatively broad selection of the flavors of Unix (SunOS 4.1.x, Solaris, HPUX, AIX, BSD), VMS, a goodly number of Linux flavors, and MacOS. 

I can tell you unequivocally (and notwithstanding the opinions of others), that the absolute best computer out there to get is:  the one that gets the job done best for you.

BrokenMa's Windows lappy died, and she decided she wanted a Mac.  I got her one, and I liked it enough that I had a serious jones for one for about a week.  Then I realized that some of the features that I absolutely require to do my work...simply weren't there, and could not be made to be there.  So the Mac is the wrong computer for me.  I use a combo of Linux and Windows at work.  I have a Windows laptop at home, with Linux virtual machines running in.  The servers in my home are all Linux. 

Different computers and different operating systems for different people and different purposes.  Figure out what works for you, and ignore anyone who scoffs at you for your choice.

[BlueStarLizzard]

thank you, brokenpaw.

i am not a computer person. i am a competent user of computers. thats it. i don't like trying to remember numbers and have a hard time understanding technical terms. some of this goes for guns too. i barely remember NATO round designations, much less all the model numbers for Glocks and thats with something i actually really do want to be able to rattle off without resorting to looking it up.

when it comes to computers, i really don't care about remembering this stuff beyond actually getting a new computer. thats why i came here, to ask. i don't want to get something and then find out i got the wrong thing. i want to be able to go to the store and, if i happen to see a neat game i actually want to be able to buy it without worrying that i don't have the system for it. thats the real reason i'm asking so many questions. for the basic run-of-the mill crap i do, the 300 doller wonder will mostly suffice, but for me 300 is a lot of money and i'd rather actually spend more money to ensure that i have something that will last for several years and will be able to handle odd jobs that i might really want to do, then spend 300 now and find out in 6 or 7 months, that i got something i don't really want and be 300 short of what i could have.

at the same time, i don't want to spend money on some bit that i won't use, and i want to have an idea now of how much money i need to aquaire to get what i want.

alright, i have more to add, but APS keeps doing this weird thing that makes it hard to type past a certain point so i will continue in another post.

[AZRedhawk44]

Sorry, BSL.  

Either AZ's just joshing, or he's being a reprobate and deserves a thumping.  Either way, don't let it get to you.

A little of both.  I'm a reprobate at heart.

I loathe the Mac Cult and worked inside the pericardium of its rotting heart for about 5 years... in an upper middle class school district that oozed Macitis.

The simple facts of the environment were:
-All elementary schools were 100% macintosh.
-All junior highs were predominantly macintosh, with about 10% PC's for a handful of specific laboratory tasks in robotics labs.
-All high schools were predominantly PC, with the exception of:
*special education
*graphics labs

There were NO programming courses for Macs.  There were 6 different programming languages with 3 levels of coursework each, for PC's.  

One of the graphics labs committed the incorrigible sin of wanting to change to PC.  They were told the software didn't exist, that the software costs would be too high, the support infrastructure in the district couldn't handle it, and a host of other mistruths.

Simply put, the MacHeads wanted job protection and if the per capita machine count of their systems dropped, they would lose staff (since none of them knew anything about supporting a professional computer environment consisting of enterprise grade server systems).

That teacher actually got his way after awhile.  His classroom efficiency increased, and even found new software to augment his lab's capabilities that was not available on Mac.

So, in an environment with ~10,000 computers, the primary Mac users were either unsophisticated (non-programmers), young (K-8) or mentally handicapped (special education in high school).

Add to that:  The MacHeads, when a new paper-pusher would arrive at the district, would lobby like mad to get that person on a Mac instead of a PC.  The software load of a typical paper-pusher involved:
-Data input via AS-400 telnet terminal (wimpy-easy program that is a command line interface)
-Email client software
-MS Office
-Web browser

This can be done with a PC to meet the goals of the business for ~$750, or with a Mac for ~$1250, back then.

I'm a software engineer of 16 years' experience.  I started with an original IBM PC, and DOS 2.0, back in '84.  Since then, I've used every flavor of DOS and Windows, and a relatively broad selection of the flavors of Unix (SunOS 4.1.x, Solaris, HPUX, AIX, BSD), VMS, a goodly number of Linux flavors, and MacOS.  

I'm also a software engineer, been doing it for about 2 years now after about 10 years in network administration and engineering and light code hacking/tweaking.  I've written software for many different environments... and I've supported the end user desktop of many OS's, including even an LTSP Linux lab of thin clients, along with hundreds of PC's and Macs.

I'll admit to taking a pot-shot at the MacCult any time I can.  From my experiences with the platform and OS, they have earned the criticisms.  The uninformed should be better educated in regards to computers (cost versus performance, the power of the right click, the real story on software available for both platforms, hardware design that deliberately damages components, the list goes on).  The cultists should be... something.  Sterilized, euthanized, hydrolized, catalyzed and pasteurized would be a good process IMO.  Run out of schools for wasting taxpayer money would be a good starting point.

[Balog]

Picking up *random new game is going to require a heck of a lot more powerful system than email+forum+youtube. Not saying that is wrong, just noting that as a capability you will need to be prepared to pay for.

The barebones kits from someplace like Tiger Direct are often good deals. They are fairly simple to put together, cheap to have someone else put together, and if you have friends with minimal computer building knowledge you can prolly get it slapped together for a nice dinner or something. That would also be your best bet for getting a gaming capable system at a lower budget point.