Yep. I’m gonna take a piece of the nice big signing bonus from the new job and buy a new machine as I will be losing my laptop upon my termination at this job. While I’m not going to just blow my wad and spend thousands of dollars, I am planning on spending $1500 to $2000 to buy a nice machine. This is mainly gonna be used for internet purposes at home, but I also want to have the capability to play strategy games (Railroad Tycoon, SIM games…) and to use Word and Excel whenever I need.
Right now, I’m planning to buy a generic box from a local mail-order company that seems to have a good reputation among friends here in town (Microshack.com). I’m probably gonna go with an Athlon 500mz CPU with 128 megs of RAM. I’m also planning on getting a CD-R device, I’m gonna splurge on the 19 inch monitor, and I’m considering going with DSL from the local phone company.
While I’m fairly adept at using computers, I’m not that technologically saavy with understanding the insides and all of the different options that go into putting a machine together.
Might anyone want to offer some random advice as to brands to look for or to avoid (particularly for peripheral devices), processors, pitfalls, typically overlooked necessities and the like? Might I consider going with a lesser processor? I would be most grateful if you have anything to share. I’m really excited about this, but I want to make sure it’s done right!
Oh - and I forgot to mention that yes, I am aware of CNET and ZDNET and other buyers’ guide services and I have looked there for some advice, too. I just figure I might could stand get some honest answers from my Doper friends as well.
JH it doesn’t matter what computer is recommended there are gonna be opponets of that particular brand. So let me tell what I bought recently and am satisfied with it.
Gateway
64 MB Ram
20 GIGs hardrive
has Gateway Go back installed ( if you do something you don’t like or erase a file you can “Go back” to the previous day and that fixes it.
56K modem
win98SE ( has a shutdown bug in it )
One year on site warranty and 3 years regular warranty
Mouse with scroll wheel
Speakers are pre-amped very nice
I could probably think of some other features but I will stop there.
PRICE? 1600.00
There are people out there that say gateway sucks but mine doesn’t.
This’ll probably be the opposite of the advice everyone else will give you, but: get a Mac.
They’re fun, they’re easy to use, they’re basically as cheap as Wintel boxes, and the speed/power is very comparable. The big benefit is that you’re a hell of a lot safer online; there are only about half a dozen major viruses for Macs. Since everything else is basically even (OK, a comparable Mac is still slightly more expensive, but only just a bit), you get to kick back and ignore all the virus frenzies that hit everyone else.
“I Love You,” anyone? “Melissa”? Couldn’t touch me!
Yeah - my brothers and I bought my Dad an IMAC for Christmas and were pretty pleased with it. He’s 64 years old and decided last Fall that he wanted to get online and I must say that I been very impressed with how quickly he picked up on things. He uses it mainly for email (now he just bitches at me electronically instead of on the telephone ), and checking on his stocks and sports, but I proud of him that’s he making an effort. Of course, I wish I could get him to use a spreadsheet to track his stocks instead of just writing everything down off of the screen onto paper, but that’s no big deal… We bought the IMAC because we figured it would be the easiest way for him and I think we were right.
Unfortunately, while I think that the IMAC is a neat machine, I’m a Wintel kind of guy (and a Chevy truck man), so I don’t think I could get a mac myself.
Mac has a lot of great things going for it, but there’s not as many cool games available for it as there are for the Win platform. However, it does a lot of other equally cool things that make up for it if you have the time and inclination. (Like, say, moviemaking.)
And Macs are drawing attention from the viral world; Virex works nicely.
FWIW, I’ve had several computers, I’ve had factory packages and Frankensteins. I’ve currently got a Mac on one side of the desk, an IBM Aptiva on the other, and a Linux box under the desk I got to get together one of these damn days. (I gotta get a bigger desk)
My only negative experience: well, you’ll regret buying a Compaq.
Good luck to you; new toys are great fun and picking them out is fun too.
The most important thing that I consider when building a new machine (other than current performance) is future upgradability.
You’ll want a motherboard which can support faster processors, more memory, and has plenty of open expansion slots (PCI).
Some motherboards support the new ATA/66 hard drive interface as well as the older ATA/33. This means that you can use newer, faster hard drives to their full capability. Or you could even go SCSI, which is expensive but fast.
I’m not very familiar with Athlon motherboards, but you can check out some reviews at http://www.anandtech.com.
As for graphics and sound, don’t be cheap. You probably want a SoundBlaster Live! of some sort, or a comparable sound card. For video, you’ll probably want one of the new 3dfx Voodoo5 or a card based on the Nvidia GeForce.
This may be overkill now, but it’ll last a while.
I built my machine in August for just about $1000 (not including monitors). Here are my specs:
Abit BP6 Dual socket370 motherboard
Celeron366 running at 558Mhz
256Mb RAM
TNT2 - main video card
Savage4 - secondary video card
SoundBlaster Live! Value
17Gig hard drive
DVD drive
40x CDrom
Well, I used to think it was important that a computer could be upgraded in the future but I learned that in the future all the computers I got it was time for a new case anyway…
Buy from a local store that can make your computer, don’t buy from a mailorder just to save bucks [except on printers or monitors]. Oh, I prefer to buy the store floor models. Why? 1st, they have been on for days so if anything would happen to them it would have already happened 2nd, they are ready to plug in 3rd, I can play with it in the store 4th, they are cheaper.
Nerd - that sounds great. I assume you built the box yourself? I know it’s cheaper to go with components, but I don’t think I know enough to put one together myself (cuz I know it’s a lot more complicated than just plugging everything together).
Few more questions:
If I’m not interested in playing Doom or Flight Sim or other 3d type video needs, would you still recommend a second video card?
Could I stand to go with a K6 or PII or <gasp> Celeron? I’m specifically worried about future obsolescence…
Does anyone have any recommendations about CDR’s? I want to use this machine to make audio CD’s as well…
I won’t make a specific suggestion, because I’ve outfitted a dozen friends, and my choices inevitably contain the implicit assumption that you had someone around who can slap computers together like sandcastles
Yes, that a good thing. Usually.
However, I feel I have to comment on the advice not to buy anything mail-order except printers and monitors.
I do the exact opposite, because laser printers and monitors are so expensive to ship ($30 min; $50 typically) that it cancels out the internet price and convenience advantage, and is a potential disaster: if it arrives broken, or needs warranty work, you have to repack and re-ship the big heavy expensive box. Monitors and printers are also the most likely to have something break in shipping (vs. a loose connector you can snug down under phone guidance).
I just bought a new machine for my job a few weeks ago, and was trying to keep an eye on the future (keep it viable for maybe 3 years instead of two). So I ordered a 733 MHz CPU upgradeable machine with the new 133 MHz bus.
The news is that the 133 MHz bus doesn’t work yet, it has timing problems that crash the machine. After my vendor tried a few things over two weeks (while I acclimated to life on the job with nothing to do) they replaced the motherboard with an 850 MHz Xeon on a 100 MHz bus.
I spoke with the vendor yesterday (they called to see if I’m happy - I am) and they told me the 133 MHz bus has a pretty well established reputation as a dog by now, and it’s not fixed yet.
You’ll have to purchase the folowing seperate if you build one.
1 Case - The power supply sould come with that.
2 Fans for case
3 Floppy drive
4 Motherboard - make sure case and mother board are the same style.
5 Processor
6 Fan heatsink combo if the processor is not retail version
7 Memory get PC133 128MB - You can find it for about the price of PC100.
8 Hard drive
9 Cdrom drive
10 Keyboard
11 Mouse
12 Monitor
15 Video card
16 Sound card
17 Speakers
My added notes. match the numbers.
1 Look for one that blows air directly over the processor. A full tower case will help keep everything cooler.
4 Get a board that has the 66 IDE connectors. The higher the AGP speed the better. 1x, 2x, 4x. Look for a bios set board, or jumperless. It will be much easier to set up. Look at the manufactures Faqs section for that board, if you see a bad trend in the questions asked, get some other board.
5 I like the 500 PIII’s for now. The Alathon have had problems with some system combinations.
7 Memory has no problem running at a slower speed.
8 Get a 66 capable hard drive. It requires a special cable to use the higher speed. A regular IDE cable will run at 33.
9 Monitor 19" min. Look at the max res it can do and frequency.
15 Get a Geforce video card if you can. DRR memory even better, but pricey. TNT2 Ultra card for even cheaper video that is great. Make sure it’s an AGP card, it will run faster than a PCI card.
16 Sound Blaster Live Value card with positional audio.
17 Get positional sound speakers, thats 4 speakers and a subwoofer. Don’t buy to low end a set.
Just to clarify, I didn’t recommend a second video card. I happen to have one, because I run two monitors. If you never ever plan to run 3d applications, then you can go with a cheaper video card. But generally, those are cheap not only in lacking 3d features, but also in general driver quality. It’s up to you.
And putting together a box isn’t all that much more complicated than plugging everything together. It’s that and setting some stuff in the BIOS and installing an OS. If you despise troubleshooting, pay the extra money to have someone else build it. My roommate chose all his components then told the shop to build it. He’s been happy with the results.
Phobia makes good points. I forget that not everyone has spare floppy drive, keyboard, mouse and monitors lying around.
I hate to say it, but I have spare of most things laying around. I can usually grab something at home, and run over to a friends to fix their computer.
I just wanted to point out all the little things, that might be forgotten, and that add up to a fair amount.
Also you might need to buy:
1 Operating system. The seller of the mother board and processor can probaly sell you an OEM version for half of what the retail version costs.
2 Printer and cable.
3 Surge protector or better an uninteruptable power supply (UPS).
4 A cable modem will need a Lan card, but the company that installs the cable modem will probaly install that too. That gives you a permanent internet address also, so be sure to run a software firewall like Zone Alarm.
Just a few observations on the local vs mail order thing…we (when my Ex was still around) bought 3 Gateways. Overall, the experience was pretty good. (Yeah, the tech support has been spotty; it all depends in who you get.)
BUT when something craps out, it’s a pain getting repairs done. They’re fast, but no matter what, you have the shipping hassle and time to contend with.
Just a minor horror story: the video conked on my 2000 Solo laptop, so I packaged it up and sent it off–after futiley hunting for the original box, cussing over bubble wrap, etc. They fixed it very quickly, and shipped it back w/in a week.
That’s the GOOD news. The bad news was they sent it UPS and the bozos just left it sitting on my back porch. No lie: a few grand worth of computer, just plonked down in view of every light-fingered passerby.
It was okay; it was there when I got home–but that experience alone has dissuaded me from any more mail order purchases.
If you choose to go with the mail-order computer, make sure to look at brands other than Dell, Gateway, and Micron.
When I was ready to buy, I got this big magazine (Computer Shopper?) and read the ads. I called the big three, and then I called a few others.
I bought from a lesser known company (Quantex) for a couple of reasons. First, it was a local company, and I like to support businesses in my area. Second, the computer I got was also cheaper than the ones from Dell, Gateway, and Micron. I have had it for a year and a half and have had no problems at all.
I haven’t been keeping up with much in the computer world lately, so in this post (which is completely free of subliminal messages of all kinds) I am not going to give you any advice. Any advice that I could give you, you’d probably end buy a mac up not taking, anyway. I’m not even buy a mac sure why I put this post (which I’d just like to reiterate contains no subliminal messages whatsoever) here in the buy a mac first place, but here it is. In short, don’t listen to me, or anyone buy a mac else, just go with what you think is right. I’m confident you’ll make the right choice.
P.S. My ambition right now is to save up some money and get a Macintosh G4. Yeah, I’m kinda setting my sights high, moneywise, but I think I could be satisfied with one of those for a long time. Not that this has any bearing on your question, or anything, I just thought I’d say that.
), and checking on his stocks and sports, but I proud of him that’s he making an effort. Of course, I wish I could get him to use a spreadsheet to track his stocks instead of just writing everything down off of the screen onto paper, but that’s no big deal… We bought the IMAC because we figured it would be the easiest way for him and I think we were right.