Advice. What brand desktop?

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redlined

redlined

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My old Gateway desktop bit the dirt. Been looking, but it seems there's 97 different brands and configurations these days. Numerous processors too, up to six core, etc. I'm on the wife's new laptop, she's using her old one, she ain't happy about it either.

What's good these days? Mid price range, want a decent one that'll last a few years. Gave $1100 for the Gateway six years ago, worked pretty good 'til the hard drive threw a rod.

It had a dual core Pentium D, 2.8ghz per core. Might like something with a little more horsepower, but obviously, don't know a helluva lot about 'em.

Brand/processor recommendations please?
 
I just bought a new e machines desktop and it is perfect for my home and small business needs. The computer was not expensive at all, (about $300.00) and has a good amount of memory.
E Machines
EL1352G
2.00 GB
64 Bit O.S.
AMD Athlon IIX2 22o Processor 2.80GHZ
Windows 7 Professional
 
I would lean more towards Grateway or DellHell, and away from EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEeeeeeeeeee!!!machines or Comcrap.

BUT DO THIS!!!!

WHAT EVER machine you buy, MAKE ABSOLUTELY SURE that you can buy re-install CD/ DVDs and DO NOT swallow the answer that "it has a restore function on the hard drive."

I haven't checked in about 3 years, but GENERALLY you can get restore / reinstall media for free to up to about 40 bucks, depending on the machine. YOU CAN NOT GET these after the warantee ends.

ALSO (my mistake, here) This little Acer which runs Linux, has a Microsh#t license on the bottom of the machine. I didn't notice that it was PAPER and not plastic, so now you can no longer read the key.

If I ever need to reinstall Winhozed7 I just might be screwed.
 
absolutely go MAC! after buying a 1200 dollar macbook pro, ill never buy another PC product again...MAC all the way!
 
I had a emachiine made bt gateway worked great.
 
I would buy a laptop instead of a desk top. We have 4 laptops here @ home and have had good luck with Dell (get the Latitude) and Compaq Presario. I have also had good luck with Toshiba's. I use a laptop on my tool truck. They are
velcro'd to my desk and take lots of bumps and jars. they also have to operate in the cold of Iowa winters and they have to be able to stay cool at 100 degrees in the summer. I get 3-4 years out of my work laptops. Batteries are a common thing if you leave them plugged into house current constantly. The cheaper the computer the cheaper the components are inside. I have had a couple hard drives fail in the last 15 years, but I replaced them myself with bigger/better drives and had no more problems.
toolmanmike
 
Your current computer seems adequate for most usage, unless you are going to do heavy multi-tasking or video editing. You can replace the harddrive pretty easily yourself. I've done it a couple of times and I'm no techie.
 
Instead of buying a "brand" box, go to a local place, talk with someone who you are comfortable with, and they will build you a system using quality brandname interals, based on your needs. The price will be the same, the component quality usually better. As well, you'll get an actual oem disc for your Windows OS. You'll avoid many headaches, and get a lot more life out of it. Having said that, avoid the local places that build cheap crap.. like anything, it will come back to haunt you.

Grant
 
I Mac all the way ........ Never ever ever will I go back to a pc.
Just go try one you,ll see what I'm talking about.
 
...really depends what you want to do with it...we have both desktops and laptops..they both have their forte...If I had to use a laptop..I would have to have an external keyboard, mouse and monitor.

Stick with mainstream...Apple has @ 5% of the market for computers..once you buy in, you are locked..and quite frankly, the destop pub ability that apple held is gone..

Regardless of what you buy, it should meet your needs..

Being in IT for more years than I want to remember, HP and dell for detops and HP for laptops have been very good to me and my clients.

Grassy

Grassy
 
Mac!! We have an iMac and a Mac mini. We also keep a Toshiba laptop just in case, but love the Macs.
 
OneOfMany said:
Instead of buying a "brand" box, go to a local place, talk with someone who you are comfortable with, and they will build you a system using quality brandname interals, based on your needs. The price will be the same, the component quality usually better. As well, you'll get an actual oem disc for your Windows OS. You'll avoid many headaches, and get a lot more life out of it. Having said that, avoid the local places that build cheap crap.. like anything, it will come back to haunt you.

Grant
Click to expand...

this.

Doing it this way also avoids proprietary parts (where you can't upgrade components inside the computer)
 
OneOfMany said:
Instead of buying a "brand" box, go to a local place, talk with someone who you are comfortable with, and they will build you a system using quality brandname interals, based on your needs. The price will be the same, the component quality usually better. As well, you'll get an actual oem disc for your Windows OS. You'll avoid many headaches, and get a lot more life out of it. Having said that, avoid the local places that build cheap crap.. like anything, it will come back to haunt you.

Grant
Click to expand...
X2 I worked for a custom built shop for 10 years and wouldn't do it any other way. As a side note: We (my employer) have a brand new Imac 27" I3 and I installed an extra 4 gigs to bring it to 8 gigs, this is for a printing company, this pc is NOT 1 year old yet (new September 2010) and we have had to replace the hard drive AND the dvd drive, the glass on the montor HAS TO COME OFF TO WORK ON THESE THINGS. if you buy a MAC good LUCK, make sure you pay $179.99 for the extended warrantee.
 
I say Mac also. For what you're doing with it, the Mac is a perfect solution. If you have a monitor you like, you might look at a Mac Mini.

Yeah, everyone has bad ones, but overall Apple's service record is very very good. I have three Macs at home (Mac Pro and two Macbooks), and around 40 at work. We have had almost zero problems, and many of these machines get used for testing every day.

Apples do cost more to buy, but then it isn't put together as cheaply as possible like your garden variety commodity PC. Also, they hold their value very well. I bought a Macbook in 2007 (?) and sold it last fall for $500 on Craigslist.

Additionally, the new mac keyboards ROCK.

Steve
 
It all depends what your needs are. You dont need a 6 core processor if your just websurfing and typing. Dual core and 4 core are the norm now. The Ghz is your horsepower more Ghz the faster the processor is but more RAM helps too. I bought my wife a macbook she likes it. You dont have to worry too much about viruses and if you ever need tech support you can go down your closest apple store and they can usually help you out. My wife has gone in there for some issues and they helped her out. The macs usaully run a bit more $$ as well. Im a PC guy cause I am a bit of a gamer and you can upgrade/customize easier. I built my own unit so no specific brand. I'm running a AMD 965 3.4ghz and 8G of RAM. When I use my wifes laptop everything is opposite. Like closing windows or the the command button but when you use often you get used to it. Try to get down to a electronics shop/apple store and test drive some and see what you like. Cnet.com is one site that does reviews on electronics you can check that out as well. Like 3406pk said you could always replace the hard drive for a cheaper and quick fix just need the windows discs.

Roger
 
I'll agree to a point LXGuy..

Apples cost more to buy. They are generally built with decent hardware. Most people that have problems with their PC have them because they spent 40% of the cost of a Mac and expect equal quality. If they spend 80% of the cost of a Mac, they will have superior hardware, more options, better upgradablity, and more performance.

We "only" build with top quality parts. If a customer wants "cheap", we explain our position and tell them to shop elsewhere. I have customers that we built Win98 systems for coming in to buy a new one just because they want to get something newer lol..

Grant
 
Macs are great but are expensive for what you actually get. I had an E machines for probably 6-8 years, still works fine. I gave it to my parents to use. I don't know if Id recommend buying one though. From what I understand they used to build Emachines out of leftover parts from discontinued computers. Not sure if they still do. Also stay as far away from dell as physically possible. Not only are they crap but you need to go threw tech support to warranty anything. Their tech support is horrible, you talk to guys overseas that don't have a clue about computers. I spent 3 months trying to get my 500 dollar graphics card fixed under the warranty. Never got it warrantied got angry and sold the computer. won't ever touch dell again. Lately I have been using HP computers. good bang for the buck in some cases and have not had issues with either of the two yet.

As for a laptop, I would not recommend it unless you really need it. They just end up with more problems over time and in my experience don't last as long as a desktop. but that's the trade off of being able to take it with you. They are very nice if you travel a lot.
 
Depends what your plans are if you is it for surfing the net and basic spreadsheets check dell's website.
Everyday they have a "deal of the day" You can pick up a decent desk top for $399 nicely equipped.
As for Mac they are nice but a little overpriced in my opinion then when you run Windows on a mac you dont benefit from the best part of a mac.
The best thing is you can not get virous's on a mac.
I use both,and am responsible for keeping several computers working for work and at home.
If you want a simple easy to use PC I would recomend a Mac.
Also the digital photo software on apple is very nice.
 
Mac doesn't lock you in anymore. Now that everything is done within the browser, it really doesn't matter. Windows is my bread and butter, which is why I sold my last Mac. If you want the best of both worlds, get a mainstream PC, and install any freely available Linux distro. Every iteration of Mac OS10 is merely their GUI on top of BSD Unix. Nothing special, really. Even the hardware is the same, with modified ROM. Kind of like choosing a Cadillac CTS over a Saturn Aura. Much nicer, but very much the same under the hood. If my work didn't supply me with computers, I'd likely go Macinthosh again myself. But in the end, they all do the same thing.
 
Hard to believe there are so many Mac devotees here with the tiny market share Mac holds.

Steve Jobs is the only guy in the world I hate more than Bill Gates, uh, I mean, Steve Balmer
 
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