Computers

Sgt Busa

Donating Member
Registered
Well I am about to leave night shift next week, so no more spending time on the internet for hours. Looks like I am going to have to buy my own PC.

I want a PC that will do about any thing except play games. I have an Xbox, so what's the point. I also want a lot of redundant memory and a half way decent internet connection. I figure there will also be a digital camera down the line so I can take some at least kind of decent photos of the Busa. But in the end I am not looking to pay shid load.


If it where not for the AF I wouldn't no crap about computers. So any suggestions will be greatly appreciated.
 
I suggest you go for the following config ...

2400+ AMD Athlon
512 KB L2 CACHE
256 DDR RAM
80 GIG HDD
CDRW / DVD RW (Combo)
6 USB support

smile.gif
 
Been in this stuff since late 1986.

I would suggest the following min:

min AMD 3000+ or better
min of 512 megs of ram
min 80 gig hard drive but would say get 160gig or 250gig
video card min 128bit 128megs
either seperate DVD/Player Recorder and CD Recorder or a combo.(prob with a combo is if one part goes it is all useless)
Make sure you got min 4 USB Slots as well as 2 FireWire Slots
SATA ability of 2 inputs
17" monitor or LCD display.
ALSO GET AN EXTENDED WARRENTY!!!




I run a FX-52 2.2gig AMD Processor
2 gigs or ram
4 250 gig hard drives
scsi dvd and cd recorders
4 sata slots external and 2 internal
8 USB(with 4 external USB adapters, giving me 24 USB slots) 4 fire wire
21 viewsonic monitor
128bit 256 meg graphics card
Dual channel scsi card
SB top of the line Sound Card
2 250 meg USB hard drives


But all this I use my 3.06g lap top LOL!!!


Also waiting till 500gig 7200rpm hard drives come out to replace all hard drives in main system. giving me 1.5 to 2.0 terrabytes...



<!--EDIT|FAKK2
Reason for Edit: None given...|1114692206 -->
 
Been in this stuff since late 1986.

I would suggest the following min:

min AMD 3000+ or better
min of 512 megs of ram
min 80 gig hard drive but would say get 160gig or 250gig
video card min 128bit 128megs
either seperate DVD/Player Recorder and CD Recorder or a combo.(prob with a combo is if one part goes it is all useless)
Make sure you got min 4 USB Slots as well as 2 FireWire Slots
SATA ability of 2 inputs
17" monitor or LCD display.
ALSO GET AN EXTENDED WARRENTY!!!




I run a FX-52 2.2gig AMD Processor
2 gigs or ram
4 250 gig hard drives
scsi dvd and cd recorders
4 sata slots external and 2 internal
8 USB(with 4 external USB adapters, giving me 24 USB slots) 4 fire wire
21 viewsonic monitor
128bit 256 meg graphics card
Dual channel scsi card
SB top of the line Sound Card
2 250 meg USB hard drives


But all this I use my 3.06g lap top LOL!!!


Also waiting till 500gig 7200rpm hard drives come out to replace all hard drives in main system. giving me 1.5 to 2.0 terrabytes...
Could you translate that into English for me please?
 
Any suggestions would be appreciated?  OK then...

www.warrenbrown.com images missing
 
Been in this stuff since late 1986.

I would suggest the following min:

min AMD 3000+ or better
min of 512 megs of ram
min 80 gig hard drive but would say get 160gig or 250gig
video card min 128bit 128megs
either seperate DVD/Player Recorder and CD Recorder or a combo.(prob with a combo is if one part goes it is all useless)
Make sure you got min 4 USB Slots as well as 2 FireWire Slots
SATA ability of 2 inputs
17" monitor or LCD display.
ALSO GET AN EXTENDED WARRENTY!!!




I run a FX-52 2.2gig AMD Processor
2 gigs or ram
4 250 gig hard drives
scsi dvd and cd recorders
4 sata slots external and 2 internal
8 USB(with 4 external USB adapters, giving me 24 USB slots) 4 fire wire
21 viewsonic monitor
128bit 256 meg graphics card
Dual channel scsi card
SB top of the line Sound Card
2 250 meg USB hard drives


But all this I use my 3.06g lap top LOL!!!


Also waiting till 500gig 7200rpm hard drives come out to replace all hard drives in main system. giving me 1.5 to 2.0 terrabytes...
Nice setup brah! I have finally decided to upgrade my setup. My priorities were my servers, now since my 4200ti died and swollen capacitors on my mboard I am forced to upgrade.

Current setup:

Asus p4s333 mb
p4 2.2ghz
2gigs mushkin blueline with coolers
8 usb's, 2 firewires
sb audigy platinum
gainward ti 4200 clocked to 4600 specs
4 80gig ide 5400rpm hdds
ata card
cdrw
4 120mm fans
4 80mm fans
1 neon
clear side
 
Werdkat thanks, I did mine over a year ago witht he 940 pin processor now they are 939. Anyhow I wanted top of the line, and all so I figured it would last me @2 years or so then redo it again. this time wanting 19" to 26" LCD display. lol... It never ends... LOL!!!
 
God tell me about it these dang addictions!! Built mine in 2001 lol I know a bit old but it still runs haha!!! Been past time to upgrade to pci express and sata!!!
 
Been in this stuff since late 1986.

I would suggest the following min:

min AMD 3000+ or better
min of 512 megs of ram
min 80 gig hard drive but would say get 160gig or 250gig
video card min 128bit 128megs
either seperate DVD/Player Recorder and CD Recorder or a combo.(prob with a combo is if one part goes it is all useless)
Make sure you got min 4 USB Slots as well as 2 FireWire Slots
SATA ability of 2 inputs
17" monitor or LCD display.
ALSO GET AN EXTENDED WARRENTY!!!




I run a FX-52 2.2gig AMD Processor
2 gigs or ram
4 250 gig hard drives
scsi dvd and cd recorders
4 sata slots external and 2 internal
8 USB(with 4 external USB adapters, giving me 24 USB slots) 4 fire wire
21 viewsonic monitor
128bit 256 meg graphics card
Dual channel scsi card
SB top of the line Sound Card
2 250 meg USB hard drives


But all this I use my 3.06g lap top LOL!!!


Also waiting till 500gig 7200rpm hard drives come out to replace all hard drives in main system. giving me 1.5 to 2.0 terrabytes...
Nice setup brah! I have finally decided to upgrade my setup. My priorities were my servers, now since my 4200ti died and swollen capacitors on my mboard I am forced to upgrade.

Current setup:

Asus p4s333 mb
p4 2.2ghz
2gigs mushkin blueline with coolers
8 usb's, 2 firewires
sb audigy platinum
gainward ti 4200 clocked to 4600 specs
4 80gig ide 5400rpm hdds
ata card
cdrw
4 120mm fans
4 80mm fans
1 neon
clear side
So you two just wanted to brag about your own setups?
smile.gif
 
Well I am about to leave night shift next week, so no more spending time on the internet for hours. Looks like I am going to have to buy my own PC.

I want a PC that will do about any thing except play games. I have an Xbox, so what's the point. I also want a lot of redundant memory and a half way decent internet connection. I figure there will also be a digital camera down the line so I can take some at least kind of decent photos of the Busa. But in the end I am not looking to pay shid load.


If it where not for the AF I wouldn't no crap about computers. So any suggestions will be greatly appreciated.
How much money do you have to spend, what are you most comfortable with and do you want to learn new stuff?

I've been in computers starting as a hobby in 79 and as a job in 84. I use Windows, Mac OS X, Linux and Solaris on a daily basis.

My Mac Powerbook is a great tool. My wife is your basic user and has been a Windows user for many years. Now she spends all of her time on the Mac. It's less suseptible to viruses and worms and it's based on BSD so the user security is significantly better. I believe the higher price of the hardware offsets the cheaper price of an Intel+Windows box.

If you have the bucks and are going Windows, then get the most processing power you can find. Most everything else can up upgraded in a system but with the constantly changing motherboards and CPU's, you'll be hard pressed to upgrade it at a later date.

Next is the most memory you can afford. A gigabyte is adequate for most users needs. Since you're not doing games and a digital camera isn't in the immediate future, the motherboard VGA adapter will work fine and you can upgrade later. If you're not doing music files, a smaller hard disk is also ok. 40 gigs or so will be fine.

You might want to consider a DVD burner for backups of your data and especially your pictures. I wouldn't go with a dual-layer burner at this time. I think the tech is still a little too new.

When you start working with pictures or sound, you can add a second hard disk and have it be as cheap as the initial drive. Install a decent video card so you can manipulate images but don't get suckered into a top of the line card. Those are mostly used by gamers and far beyond what your typical digital camera will need. Granted digital cameras have 5 megapixels and high resolution modes but most people I've seen go middle of the road with their camera.

A 15" or even 17" LCD panel would work great and the prices are coming down. Otherwise a 17" monitor is still a good size.

Now what you can do is take the above info and go to your local CompUSA, Best Buy, Circuit City or even Hacker Den and get a system to your specs. You can even go to Dell or Gateway and properly build a system for the best price that'll do exactly what you want for 3 or 4 years.

Carl
 
Here's some advice:

If all you are going to be using the computer for is Internet browsing, the occasional email, a document or two and saving/printing digital photos, you can go for some of the cheapest PCs out there. Don't worry about CPU/proc speed too much because anything over 1Ghz will do you, and most machines out there today have at least that much power.

Get as much memory as will fit in the machine, memory is cheap so there's no point in being stingy. Get it fitted when you buy the box, that way you don't have a reason to open the box to do it yourself.

If you're going to use a digital camera, make sure the computer supports USB 2, it's much faster than the earlier version so you don't have to wait as long when transferring images to the the hard drive. Firewire isn't a requirement unless you want to capture output from video cameras, USB is becoming the standard for most peripherals nowadays.

80Gig hard drive should be more than enough for what you said you will be using it for, unless you decide to get into video capture or buld a huge collection of MP3s, movies etc.

Most machines come with at least a CD burner, useful to have for making backups of photos, douments etc. (backups are important if your hard drive decides to crap out.) You don't need a DVD burner unless you're getting in to the video thing.

Personally, I've built machines from components and I've bought ready-made boxes. For your purposes I'd recommend you buy a machine from a reputable manufacturer that you know will be around in the future should you need support. I've had good experiences with HP machines myself. Some of the super-cheap stuff might seem attractive, but it's probably made in a garage somewhere and the people that built it might not be there next year....

Finally, think about the type of Internet connection you need. If you are using email and chatting on forums like this one, you could get away with a dialup connection (in which case you need a PC with a modem built-in or an external unit.) However, I'd recommend that - if your budget can handle it - you get a DSL or Cable modem high speed connection if possible. Two reasons for suggesting this, firstly if you want to upload your 'Busa pictures to this site, or download content from the Internet, it is MUCH faster using one of these connections. Secondly, the future of the Internet will be about delivering all kinds of interesting content (video on demand, interactive websites etc.) which require high-bandwidth connections.

Hope this helps.
 
All of the above are great setups~ Any of them will do~ You gotta look at just what you're gonna be using it for also~ If you just want to surf the net and store pics.. you don't need to go crazy with a mega gig hard drive~ In fact, as I do, you can just find two smaller hard drives..maybe 20-30gig and set one up as a slave just for storing pics and fliks~ My main drive is only 30gigs (maybe use half of it), my slave is only 10gigs (just used for pics and fliks)~ This is handy incase you ever have to send your system in for warrenty or repair work.. just take the slave HD out and keep nosey peeps outta your personal stuff~
wink.gif

Depending on what you use for your Operating System (XP is prolly most common these days) you would want to run anywhere from 256 to 512 of RAM~ 512 would definitly be ideal~ A burner is also a good option to have~
I build systems as a hobby~ The fair grounds has a comuter fair every now and then where you can go and buy everything you need to build a system to your exact specifications~ The upside is, you get only what you need and will use, without all the extra bells, whistles, and programs that never get used~ The downside is.. you don't have a warrenty to fall back on if something should crash on you down the road~
Most importantly... get RoadRunner once you're ready to conect to the net~ This site is the bomb.. but even with the broadband of cable modems it tends to drag some days~ I feel real bad for the people still running dial-ups.. like I have to do from here (at the office)~
sad.gif

If you'd like.. and you're really not sure what you need.. shoot me a PM and I'll try to hook up with you one of these weekends and we'll go computer shopping!
cool.gif
 
A couple simple questions to ask yourself is do you want a desktop or laptop, but to answer you need to think about how much space you have and do you need any mobility? Once you've decided that you can put into play some of the setups that werdkat and fakk2 have suggestd. Like dm gsxr said, how much money you have to spend is very important, as well.

Kind of like do I buy a new or used Busa? Do I add bolt-ons or a full exhaust? If a full exhaust which one?
biggrin.gif
 
This is a question with an unendable amont of answers. I sell computers as well as I am a Network Administrator for the federal government. The first question I want to ask is how much do you know about computers? Do you feel comfotable working on hardware yourself? Could you replace a video card if you had to. If not I would buy a system all made before trying to build one or pick out the parts for one yourself. Next is what are you going to be doing with this computer? You already said you will not be playing games and let me tell you that you have saved yourself alot of money there. A good video card will cost in the neigborhood of 4-500 dollars alone. For the internet and general computer use (and I do sell my own custom built systems) I would go with a Dell . They sell a good solid inexpensive platform, provide good service and a long warranty. Dont buy the cheapest one you can find on there. I would look for something that did not have integrated video because some of them do not come with slots to upgrade later on down the road if you want to. Here is what I would look for ... AMD and Intel both make very good processors now.. AMD had a bad spell a couple of years ago but seems to have come out of it and they test faster than Intel on alot of benchmarks. AMD is less expensive so for a home user it usually wins out. Intel I like alittle better it is much more tested with Windows OS I am sure most everyone has heard of Wintel (Windows Intel) but its all in presonal preferrence on that part. I would get a minimum of 512Mb of RAM its not to expenisve and if you have it put in right off you will be happier with your system. The new technology for hard drives is called SATA (Serial ATA) it runs faster than the ATA (133 compared to 150) right now but I expect to see those numbers much faster by the end of 05 SATA is new and they should be pushing around 200 I think by 06. So a motherboard that supports SATA is better The hard drive is the slower part of the computer bus speeds and Memory are very fast but eventually it will have to write things to the HD and that speed is what you notice. Integrated sound and LAN is pretty much standard unless you are going to be doing something very sound intensive it should work fine and if it dies after the warranty runs out you can get a PCI sound card and should have plenty of free spots. Take a look at the Dell 4700 line it is the least expensive line with SATA drives. If you are on a budget integrated is OK but figure about 900 bucks will get you something already built with an OS and warranty DVD CDRW flat screen etc etc I hope this helped some.
 
All said and done.. AMD is the way to go.. Intel's are too over priced. AMD gives same performance at literally half the cost!!!
wink.gif
biggrin.gif
 
Back
Top