Any Computer TecH PEOPLE Here?

Valve Replacement Forums

Help Support Valve Replacement Forums:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

lcwhitney

Well-known member
Joined
Oct 10, 2002
Messages
440
Location
louisiana
I will be buying A new computer soon. Are there any computer tech people here who can help me decide what type computer to buy?When you start talking about GHZ AND RAM I'M lost.HELP! PLEASE SOMEONE
lETTITIA:confused: :confused
 
I'm not a computer tech, but I have got along well going to Office Depot and buying a computer off the shelf. They, or any other store, has someone to help you make the choice. I have been satisfied with the cheapest one they sell. This last time I bought one a step or two higher, and I haven't been disappointed. That was last July, and I am still waiting for the rebate check on it.
 
I am a computer tech but based in Australia so anything i recomend won't take into account US retail stores.

You need to ask yourself what you want to use the computer for, if you just want to browse the internet and use your ipod software then almost any computer will do....perhaps if you post what you want to do with the computer we could give you some examples to compare with local stores.

I find www.dell.com usually has a range of computers for different 'uses', even if you don't buy from them you can print the computer details from their website and go around the local stores asking for 'one like this'.

Good luck.
 
One word:

Macintosh.

Of course, you may enjoy dealing with viruses, worms, crashes, spyware, and all the other headaches that come with PC's.

In that case, I would recommend a Dell or IBM or any other windows based machine.

If you'd prefer not to deal with any of those headaches, but still run all your favorite software and continue to exchange files, e-mail, etc., with everyone else in the world, and do so in a lot more elegant and fun computing environment, get a Macintosh.

Check out this site for more details: http://www.apple.com/getamac/

.
 
First thing you need to define is what you are planning to use it for. That will help narrow down your requirements (and cost).

I'm quite happy with my middle of the road HP Multi Media machine (m7250n) for what I use it for, which is mainly e-mail (Outlook), internet, MS Office Suite, other desktop publishing (MS Publisher, Print Shop), burning DVD/CD, Quicken, QuickTax, and Photo organizing and imaging (Photoshop Elements 4.0). It has a TV interface so I can use it like a VCR to record programs which is nice to have. Anyway as a benchmark to compare what you might need, it's Dual Core (pretty much the way to go these days) 2.8 GHz. I've upgraded it to 2 GB memory (it came with 1 GB). It came with a 250 GB hardrive and there is a bay to easily add an optional HP portable external hard drive so I got one (150 GB). It has an ATI Radeon x300se graphics card. It has surround sound speaker capability if you are so inclined, which I got, so great for watching DVDs. It has built in card readers for the various memory cards (SD, xD, etc).

It's not so good for the newer high tech games, though, but I'm not an avid gamer so it doesn't matter. If you are, you'd probably need more speed, memory, and a better graphics card than this.

Anyway, for what I use it for these specs seem to work fine. Hope this helps as a starting point for comparison. Happy hunting!
 
I have a Dell laptop. Our computer geek nephew built our desktop. He's working on his thesis for his master's in computer science engineering & design, and the university gave him an allowance (I think $3,500) to buy a desktop to use at school. He ordered a Dell. Don't remember all the specifics, but it has tons of memory.

When my laptop arrived, Ryan tinkered with it, added more memory, took off some factory-installed programs, put on Windows XP Professional, spyware, etc.

Have not had any problems with it. On the other hand, we have had problems with our ISP, Compuserve. Had to uninstall Compuserve & reinstall it once on my laptop.
 
minimum 1G RAM, 80G hard drive

I do computer support, and my recommendation has always been to watch the ads for Circuit City and Best Buy. Office Depot and Staples sometimes have some good deals, too. Unless you're going to do a lot of things like photo/video editing, a basic setup for around $500-$700 will probably do just fine. Any of the name brands is OK -- Toshiba, HP, Compaq, etc. I'm not sure I would buy eMachines.

(Another reason to buy a lower priced computer is that when new stuff comes out in a couple of years, you might not feel so bad about ditching the "old" computer because you didn't spend that much to begin with.)

If you get your internet service through cable or DSL, those companies will provide security packages that include a firewall, virus protection, and spyware protection. You should be pretty secure with that.

The computer packages usually come with a printer. An "all-in-one" (print, scan, copy) is a good choice.

My Mom recently bought a Toshiba laptop ($350) and an HP all-in-one printer ($70), and got wireless DSL for the internet. She loves the whole setup. These items replaced an old (5 years) laptop and dial-up internet.

Happy Computer Hunting!
 
Unless your into photoshop or high content multimedia, just about any computer will be fine. One thing to consider though, if you go PC IBM compatible like you have now, it will come with Windows Vista on it. It's a whole new ball game not at all like what your used too. Plan on a learning curve if this is the case.
 
WayneGM said:
I had one once.....I'd pass. It wasn't very good qualility in my opinion.
I agree here. Gateway has bought Emachines, but they are still the cheapest made things that I've seen and component failure is high with them.
 
Ahhhhh A Person Who Knows What's Good...LOL

Ahhhhh A Person Who Knows What's Good...LOL

StretchL said:
One word:

Macintosh.

Of course, you may enjoy dealing with viruses, worms, crashes, spyware, and all the other headaches that come with PC's.

In that case, I would recommend a Dell or IBM or any other windows based machine.

If you'd prefer not to deal with any of those headaches, but still run all your favorite software and continue to exchange files, e-mail, etc., with everyone else in the world, and do so in a lot more elegant and fun computing environment, get a Macintosh.

Check out this site for more details: http://www.apple.com/getamac/

.

Hey Stretch....Excellent Choice....I have an Apple IMac and I love it.....unfortunately, I do also have to have a PC due to the work that I am doing, but I do find that Apple's are a very stable computer and I really prefer it over my PC....Just thought I would add a little support.....:D :D Harrybaby:D :D
 
StretchL said:
One word:

Macintosh.

Of course, you may enjoy dealing with viruses, worms, crashes, spyware, and all the other headaches that come with PC's.

Man, we've had the valve choice argument, the religion discussion and now you want a mac vs pc thread.....you're a sucker for punishment ;)

I won't chip in with my mac comments to add fuel to the fire..:D
 
Thanks for the help guys. My brother Carson suggested that I go shopping with his friend Kevin. Kevin is the computer Tech person for our local CHASE MANHATTAN offices. They mostly do records storage here.Kevin is incharge of programming and repair of all of the computers here. He is also one of my brother's oldest friends he would never intentionally steer me in the wrong direction.

Lettitia
 
Magic8Ball said:
I won't chip in with my mac comments to add fuel to the fire..:D

Oh I see how you are, well I will then. Give MAC time to become large enough for the virus writers to want to exploit and it will be no safer then a PC. :D
 
StretchL said:
One word:

Macintosh.

Of course, you may enjoy dealing with viruses, worms, crashes, spyware, and all the other headaches that come with PC's.

In that case, I would recommend a Dell or IBM or any other windows based machine.

If you'd prefer not to deal with any of those headaches, but still run all your favorite software and continue to exchange files, e-mail, etc., with everyone else in the world, and do so in a lot more elegant and fun computing environment, get a Macintosh.

Check out this site for more details: http://www.apple.com/getamac/

.

A second word... Profit

Isn't it interesting that Microsoft invested $150 Million US in Apple in 1997 as Apple was dying... why?... Anyone know Apple's current market share of the PC market?

Ross - Don't worry - Apple will never be big enough...

Not being a bigot just being a capitalist. Also interesting to note that all Apple machines were scheduled to ship with Intel chips by EOY 2006.

? If we want to move forward and see Apple healthy and prospering again, we have to let go of a few things here. We have to let go of this notion that for Apple to win, Microsoft has to lose. We have to embrace a notion that for Apple to win, Apple needs to do a really good job. And if others are going to help us that's great, because we need all the help we can get, and if we screw up and don't do a good job, it's not somebody else's fault, it's our fault. So I think that is a very important perspective. If we want Microsoft Office on the Mac, we should treat the company that puts it out with a little bit of gratitude; we like their software.

So, the era of setting this thing up as a competition between Apple and Microsoft is over as far as I'm concerned. This is about getting Apple healthy, this is about Apple being able to make incredibly great contributions to the industry and to get healthy and prosper again.[4] ? - Steve Jobs (Macworld Expo 1997)
 
I agree with David. Apple will never match Microsoft's market penetration for generalized computing. That's a good thing, in my opinion.

(Before I go on, has anyone seen a demo of Apple's reinvention of the phone? It's quite amazing: http://www.apple.com/iphone/phone/ Make sure you click on the icons in the upper right corner of that page to see how it functions as a phone, wireless internet device, camera, etc...)

Now, back to the discussion...

There's little question that Apple dominates the creative side of computing (ie. video, film, music, multimedia, and photo creation and manipulation), as well as the "home entertainment" (ie. iTunes) side of things.

Because of Apple's dominance with regard to these aspects of computing, especially as the lines between televisions, computers, stereos and other home entertainment devices continue to blur, Apple will be the company that will push the envelope and continue to redefine what users expect of a home computer.

While Apple's doing that, Microsoft and Windoze can enjoy the position they have as the operating system that millions of people peck away on for eight hours a day in their millions of florescent-lit cubicles.

Regarding security- The fact is that the security and stability of Apple's operating system far surpasses that of Windoze only partially because of Apple's lack of market penetration.

The other major reason Macs are incredibly secure is because of the design of their Unix operating system, which is based on three levels of user privileges: "User," "Admin" (sort of a superuser but still in the graphical user interface), and "Root" (a superuser working on the actual Unix code level).

Only the Root user, which is password protected and is locked by default when the computer ships, can make changes that effect the entire system. User has the least privileges to change things, but it's on this level that all the applications run. This means that any unauthorized applications or applets (viruses or trojan horses) would also run on this "minimally privileged" level, thus helping protect the computer's operating system.

Bottom line, Macs aren't virus or hacker proof, but they're inherently more secure.

.
 

Latest posts

Back
Top