Advice on buisness comp.

[Steve]

A friend of mine has been given the green light to buy a new computer at work. He does alot of documentation of restoration work. Taking photos, writing reports and putting it all on cd's and paper.

He asked me for my advise! http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/eek.gif Ya right. I told him I'd get back to him. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/wink.gif

This is the computer he's thinkin' of gettin'.

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?sku=TSA-17-10A

What do you guys think? Will this do? He seems to be sold on xp. I don't know why, but stability is of utmost concern.


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Peace and Love, brothers and sisters. Peace and Love

[Paleo Pete]

250watt power supply is way light for that system.

CSO (http://www.computersurplusoutlet.com/showproduct.asp?category=3&subcategory=92) has several systems that are around 1GHz processor speed, much cheaper...main category link Here (http://www.computersurplusoutlet.com/showproduct.asp?Category=3) if you might want to check out others. Price Combat (http://www.pricecombat.com./) has some good prices listed, Price Watch (http://www.pricewatch.com/) too.

Check the systems out, if they don't have a power supply wattage listed, check into it. Power supplies, especially on high speed AMD machines, have to be beefier than 250 watts. Watch out for onboard video and sound, not highly recommended. I wouldn't touch XP with a 10 foot mouse pad, but I guess that's each person's prerogative.

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[Steve]

Thanks Pete,

That was what I thought about the power supply, too. I guess they have to skimp on something. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/rolleyes.gif

Two weak spots. Power supply and XP. I think he can do better.

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Peace and Love, brothers and sisters. Peace and Love

[Steve]

'Afternoon Folks,

Does anyone have experience in setting up this type of computer?

He takes pictures with a digital camera, stores them on cd and harddrive and writes reports that include text and image. I think he uses Corel products for all this.

I'm lookin' for suggestions as to processor and OS.

I don't know if he really needs 1.7 ghz. Would 800-1000 mhz work for this application? Amd? Intel? Would a P111 or Celeron work?

What about the operating system? Win98se? Win2000? NT? This is his work computer so stability is a real issue.

He's got $2000 to work with. It would be nice to get him set up real good.

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Peace and Love, brothers and sisters. Peace and Love

[This message has been edited by Steve (edited 10-27-2001).]

[BigBlue66]

Whewie!!!!!!!!! Two grand, eh? Send him on over, I'll build a dandy for him. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/biggrin.gif

But seriously, go to www.accessmicro.com (http://www.accessmicro.com) and look into the barebones systems. Some mighty fine deals there and they will assemble, test and burn in for 24 hours before they ship it. Of course, keep in mind that this is a barebones system, which will only include case, ps, motherboard, memory. I think that's it. You can get some dandy Athalon systems with motherboards that support DDR RAM for some very good prices. Then, you will need a hefty harddrive, UDMA 100 preferably, regular CD-ROM, CD-RW, monitor, printer, etc. You get the idea.

'Course, you can always opt for a snazzy complete Dell system, but it's more fun to buy all the parts and put them together yourself. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/biggrin.gif

Cheers,

Big Blue 66


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Life = Karma, or is it, Karma = Life?

[Paleo Pete]

Would 800-1000 mhz work for this application? Amd? Intel? Would a P111 or Celeron work?

What about the operating system? Win98se? Win2000? NT? This is his work computer so stability is a real issue.

Yep, 700MHz or better would be just dandy, Intel or AMD whichever is your preference. RAM will more likely be the primary issue with that kind of applications. Minimum 256MB.

For stability go with NT or Win2000. XP might be as stable or close, but until it's been around for 2 years or so and we find out what the activation garbage is really like, as well as give them time to work out all the bugs, I'd stay away from it.


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Support the right to keep and arm bears.
Note: Please post your questions on the forums, not in my email.

Computer Information Links (http://www.dreamwater.com/paleopete/computer.htm) has been moved, please update your bookmarks.

[Steve]

Thanks BigBlue and Pete,

We're startin' to get a mental picture of his new machine (or are we just gettin' mental? http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/wink.gif )

How about cache memory? Is there a noticable difference between say 64k and 256k?

He's set on an AMD chip. Which one? No decision yet. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/rolleyes.gif

He's settled on win2000 os.

He's going with a 17" monitor. 19" might cause computer envy in the office.

It's lookin' good so far. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif

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Peace and Love, brothers and sisters. Peace and Love