Difference between these 2 specs before I buy?

Millionare

Cricri wrote: »

Ah, yes, Vista, I forgot that some people use that

I had a P2-233 with 256MB of RAM running winXP and Office 2003. It was running ok (although I had to disable a lot of services and eye candy).

The Vista recommended requirements (not minimal) are:
1 GHz 32-bit (x86) or 64-bit (x64) processor
512 MB of system memory
20 GB hard drive with at least 15 GB of available space
Support for DirectX 9 graphics and 32 MB of graphics memory
DVD-ROM drive
Audio Output
Internet access (fees may apply)

So the cheap one should do the trick as well?

Those are Minimums for the most basic vista which is Vista Basic.

In real world terms you should be buying above and beyond that because after you upload your software and security programs if you have that spec your system is gonna be very very very slow.

Again most versions of Vista are going to be run on Home Premium which requires

Minimum Processor Speed 1 GHz processor
Memory Required 1 GB of system memory
HardDisk Required 40GB hard drive with at least 15GB of available space
Display Support for DirectX 9 graphics with:

* • WDDM Driver
* • 128 MB of graphics memory (minimum)
* • Pixel Shader 2.0 in hardware
* • 32 bits per pixel

its all depends on what OS the OP is gonna run on it.

gotan

The supervisor is ringing me tomorrow because I said no to the quote!
If I do ever run Vista, it will have to be the business edition because of work. I want XP Pro for the moment.
The 6400 comes with 2x 512RAM whereas I wanted one slot.
I am mostly concerned about having a decent display as have eye problems. That's why I turned down the 640M (14", prob ok, but integrated graphics).
Unfortunately I don't have the space at home for a desktop or desktop monitor.
Btw are Dells made in China?

many thanks.

Millionare

gotan wrote: »

The supervisor is ringing me tomorrow because I said no to the quote!
If I do ever run Vista, it will have to be the business edition because of work. I want XP Pro for the moment.
The 6400 comes with 2x 512RAM whereas I wanted one slot.
I am mostly concerned about having a decent display as have eye problems. That's why I turned down the 640M (14", prob ok, but integrated graphics).
Unfortunately I don't have the space at home for a desktop or desktop monitor.
Btw are Dells made in China?

many thanks.

If your gonna run Vista business in the end, then the 2nd spec is better. Also you require 1GB of ram minimum as then at least the system has more memory to play with as you have a dedicated grahphics card.

If you gonna run XP pro then the cheaper one will easily handle XP

If the supervisor rings 2mrw haggle them for either 2gb ram or faster 1.83 proccessor or £50 cheaper and say you'll have it off them if they do:p

Tell them youve seen another make and are considering that, but make you an offer.

Dont get a high Res Monitor if you have eye problems. 1280*800 is nice on a 15.4"

Dells are made in Ireland, but have components from all over the place.

Cricri

Millionare wrote: »

Those are Minimums for the most basic vista which is Vista Basic.

No, these were the recommended, and not minimum (as specifically stipulated in my original post) requirements, as found on the official website:

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/windowsvista/editions/systemrequirements.mspx

Except that I used the home edition list since I didn't expect anyone could afford the premium licence

Besides, it is clear that "Pixel Shader 2.0 in hardware" is only used by eye candy such as transparency, it is hardly "required" to run a computer OS.

gotan wrote:

I am mostly concerned about having a decent display as have eye problems. That's why I turned down the 640M (14", prob ok, but integrated graphics).

It is true that back in the 90s, different gfx chipsets provided different image quality (IQ). For instance, Matrox cards were famous for their 2D IQ.
Nowadays, better cards really means "more powerful in 3D environment" cards. Integrated graphics does NOT necessarily mean lower 2D IQ.

Millionare

Cricri wrote: »

No, these were the recommended, and not minimum (as specifically stipulated in my original post) requirements, as found on the official website:

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/windowsvista/editions/systemrequirements.mspx

Except that I used the home edition list since I didn't expect anyone could afford the premium licence

Besides, it is clear that "Pixel Shader 2.0 in hardware" is only used by eye candy such as transparency, it is hardly "required" to run a computer OS.

Well try running Vista at those specs and you'll realise what im going on about.

Just because Microsoft have decided to call it recommended, they are basically saying "to run this system have at least this as minimum" otherwise why are they recommending this if it can run comfortably on lesser specs? the reason?, they know its gonna struggle.

Ive been running Vista since it came out and know what those requirements are saying and what in real terms you require to run it without going at a crawling pace once you have upload general other software thats required. like antivirus, spyware programs, internt conncetions etc

Ive been following the vista develpment quite closely over the years and there have been many articles on what Microsoft have published minimums/recommended spec and the difference in actually running the system comfortably doing basic tasks and the resources it uses.

Perfect example is that for Vista premimum 1gb is recommended. however monitoring my resources using 1 app such as internt with virus scan uses 70% of my memory. that 1400mb as im running 2048mb.

so if i was sticking 2 1024mb my system would be working overtime to clear the ram for these prgrams and thus in the process slowing down my system to run.

this happens reguarly, my system easily eats up close to 65-70% of ram which eqautes to 1400-1600mb of ram on a daily baiss with some basic multi-tasking.

Millionare

Cricri wrote: »

It is true that back in the 90s, different gfx chipsets provided different image quality (IQ). For instance, Matrox cards were famous for their 2D IQ.
Nowadays, better cards really means "more powerful in 3D environment" cards. Integrated graphics does NOT necessarily mean lower 2D IQ.

Unless your running high end games there is nothing wrong with using integrated graphcs cards.

However they use shared memeroy and in this case will eat up 256ram on you system mem.

Running this on Xp is no problems, but running it on Vista which is a resource hog on memery and will easily eat up the remainder on the memory means in the long run your pc will run slower. over something that has a dedicated graphics card.

Cricri

So we're saying the same thing: integrated graphics is fine for office work. I agree that the most expensive card will be better for games, partly (as you rightly said) because of memory management.

As for Vista, the bottomline is that Microsoft is lying. And I can't contradict them because i never used Vista, and that's because I know that it is inefficient resources-wise, hence me sticking to XP (which allow me to say is rock stable). You can even install a Vista skin which I did so as to change a bit from the good old XP standard and Royale looks.

So to come back to the PC and summarises my view: if gotan wants games, 3D and eye candy, then definitely go for the higher end one. If gotan is going to concentrate purely on office applications, web surfing and such, the lowest price PC will perfectly do the trick.

Millionare

Cricri wrote: »

So we're saying the same thing: integrated graphics is fine for office work. I agree that the most expensive card will be better for games, partly (as you rightly said) because of memory management.

As for Vista, the bottomline is that Microsoft is lying. And I can't contradict them because i never used Vista, and that's because I know that it is inefficient resources-wise, hence me sticking to XP (which allow me to say is rock stable). You can even install a Vista skin which I did so as to change a bit from the good old XP standard and Royale looks.

So to come back to the PC and summarises my view: if gotan wants games, 3D and eye candy, then definitely go for the higher end one. If gotan is going to concentrate purely on office applications, web surfing and such, the lowest price PC will perfectly do the trick.

Im getting at the OS gotan wants to use on the system . For basic tasks.

Running XP:

If your gonna Run XP, the Cheaper one is more than enough to do what he wants as XP uses nothing like the Ram vista can eat up.

Running Vista:


It is advisable to get somethimg that has more system memery available which in this case is the second one becasue its has a dedicated graphics card meaning it wont take the system memory away from Vista to use.

Even better, forget the graphics card and see if you can get 2gb memory. Because its the memory that is important here, and how its used.

Its widely known that Vista is abit of a resource hog and ideally 2gb Ram is what should really be in a system.

Ive been running both Xp and Vista next to each other on similair laptops and Vista eats alot more Ram for the same tasks than if i do it on Xp. Im using 41%ram just using the internt now, which equates to over 800mb on vista at the moment. add 256mb to that = over 1056 ram for surfing the internet on vista!!

Where is my integrated graphics card gonna get the ram from? by forcing the system to clear ram which means slowing the Pc down and working the system harder

When I first got the Vista system I noticed it was always working away when my XP system was idle in the same state.

I swapped the ram from 1024mb to 2048mb into my vista from my Xp machine. and guess what? The Vista machine now no longer constantly working away.

Reason? Its got the extra ram to play with and doenst have to constantly force "clearance" of the ram.

And also ive noticed it's quicker loading stuff up and booting up as its got that free ram to play with.

that what im getting at, from personal use of Vista

by the way, i could tell you hadnt used Vista from your posts

gotan

If you need 2GB RAM to run Vista properly, sounds like MS have made a(nother) mistake. I look at the screen all day. Fatigue causes the eye problems (blurry vision) and I can't see too small text. Dell advised their Truelife screen which is 1400 x 900 which I thought was a widescreen version essentially of 1200 x 800?
I prefer the old style lappy or desktop monitors on 1280 x 1024 but don't think any lappy has them anymore. They must be £££s to produce. The macs now have them too. Hurts my eyes.
I use the PC for hours pd for office apps and photos and music as well as the web. My current PC has execrable speakers so hopefully the new Dells aren't too bad?

Millionare

gotan wrote: »

If you need 2GB RAM to run Vista properly, sounds like MS have made a(nother) mistake. I look at the screen all day. Fatigue causes the eye problems (blurry vision) and I can't see too small text. Dell advised their Truelife screen which is 1400 x 900 which I thought was a widescreen version essentially of 1200 x 800?
I prefer the old style lappy or desktop monitors on 1280 x 1024 but don't think any lappy has them anymore. They must be £££s to produce. The macs now have them too. Hurts my eyes.
I use the PC for hours pd for office apps and photos and music as well as the web. My current PC has execrable speakers so hopefully the new Dells aren't too bad?

Im using the 1280*800 native which is a Apple standard on my Dell Widescreen Laptop. Much nicer to use.

I had 1680*1050 on my XP laptop which was just too small. I personally dont know what 1400 looks like but i would advise you to pop down pc world to check it out before you buy, becasue i regretted getting 1650 but it was too late to change it.

Also the trulife, check out the glossy screens in pcworld to see if you like them. I found that firstly

you get reflections on the screen as its glossy and can be annoying as tft you dont
and also videos/dvds are dark and some darker scenes are hardly viewable sometimes with trulife.

the colours are more vibrant though. try it out before you but it.