Looking for advice on buying a new pc please

Confuzzled

first of all thank you for taking the time to read this. i'm after a new pc as mine is over 4 years old and has been quite heavily used during that period. i'm feeling it's age now when trying to play games and do more than two things at a time etc so i think it's time to pass it down to my daughter and get myself a new one.

i saw an advert tonight for pc world and they have this unit on sale for £399.00 http://www.pcworld.co.uk/martprd/pro...rmationSection

what i want the computer for is heavy online usage, some graphic intensive online games and lots of storage. currently i have an AMD 64 dual core 3200, 1 gig ram, 512 vram (i think), nvidia geforce 6400 (i think) 300gb hardrive, windows xp pro etc etc

i have 20gig of hardrive space left on my old computer so i think that the 320gig on this new one would be fine as i have a fair bit i could dump off if i wanted to and some of it i'll just leave stored on the old computer when it's replaced as a backup as my daughter will only be using it for the internet and some basic games etc.

so, in opinion of those who perhaps have this machine or a similar model and/or know more about recent models and prices for computers is this a good deal? are there any major issues i should know about if i went for this machine? and how is windows 7 working? i always shudder at the thought of using a windows OS before the first service pack is out...

any other helpful advice about what to consider with a new computer would be helpful, it's been a few years and i like to do my research before making a big purchase, especially for something i will use so heavily and because i want something that will last a long time, we use our computers til they die, literally one of ours was nearly 9 years old and went POP the last time i tried to boot it up thankfully i'd already gotten everything off it i needed, i was just seeing if it was worth giving away, the short of it was no!

thanks in advance!

Bowling_4_Gold

Although it seems an average deal (note it has the dreaded 'integrated graphics - probably worse than you have at the moment), I would strongly advse AGAINST PC World (and I am sure many others will too) because of their sheer lack of Customer Service and the pain you will go through if something goes wrong.

I am struggling to find an equally priced Dell with similar spec, but will keep looking

deanos

Its a small case, only has onboard graphics , upgrading may be a problem

Do you really need a monitor , 19" is very small

this is a extremely good deal> http://www.currys.co.uk/martprd/product/seo/140086

£379 with free windows 7 upgrade

AMD Phenom X4 9750
(2.4GHz, 2MB Cache)
Genuine Windows Vista® Home Premium
4GB memory
500GB hard drive
Blu-Ray player and DVD Rewriter
512MB ATI Radeon HD4350 graphics
6x USB ports
Media card reader

Confuzzled

Bowling_4_Gold wrote: »

Although it seems an average deal (note it has the dreaded 'integrated graphics - probably worse than you have at the moment), I would strongly advse AGAINST PC World (and I am sure many others will too) because of their sheer lack of Customer Service and the pain you will go through if something goes wrong.

I am struggling to find an equally priced Dell with similar spec, but will keep looking

i had wondered about the integrated graphics, i've never had a computer with it but something at the back of my mind is nagging at me in that regards... though i'm thinking that has something to do with agi or api? anyway i'll research more into that, i really need much better graphic capacity not worse!

i have wondered about pc worlds customer service, have others had issues with them too? my computer is an evesham model and i was glad i took out their 3 year onsite warranty (only 80 quid, real bargain there for onsite) and i was glad i did so. i did have some issues with this computer but they fixed it 3 times (i've had nearly everything replaced in it, it's 'newer' than it's original age!) and they were brilliant... i'll have a look at their website but they tend to be quite pricey.... edited to add: well they went into liquidation so i won't be buying from them then! oh well i got my 3 years worth of warranty out of them at least!

thanks for the heads up though i'll take both things into consideration

Confuzzled

deanos wrote: »

Its a small case, only has onboard graphics , upgrading may be a problem

Do you really need a monitor , 19" is very small

this is a extremely good deal> http://www.currys.co.uk/martprd/product/seo/140086

£379 with free windows 7 upgrade

AMD Phenom X4 9750
(2.4GHz, 2MB Cache)
Genuine Windows Vista® Home Premium
4GB memory
500GB hard drive
Blu-Ray player and DVD Rewriter
512MB ATI Radeon HD4350 graphics
6x USB ports
Media card reader

actually, no i don't need the monitor i have one that still works fine and a new one can be had cheaply enough. my own monitor is a 19inch so i wouldn't have noticed the difference anyway but i'd rather get higher specs and skip the monitor if truth be told

Bowling_4_Gold

Ok, I think this is about the best Dell you can get for your money - it is pretty much the same spec with two slight differences - the processor, and the monitor (IMO Dell's is better out of the two)

If you can stretch an extra £100 (a lot, I know), you can get this system with more RAM, double HDD space, larger screen, and dedicated 512mb Graphics.

Or, if you can cope with keeping your existing monitor, you can get a v. good system with 4GB RAM, Windows 7, 640GB HDD, 512mb dedicated graphics, and a Quad-Core processor for £450 here.

deanos

Found this > £329

http://configure.euro.dell.com/dellstore/config.aspx?s_tnt=20232:1:0,&vw=builder&c=uk&cs=ukdhs1&l=en&oc=D004603&dgc=AF&cid=5212&lid=122756&acd=583855f1144bf4032ab22ad16f468703

Already has Windows 7, proper graphics, 4gb ram and 500gb hard drive

Components
Genuine Windows® 7 Home Premium, 64bit, English
AMD Athlon™ 64 X2 Dual Core 7550 (2.5GHz, 512kx2)
Microsoft® Works 9.0 / English - (Does not include Microsoft® Word)
1 year of coverage included with your PC
McAfee® Security Centre - 15 Month Protection - English
Display Not Included
4096MB Dual Channel DDR2 800MHz [4x1024] Memory
500GB (7200rpm) SATA Hard Drive
512MB ATI® Radeon™ HD 4350 graphics card
DVD +/- RW Drive (read/write CD & DVD)
Dell™ USB Entry Keyboard - UK/Irish (QWERTY)
Dell 2 Button USB Scroll Optical Mouse - Black
19-in-1 Media Card reader
No Modem
Integrated Channel High Definition Audio
Accessories
Services & Software
DataSafe Online Backup 2GB 1 year
Also Includes
No Accidental Damage Support
Inspiron 546 Minitower with Black Bezel
Inspiron Desktop 546MT Resource DVD (Diagnostic & Drivers)
English Documentation
D124603
Inspiron Desktop 546 MT Order - UK
No Speakers (Speakers are required to hear audio from your system)
1 year of coverage included with your PC
Piano Black
2 Meter Power Cord - UK

deanos

Bowling_4_Gold wrote: »

Ok, I think this is about the best Dell you can get for your money

Mines better

Confuzzled

deanos wrote: »

512MB
ATI Radeon HD4350 graphics

thanks for posting this, though i am a bit concerned about these two things. it's ATI that i was fumbling for earlier and i'm certain i've heard very bad things about their graphics cards..now those might have been onboard so i'm not sure but the graphics card is very important to me as i need it for games like second life, blue mars (i'm a beta tester, well i'm trying to be, my computer is trying NOT to be!) and cities xl.

i know with SL only having 512mb of graphics memory caused me huge problems with lag, on there i can still walk but on blue mars i can barely move at all and i haven't even gotten online on cities xl yet because i don't think my computer can handle it. would having 4gb (vs my current 1gb) of ram make enough difference without upping the video ram too? and would 512mb be enough for future gaming? i tend to go for graphics rich games, i like the feeling of total immersion when i do play...

Confuzzled

ooh that does look good deanos!

i'm really confused about how much video memory i need...is 512mb really enough? i want something that will last me a good few years. i don't keep up with all the latest pc offline games but i do the online games as mentioned before so i want to be able to keep up that way for at least a year or two!

also, how much of a difference is there between a dual core and a quad core? i don't need an all singing or dancing machine but i do need an improvement on this one... when i bought this i hadn't discovered second life yet and so i bought something geared towards office work as i work from home, now i wish i'd gone with at least a mid level graphics package and i think that would suit me now too as i only get on SL now for business, and my time on blue mars and xl cities will be limited next year when i return to uni full time.

there are a lot more considerations now then there was last time i bought a pc so i'm feeling slightly lost about some things

deanos

4gb ram will make a huge difference, as for the graphics card you never usually get top end cards when buying a PC, i would suck it and see and if you find it no good then upgrade, you can get decent cards for £50-£60 nowadays

Ignore the memory on the graphics card, never compare cards that way, you could have a 1gb card thats worse than a 512mb card, its very confusing but its more to do with the speed of meomory and clock speed of the GPU

Ive got a quad core machine and to be honest im looking to change it as i dont need all that power and it uses alot of electricity a good dual core will be fine and cheaper to run.

Just a word of warning if you go with Dell do not go for any of there upgrades they are extremely expensive

Loads of good advice here: http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/