97'GlanzaVTurbo
Member +
[/quote]The fourth thing is don't forget the software this can add a chunk of money on the price and remember to get good anti-virus software support.
Lastly ask people to give you machine specs/software lists that will do what you need.
Top of the list is run Vista well as support for xp is ending soon and the last thing you want is to be waiting 5mins+ for boot up. (you'll need at least 2gb memory RAM, 2.5Ghz Dual Processor CPU & 500GB Hard disk)
I think £600-700 buys you a good machine that should last 5 or more years.[/quote]
Software really does add a chunk of money onto a computer especially programs like Microsoft Office etc as for anti virus dont pay fo it just advise you dont want it. I would recomend Avast 4 Home Edition as an Anti-Virus its a great program and completely free of charge. As for your Spyware needs I would recomend SuperAntiApyware again completely free and does the job very well.
Anti-Virus that usually they will try and sell you will be Norton or McAfee, I dont rated these highly at all, actually if anyone has these installed on their computer then change them now, they cant detect any viruses at all even if a machine is riddle with Viruses. This sint my opinion this is tried and tested like I ran Norton the other day for a customer as they had already paid for it came up 'No Viruses Found' so I ran Avast which came up '8 Trojan Viruses Detected'.lol. Not to mention Norton is the biggest cause of incompatiability and systems running slow.
As for running Vista you really dont need that high spec system to run it unless you are looking to use it for playing games or constantly downloading all day. If you maintain your computer it should never run slow, I think 2GB memory, 2.0GHz Dual Core and 160GB hard drive is well more than enough to run Vista, people get sucked in by the HUGE memory and hard drive space and automatically think their operating system will run fater but this isnt the case. Its all down to the processing speed of the memory and hard drive and the cache of the processor.
Like memory processing speeds are usually 553MHz or 667MHz obviously the 667MHz will make the operating system run faster.
Processor is down to the cache size,the processing speed and size of processor these varie so much depending on the manufacturer most people look at the GHz of the processor may it be 2.0,2.2,2.5 etc but always look at MHz which are usually either 667MHz or 800MHz and finally the cache this will either be 1MB,2MB or 3MB.
Then for hard drives all new laptops/desktops should have SATA hard drive which naturally processor faster than IDE channel drive but one thing again to look out for in the processing speeds there is usually 3 processing speeds 5400RPM, 7200RPM and 10000RPM.
All of the above will depending how fast your operating system will run. Like you could have 4GB memory 553MHz and 2GB memory 667MHz now if you try and run the same application on these systems the 2GB will be faster however if your running multiple programs then the 4GB will be faster as it has more memory to store with but for basic usage the speed of the memory is what to look out for.
Went on the Dell website and spec a machine for you and around £500 gets you a good machine that will run Vista prefectly as long as you maintain it.
Christy
Lastly ask people to give you machine specs/software lists that will do what you need.
Top of the list is run Vista well as support for xp is ending soon and the last thing you want is to be waiting 5mins+ for boot up. (you'll need at least 2gb memory RAM, 2.5Ghz Dual Processor CPU & 500GB Hard disk)
I think £600-700 buys you a good machine that should last 5 or more years.[/quote]
Software really does add a chunk of money onto a computer especially programs like Microsoft Office etc as for anti virus dont pay fo it just advise you dont want it. I would recomend Avast 4 Home Edition as an Anti-Virus its a great program and completely free of charge. As for your Spyware needs I would recomend SuperAntiApyware again completely free and does the job very well.
Anti-Virus that usually they will try and sell you will be Norton or McAfee, I dont rated these highly at all, actually if anyone has these installed on their computer then change them now, they cant detect any viruses at all even if a machine is riddle with Viruses. This sint my opinion this is tried and tested like I ran Norton the other day for a customer as they had already paid for it came up 'No Viruses Found' so I ran Avast which came up '8 Trojan Viruses Detected'.lol. Not to mention Norton is the biggest cause of incompatiability and systems running slow.
As for running Vista you really dont need that high spec system to run it unless you are looking to use it for playing games or constantly downloading all day. If you maintain your computer it should never run slow, I think 2GB memory, 2.0GHz Dual Core and 160GB hard drive is well more than enough to run Vista, people get sucked in by the HUGE memory and hard drive space and automatically think their operating system will run fater but this isnt the case. Its all down to the processing speed of the memory and hard drive and the cache of the processor.
Like memory processing speeds are usually 553MHz or 667MHz obviously the 667MHz will make the operating system run faster.
Processor is down to the cache size,the processing speed and size of processor these varie so much depending on the manufacturer most people look at the GHz of the processor may it be 2.0,2.2,2.5 etc but always look at MHz which are usually either 667MHz or 800MHz and finally the cache this will either be 1MB,2MB or 3MB.
Then for hard drives all new laptops/desktops should have SATA hard drive which naturally processor faster than IDE channel drive but one thing again to look out for in the processing speeds there is usually 3 processing speeds 5400RPM, 7200RPM and 10000RPM.
All of the above will depending how fast your operating system will run. Like you could have 4GB memory 553MHz and 2GB memory 667MHz now if you try and run the same application on these systems the 2GB will be faster however if your running multiple programs then the 4GB will be faster as it has more memory to store with but for basic usage the speed of the memory is what to look out for.
Went on the Dell website and spec a machine for you and around £500 gets you a good machine that will run Vista prefectly as long as you maintain it.
Christy
at 700Mb -/+ you'll have space for about 500 Movies and at the average music collection being about 50Gb ..... 
