do i need "graphic card ?

pennymakespounds

i'm looking to buy a dell optiplex 360 with xp .. which will mainly be used for work .. microsoft office stuff and internet for emails & surfing .

Will have my itunes on there

I also watch videos .. you tube etc .. so need good quality & speed for these streaming .

The basic spec of the machine says no graphic card .. but has endless variations available.

Do i need anything here ?

thanks

Eric_Pisch

i believe it has an intigrated Intel® GMA3100 graphics card which will probably be fine for youtube and bbc iplayer

if your after gaming or HD content then you would be advised to get a addon graphics card

Windows 7 is being released on 22/10 so I would hang on and get one with that installed

AHAR

Nice, quiet, no-nonsense machines those Optiplexes.
It will have a PCI-Express slot that you can add a card to yourself later if needed. Also, Dell's graphics card option pricing can be a bit daft sometimes...
Which style of case are you going for?
The reason I ask is that the mini-tower has a full height PCI-Express slot but the desktop case would only take a low profile graphics card (which are much less common) unless you got it with the optional "riser" to convert the slot to a full size one. At work I usually specify the desktop case because they're a bit more compact and can still be vertically oriented if needed.

pennymakespounds

Just a thought ... instead of about £400 for the optiplex ... would this do everything i need ... for £100 ???

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Dell-Computer-P4-HT-3-2GHz-Desktop-Tower-PC-Win-XP-Pro_W0QQitemZ250489909320QQcmdZViewItemQQptZUK_Computing_DesktopPCs?hash=item3a525cb048&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14

jaydeeuk1

pennymakespounds wrote: »

Just a thought ... instead of about £400 for the optiplex ... would this do everything i need ... for £100 ???

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Dell-Computer-P4-HT-3-2GHz-Desktop-Tower-PC-Win-XP-Pro_W0QQitemZ250489909320QQcmdZViewItemQQptZUK_Computing_DesktopPCs?hash=item3a525cb048&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14

For youtube, internet, music etc, then yes that machine will be fine. Willl save yourself a fair bit of cash too!

Edit- only comment is that the hard drive is small - 40gb. Might want to invest in a USB HD for all your music etc.