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Currys Compaq PC, 160GB, not 3Ghz, 512Mb RAM, DVD ReWriter, £399
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... and I've edited the title of the thread0
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I know not many seem to have good words to say about DELL customer service, but I had a deal today I could not let go.
I called the sales team to find out if they could offer me a better deal seeing as though there was no coupons I could find at the time.
They told me they could give me free upgrades/extras, which they did,... DVD writer and player £88 value, and also speakers £12. Managed to get some money knocked off too.
So infact I got all this + free installation for just £475 each. +£60 delivery. I ordered 2
Note: no monitor though.
Base Intel® Pentium® 4 Processor 640 with HT technology (3.20GHz, 800MHz fsb, 2MB cache)
Microsoft Operating System Genuine Windows® XP Home Edition, SP2
Memory 2048MB Dual Channel DDR2 400MHz (2x1024) Memory (deduct £141 if you want to keep 1024 )
Keyboard Dell Entry Quietkey USB Keyboard - UK/Ire (QWERTY)
Video Card 256MB ATI Radeon® X600 HyperMemory graphics card
Hard Drive 160GB (7200rpm) Serial ATA Hard Drive with 8MB DataBurst™ cache
Mouse Dell USB Optical Mouse
CD/DVD Drives 16x DVD+/-RW & 16x DVD Drives
Speakers Dell A215 speakers
Shipping Documents System Documentation with UK Power Cord
Gedis Bundle Reference List D01511a Dimension 5150
Microsoft Application Software Microsoft® Works 7.0 - English
Standard Warranty 1-Year Collect and Return service
Cover It with Dell Support Services 1-Year Collect and Return service
AntiVirus & Security Software Free 15 month McAfee Security SW upgrade
Dell Photo Album Photo Album™ SE Basic
Paint Shop Corel® Paint Shop Pro™ X Standard Edition English
Money Off Savings Save £100ex VAT
Dell Media Experience Dell Media Experience 3.0 Basic
Adobe Reader Adobe Reader 6.0 - English
Promotions Hidden Option Class Reporting -512MB RAM FREE - Double Memory Promo (if you don't want 2048 RAM you get free upgrade to 1024 from 512)
Promotions Hidden Option Class Free HDD Upgrade - 80GB (7200) - 160GB (7200)
Always worth calling and haggling with them 0 -
Micky wrote:I wonder what the 3000+ means?
It's the product labelling AMD use in order to compete with Intel celerons/pentiums, which really do clock at 3ghz+.
Basically the Semprons are designed to compete with Celerons from Intel, and although the 3000+ only clocks at 1.8ghz in my experience they are able to out perform the 3ghz Celerons in all tasks except audio and video encoding.
So if you like messing around with home movies or any multimedia I would recommend the Intel cpu's (preferably a Pentium).
I just had a quick look around and found what looks a good deal from Mesh (they supplied mine and service has been good):
AMD Athlon™ 64 3000+ Processor
with HyperTransport™ Technology
Genuine Windows® XP Home
ASUS Nforce 410 PCI- X Mainboard
512MB DDR400 Memory
160GB Serial ATA Hard Drive
128MB Nvidia GeForce 6100 Graphics
19" TFT Flat Panel Display
Sony 16x Dual Layer DVD Writer
5.1 Channel Surround Sound Audio
Sound Blaster SB260 Speakers
Media Card Reader 15 in 1
Logitech Desktop KB & Optical Mouse
Classic Warranty - 3 Years Parts & Lab
All for £499+del
Huge screen, 3 year warranty (which on a Dell would cost over £100) and the built in GPU is one of the best available and would allow for a bit of gaming.0 -
Thanks Venus and decanay, the PCs are close to the spec I want but the prices are still too high (who said skinflint?). I might contact Dell and Mesh to see if they can supply a machine to my spec at (or close to) £400.
How can a 1.8Ghz machine outperform a 3Ghz machine if the RAM and FSB are equal? L2/L3 cache and back side bus perhaps?
Venus, Did dell supply you with the XP disc?0 -
Most new pcs these days dont come with the actual windows xp discs. It's just on your PC, and you should then have the software to re-format/repair if needed.
Just a note, if you go with the 1024 DDR memory and not the 2048, you would then pay £334 for the pc I posted. 0 -
Sigh all this techie talk I'm lost! I want to get a new pc this one is always crashing aparently it has 40Gig hard drive and 128mb of ram and its got 1300 mhz and 1.29ghz. I have no idea what any of that means I just copied it off properties menu. Anyway I would like to get a new comp with flat screen as we have a chunky old square one, one that records cds/dvds etc, we don't need a printer as we have a great one and a sack of inks to go with it but it must be able to plug in via a paralell port as it does not have a usb on the printer. Oh and lastly I'd like if poss to have more usb's as my comp now only has 2 and its so annoying having to keep unplugging the mouse or my webcam etc to plug in the scanner or my mobile phone!. Anyhow so if anyone can advise me on a good set up I could look into I'd be really greatful. We have no more than £500 cash and won't get any credit dont want to get into anymore debt so cash it will be. I've had a nose round comets and currys and looked on the Dell site but I'm so confused. Oh lastly I saw a deal in Woolworths of a whole pc set up for £399 called Medion I was gonna buy it does anyone know if its any good its on the woolworths website if anyone can have a look at it for me and let me know thanks.
P.p.s it must have a Modem internally as I'm still on dial up don't want to go broad band.
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TaBunny wrote:Sigh all this techie talk I'm lost! I want to get a new pc this one is always crashing aparently it has 40Gig hard drive and 128mb of ram and its got 1300 mhz and 1.29ghz. I have no idea what any of that means I just copied it off properties menu. Anyway I would like to get a new comp with flat screen as we have a chunky old square one, one that records cds/dvds etc, we don't need a printer as we have a great one and a sack of inks to go with it but it must be able to plug in via a paralell port as it does not have a usb on the printer. Oh and lastly I'd like if poss to have more usb's as my comp now only has 2 and its so annoying having to keep unplugging the mouse or my webcam etc to plug in the scanner or my mobile phone!. Anyhow so if anyone can advise me on a good set up I could look into I'd be really greatful. We have no more than £500 cash and won't get any credit dont want to get into anymore debt so cash it will be. I've had a nose round comets and currys and looked on the Dell site but I'm so confused. Oh lastly I saw a deal in Woolworths of a whole pc set up for £399 called Medion I was gonna buy it does anyone know if its any good its on the woolworths website if anyone can have a look at it for me and let me know thanks.
P.p.s it must have a Modem internally as I'm still on dial up don't want to go broad band.
If you're on a tight budget you'd be best off upgrading your ram and reinstalling windows. You wouldn't notice much difference between the speed of your PC and something new for under £500 really, once you've installed everything you need.0 -
I would second Tr3mor comments TaBunny, but like with any computer upgrade, it all depends what you use your computer for.
If you only use it for browising the web and general clerical duties then you probably don't need a new computer. Buy yourself a new monitor, increase the ram to 512mb min, and get a usb hub (gives you more usb ports, it is basically just like a 4 bar plug, gives you 4 usb ports from the use of 1). None of this should set you back more than £200.
A reinstall of windows would then kick start your PC back into life. If your not sure how to install new ram then take to it a local PC store, they might also be able to give your computer faster CPU if your motherboard can support it, then sell the old one on EBAY, al in all much cheaper than buying new.0 -
Shouldn't this be on the **Techie Stuff** board as it's certainly not a grabbit and is now going into the techie mode on what's best?
Also, I wonder how I ever managed to rip DVD's, convert Avi files to DVD, edit pics, convert my Hi-8 video images to DVD when I was using a pentium 550mhz with only 128mb of ram and a 32mb video card....Oh wait, I don't, it just took a tad longer
Just remember peeps, Windows 3 came on 4 floppy disks (3.1 for workgroups came on 6) and could be installed with 4mb of ram. Win 95 got a bit bigger and came on around 20 floppy disks, but only took 120mb to instal and run on 8mb ram.
The minimum spec for Win xp is a PC with 300mhz processor, 64mb of ram and 1.5gb of hard drive.Welcome, rogerramjet.
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