Computer for Website Design

bazster

fuzzball172 wrote: »

Ok so this is an unusual job, but it will bring in a lot more than my 2gb RAM upgrade cost...
Lee

Exactly. Your upgrade cost. This guy is a beginner...

jweb2k

But if he has a certain budget to spend, why not get the best within that budget?!

bazster

jweb2k wrote: »

But if he has a certain budget to spend, why not get the best within that budget?!

Because he could put the spare cash towards a vacation, or a new car, or a curry or three, or whatever turns him on really. Anything rather than waste it on a blydi computer.

Marty_J

bazster wrote: »

You can buy a Mac if you want, but only if you like the way it looks. It's a total waste of money otherwise.

You do know that Mac OS X is not Windows Vista, don't you?

I can assure you the differences are much more than cosmetic.

fuzzball172

to be honest bazster, i'd rather spend the extra £40 on RAM and get a good system working now. How much money can you earn with a couple of takeaway dinners?

Marty the point about macs is that you are still paying a premium for the cosmetics of the apple brand. I have to agree that apple computers are good, but still overpriced when compared to a windows / linux alternative. When you do a direct comparison of the two machines, mac versus PC they are technically very similar, the operating system does the same job and the software is almost identical. The mac however is still the more expensive product. When you are just starting out and looking to get the best computer for your money, the PC still has the edge with its lower price tag.

Lee

Marty_J

I'm definitely not trying to start yet another Mac vs PC debate, but I'd disagree they're overpriced. You can buy machines of a lower spec that are actually more expensive from Dell. It just depends what's on your list of priorities I guess, but I would argue that there's more to comparing computers than just looking at the size of the HDD.

I don't know about its latest incarnation, but Photoshop CS3 runs quite a bit faster in Mac OS X than it does in Windows. It started out life as a Mac application (as did Dreamweaver), so maybe that's not surprising.

Mac OS X has some really nice features such as native RAW, PDF and ISO support, and Automator is crazy useful. Windows and Mac OS X are very different operating systems, and while they share many methods of doing things, they do differ in a lot of ways.

But if the OP only wants to spend £300, a Mac is out anyway, so I guess it doesn't really matter. :beer:

stee01

[SKIP TO THE BOTTOM IF YOU DONT WANT TO READ THE RAMBLE]

If you're after a laptop (ie for portability), and all you intend on doing is using office (which covers most, if not all people) and dreamweaver. Any laptop in a budget range will do fine, I'd say to stay away from netbooks (only because I don't know much about them).

Ideally you want anything with a core 2 duo, 2gb ram, and whatever hard space you need, which in terms of web design is not a massive factor I suppose. Bear in mind most "web design" also covers basic graphic design, something people overlook when deciding they suddenly want to learn to make websites. If this is the case where you need to create website logos etc, you may also consider an external monitor too, which you can plug into whilst at home. Nothing fancy, you can probably get away with a cheap 19" if your starting out. I have a 22" which was about £200 a few years ago, you can get a 24" for about £140 now, probably less if you look around.

It's very Noob for all these posters to tell you to just get something with more RAM. Unless you're editing video (which was not in your requirements), more RAM is not going to make your machine any faster.

With the release of Windows Vista, there have been vast improvements in the way windows manages memory. It utilises memory a lot better than XP and previous versions does, meaning there is no longer a need to keep shoving more memory into your machine. Chances are your machine will be running 32-bit so won;t even see more than 3-3.5gb anyway.


Microsoft's recommended specs to run effectively are 2gb RAM. You are not running anything demanding on your system, so you do not need anymore than 2gb RAM. Chances are you won't use all of 2gb anyway.


In short a budget laptop with a minimum of a core 2 duo processor and 2gb RAM is more than ample enough to meet your requirements. These as you may have seen easily fit around the 200-300quid mark.

If you want a desktop you can get one much cheaper that will fit your purposes. Better still ask around friends and family for an old machine. Chances are if its post 2003ish it should also be more than ample to do what you want it to do.

bazster

fuzzball172 wrote: »

to be honest bazster, i'd rather spend the extra £40 on RAM and get a good system working now. How much money can you earn with a couple of takeaway dinners?

But the OP doesn't know he's going to earn ANYTHING with this machine. The time to spend on a computer that would put Hal in his place is when he's established and knows that he will get value from it.

The ethos of this site is saving money, yes? Which means not wasting money on something you might never use.

And yes, extra RAM is cheap. So is more disk space. So is an inch or two on the monitor. So is a few extra CPU cycles. And before you know it, you've doubled the cost of the machine.

isofa

I'd not considering running the later versions of DW or PS in less than 2GB of total system RAM (remember you are running to OS as well as the applications), anyone suggesting you'll be fine with 1GB obviously doesn't use them in a commercial setting. And as for running Vista in 512MB to 1GB of RAM, well that isn't a good start.

If you are going for Windows and only 32-bit versions there is no point getting over 4GB of RAM, with 64-bit you can get as much as you like, with Mac OS, you can stuff it full of RAM and it can use it (like 64-bit Win).

Just because you are creating efficient websites doesn't mean the design applications don't use a lot of power, that is a total misnomer.

Photoshop functions well with lots of RAM, but also needs a fast hard disc to use as a scratch disc. Dreamweaver is a memory hungry program, any sensible designer will be at least running these two apps together, along with other bits and bobs and the OS, and a low end laptop with 1Gb of RAM will not deliver a good working environment.

Depends if you are approaching it from a professional or amateur perspective.

Presumable you are skilled in bth DM and PS, which are highly complex applications to get to know properly, it takes years to master them, I've been using PS since version 2, and there are still areas of the app I never use, or don't use fully.

(I use the apps on both Mac and PC, and personally prefer the working environment on Macs for this design process, mainly because it's more integrated, faster in general, and crucially colour accurate - however you can achieve the same for less on a PC, but factor in the cost of the software, it's not cheap).