Told I need 1Ghz for XP+Bband

B4UgoZzz

Hi, you techno-Einsteins.

My 500Mhz PC broke down and the repair man has told me that I need to replace it with a 1Ghz machine.

I wish to run XP and AOL Broadband and have been told that my computer will not do this without continual breakdown.

Just like a 2nd, 3rd, 4th opinion on this please.

Cheers, Wilf.

chris73

I'm running XP Pro Happily on a P3 700MHZ with no issues whatsoever. The Key is to have lots of memory rather than a larger processor. Unless you are using the PC for gaming or graphics intensive use, then you could probably get away with just upgrading the existing PC with more memory.

Joe_Bloggs

Buying new memory for an old PC is throwing good money after bad. A 500Mhz-1GHz PC is a borderline skip job. They are good value but a liability if it falls over and you need to call a computer engineer.

You may be able to aquire a more powerful PC second hand very cheaply. As chris73 said, more memory is the key (256Mb to 512Mb). This memory takes the burdon off the hard disk that would otherwise try compensate for a lack of memory with resulting tedious delays.
J_B.
Do you have AOL BB or XP at present ?

tru

I'm running XP Pro on an AMD Duron processor, 846 MHz, 368 MB of RAM. I use Telewest broadband.


Dunno what half of that actually means, but I hope it's useful for ya

blinky

The guy is just trying to sell you a new PC. I've seen PC's with lower specs than that sucessfully use broadband. Even a P3 500 or Athlon 500 would comfortably cope with the most flash and java heavy pages.

culpepper

so what was the problem with your pc?
could he fix it?
It does sound a bit like he is trying to make you buy something you probably dont need.
OH has a 400mhz mac which we have hooked up to the broadband a couple of times and has been able to surf the net no trouble (it has 256mb memory I think).
Maybe he is thinking XP will be a bit slow.Does it have to be XP though?
My daughter has windows 2000 running on a 333mhz computer.

T4i

1GIG just to run XP and BB...LOL

Just go back and laugh at him. Tell him to come argue his point on MSE.

I've seen XP running on a 500Mhz Athlon (old mars-bar style) with 256MB RAM. This ran BB fine, browsing the net doesnt really suck too much juice from the CPU.

Saying that, AOL software prolly needs a 10Gig CPU...

wolfman

Yep, I used to run XP on my Pentium 3 450Mhz, and I still run it on my second machine a Pentium 3 733Mhz, and it runs no problem. ADSL doesn't mean you need a fast computer. Unless you're running some very intense (or badly coded) Flash, Java, etc... (like someone mentioned above) you won't need a faster computer.

I do agree with memory though. XP can be quite memory hungry, at a minimum I'd go with 256mb Ram, it depends how many things you are running. 512mb Ram is about right for the average home user.

andy88_2

If there is some other fault that makes this not worth repairing, then ok a slightly better spec 2nd hand one will still be cheap, but the implication that your present one will keep breaking down due to overload is misleading.

As the others have said, more Ram memory will stop the continually swapping of stuff on and off the hard disc drive, which makes the computer slower and works the disc harder. 512MB is probably the maximum that will be recognised and would be plenty. If you have 128 or 256 at the moment, add 256 - cost £30 to 40. With quite a few protection processes, OE and IE, my 1GHz P3 is using about 230MB at the moment

JohalaReewi

At work I run XP pro on a 700MHz pentium with 256M memory. No problems with internet or anything. At home I still have my 256M RAM, 400MHz AMD K6 machine with a broadband modem and it surfs the internet quite happily. The only thing it isn't too good with is graphics. Some graphic intensive sites can slow surfing down a bit but this is down to the sluggish onboard SiS graphics and not the CPU. I agree with the other posters, with 512M of memory, your system should be fine for XP and Broadband. You don't say what processor you are using (AMD, Intel??).

wolfman

andy88 wrote:

If you have 128 or 256 at the moment, add 256 - cost £30 to 40.

You'll be able to find 256mb ram for under £20 easily. It's probably slightly older ram you have so maybe even £10 for a 256mb module.