Need last minute hand holding on purchase of new comp.

In My Humble Opinion
1

Ok, my family insists on getting a Dell so I cried Uncle. I’m a huge pc gamer so went top of the line graphicsl, I think. How does this system look? Am I overkilling or underkilling somewhere? Does it make sense to buy the monitor from Dell or some place on Pricewatch or something?

Base Unit:
Dimension 8250 Series, Intel Pentium 4 Processor at 3.06GHz (221-1306)

Memory:
512MB PC1066 RDRAM (311-2132)

Keyboard:
Dell Quiet Key Keyboard (310-1582)

Monitor:
19 in (17.9 in viewable, .24-.25AG) P992,FD Trinitron Monitor (320-7897)

Video Card:
128MB DDR ATI Radeon 9700 TX with TV-Out and DVI for Dimension Systems (320-0555)

Hard Drive:
120GB Ultra ATA/100 Hard Drive(7200RPM) (461-8842)

Floppy Disk Drive:
3.5in Floppy Drive (340-1927)

Operating System:
Dell Application Back-up CD, Factory Install (313-7222)

Operating System:
Dell Support 2.0 for Dimension8250 (412-0304)

Operating System:
Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition,Service Park 1,English (420-1921)

Mouse:
Logitech Optical USB Mouse (310-1413)

NIC:
Intel Pro 100M Integrated PCI NIC Card (430-0412)

Modem:
56K PCI Telephony Modem for Windows (313-1583)

CD-ROM or DVD-ROM Drive:
16X DVD-Rom Drive (313-2559)

CD-ROM or DVD-ROM Drive:
Cyberlink Software Decoding for DVD Drives with six channels (430-0427)

Sound Card:
Turtle Beach Santa Cruz DSP, Sound Card (313-5203)

Speakers:
Harman/Kardon Speakers,HK-695 (313-1487)

Bundled Software:
MS Worksuite 2002,CD with Documentation,OEM,US,English Dimension (412-0133)

Factory Installed Software:
Symantec Norton Antivirus 2002OEM Package,English,90 Day Trial Version (412-0259)

Feature
MusicMatch 7.1x Basic (412-0298)

Feature
Dell Picture Studio Image Expert Standard,Dimension (412-0271)

Feature
Dell Picture Studio Paint ShopPro Try and Buy,Dimension (412-0273)

Service:
Type 3- Third Party At Home Service, 24x7 Technical Support, Initial Year (950-4270)

Service:
Type 3 Contract - Next Business Day Parts and Labor On-Site Response, 3YR Extended (900-2933)

Service:
4 Year Limited Warranty (950-7447)

Service:
$70 DELL MAIL-IN SERVICE REBATE Rebate#36226. Redeem afte r purchase. Redemption form atwww.dell4me.com/rebates. (960-7548)

Misc:
40X/10X/40X CD-RW Drive (461-7876)

Misc:
AOL 7.0 Factory Install for US DHS (412-0279)

Misc:
AOL 7.0 Buddy Rom (412-0287)

TOTAL QUOTE AMOUNT: $3,097.58

2

That looks like a pretty top of the line (and expensive) system. If money is no object then knock yourself out. I would never pay more than $1500 or so for a computer myself but that is because I always look a couple of notches down from the top of the line to find the sweet spot in pricing. The only things that I could see that you could do to make it even more top of the line is to increase the RAM to a gigabyte and include a DVD writer too.

3

Whatever you decide to go with, I urge you not to look at ANY computer ads for the next six months. Inevitably you will see a system that’s twice as good selling for half of what you paid - no matter what you get.

4

Where do you think the sweetspot is in terms of processors?

5

Generally its the stuff just one generation older than what’s new.

6

I’m thinking maybe I should move down to 2.8 for that reason. Unfortunately I can’t get through to the dell website because they have a good special that ends tonight.

7

dell is charging like $1000 for an upgrade from a P4 2.4 to a P4 3.06…
come on that is crazy…
if you HAVE to get a dell…
get the 2.4,
and maybe at a later date, order an upgrade if you really need it.

I would also buy more RAM, but from somewhere else…

8

That is the right move. I would get the 2.6 or 2.7 myself. More RAM, either through buying it yourself or Dell is key.

SO I would say step down the processor and step up the RAM. I added extra to get to 768. Speedy!

9

I bought the equivalent of your system last summer. At the time, it was a 2.53 Ghz processor, not a 3.06. Mr. Athena was looking at your exact system last night. Yeah, the biggest place to save money if that’s what you’re looking for is to drop down to the 2.4 - 2.7 Ghz processor. You probably won’t see much of a difference speed wise for most gaming - either processor is very much top of the line.

My system is :

2.53 Ghz Processor
1 Gig RAM
Ti4600 128K Graphics card (the ATI wasn’t out at the time, and right now the 9700 and the Ti4600 seem to be duking it out over which is the best)
120 Gig hard drive
Turtle Beach sound card

It’s a screamin’ gaming machine, running everything very, very fast. Yours will be even better. If you can afford it, go for the 3.06 Ghz processor - forget the naysayers, sometimes you just want top of the line regardless of cost! But if you have to choose between RAM and processor speed, go for the RAM.

10

Athena do you have any compatibility issues with that sound card because I’ve never heard of it until today?

11

Im also thinking about bumping the monitor up to 21 inches. Would the difference in ram be noticeable yet or is it just for down the road?

12

I can’t speak for that specific sound card, but the Turtle Beach company is generally very highly regarded. I wouldn’t worry about it.

13

My brother always says to spend as much on the monitor as you can because it is the part you use the most.

If I had three grand to spend I probably wouldn’t get that powerful a system but that’s just me.

Heck I’d buy a 1200 dollar computer and be happy.

I own a Pent II 266 with 40 megs of ram and a 2 gig hard drive so you system sounds like something from Star Trek to me.

14

I would advise against maxing out on HD space or RAM, unless you are getting a special deal, you REALLY SUPER-DE-DUPER WANT IT NOW!!!, or something like that. You can most likely get a better deal on more RAM or a larger hard disk if you don’t buy it from Dell.

15

$ 3000.00+ That’s nuts!

Clutch it down to a 2.4 or 2.8 CPU. You will not notice the difference and you’ll have $ 1,000 - 1,300 back in your pocket for other toys.

16

No cdrw? What are you going to use for backup?

This is a little better:
Powerful Desktop deal: Dimension 4550 P4-2.4Ghz (Faster 533Mhz bus) Free upgrade to 256MB DDR Memory/30GB CD ATI video card, XP Home MS Works $549 - 5% coupon = $521 shipped free. All discounts appear in My cart screen.

4550 P4-2Ghz version is $509 - 5% coupon = $483.

Select Desktops, Choose Dimension, Customize It 4550, 2.4Ghz/XP Home/Basic Audio - Continue, 128MB/1yr warranty/Works/No monitor/No Speaker - Continue, Add to cart, apply coupon
Coupons: techbargains.com

BTW, Dell has a huge 20" lcd monitor for:
Dell Biz: Dell 2000fp 20in LCD $759 shipped w/ $400 drop + 24% off, Last day.

yumm.

17

I’ll join the chorus of telling you not to get the 3 GHz cpu. A 2.5 GHz cpu will be indistinguishable in gaming performance – it’s worth the (sizeable) savings.

Also, search around for monitors on the web. (Try http://www.newegg.com, for example.) The only reason to get the Dell monitor is if the whole system is black and you want it to match. Otherwise, there’s no advantage to getting their monitor. Same goes for extra RAM or HD – both are very easy to add later when you need them, and will be cheaper.

18

Thanks all for the help. I went with 2.4 which was indeed the “sweet spot.” A $680 drop in price from the 2.8 alone while the 2.66 was only a $120 drop. I did upgrade to the 21 inch monitor and a kick ass sound system.

19

I’m glad this came up - I’ve been looking at a computer but I don’t know if it’s an okay deal. (I can’t really afford it, but I’ve been trying to see if I could swing it. This is for the PC alone, no monitor, which is what I wanted - I’m happy with my monitor for the time being.

P-4 2.66 with 533KB Front Side Bus & 512KB Second Level Cache

Graphics card - nVidia Ge Force 4 8X AGP Ti4200 Graphics Card with 128MB DDR SDRAM

Seagate 120GB Hard Drive

Samsung 256MB DDR SDRAM 333MHz Memory (expandable to 2GB)

Sony 40x 12x 48 max CD Burner

16x DVD-ROM

Dolby 6 Channel Audio Controller for Digital Home Cinema

Fast Ethernet 10/100 MBit Card

56K V.90 PCI Data Fax Modem

P/S 2 Keyboard

Creative Labs Multimedia Speakers

MS® Intellimouse® (pad included)

Connect XL, 5USB 2.0 Ports, 3 IEEE 1394 Ports, Integrated Memory Card Reader, 2 Audio In, 2 Audio Out, Game Port in Front, 1 S-Video, 2 Monitor/TV Out, 1 Serial Port, 1 Parallel Port

Over 10 Audio/Video Software Programs Included

Windows XP pre-loaded and on recovery CD

Medion® Home Cinema XL, pre- installed and on CDROM (OEM Version), Cyberlink PowerDVD™, Cyberlink Medi®Show™, Cyberlink VideoLive Mail 4™, Cyberlink PowerDirector™, Cyberlink PowerVCR II™,MusicMatch Jukebox™

And just think - all this can be mine for the low, low price of $899! Since I don’t really know anything about computers, I didn’t know if this is a good deal. I do know that my old computer is about 4 years old now, somehow I made the sound stop working it has no DVD or CD burner. I don’t do any real gaming. My nephew keeps saying he could build me a decent machine, but I’m not sure he’s quite up to that yet and for less than $1000, it seems okay.

What do all you knowledgable Dopers think?

StG

20

StGermain, who makes it? What are you going to do about backup?