And now to get that cheap, replacement desktop PC...

Alan_Cross

I'm looking, if possible, to spend considerably less than I did last time around.

I see that entering the search term 'desktop pc' on ebay brings up a lot of reconditioned and 'a-grade', mostly Dell models between £50 and £100.

Would anyone say these are a possibility?

Bear in mind that I don't need gaming or streaming of films. I use the thing only for general internet surfing, basic wordprocessing and document/photo storage.

The thing to be replaced is a Dell Inspiron 531.

Anyone able to offer any words of advice? Am I right in assuming I can continue to use my current monitor (Dell) and printer (HP)..?

Please ask if I've missed out anything.

I_have_spoken

I got my dad a reconditioned HP desktop for under £100 with Window 7 and it was fine.

getmore4less

what's wrong with the one you have?

What spec it's probably still fine for what you want to do, might just need a bit of TLC and a reinstall.

debitcardmayhem

One word of advice the monitor/printer should be ok

GunJack

I_have_spoken wrote: »

I got my dad a reconditioned HP desktop for under £100 with Window 7 and it was fine.

lots of hp desktops on ebay, I got one for my dad, one for me and one for m-i-l, average cost (no OS) around £45 each which includes upping them all to 4GB RAM

If you don't need high-power systems (these are Core2Duo machines) bang-for-buck these are a great option

spud17

GunJack wrote: »

If you don't need high-power systems (these are Core2Duo machines) bang-for-buck these are a great option

True, still great for everyday use.
(Says he while waiting for workmate threatening to skip his, 'cos it's obsolete').

Alan_Cross

Just hoping for a few more replies.

I just can't clear my current pc of various faults. Rather than spend £100 on getting someone to do this (allegedly, only to find that there's still something wrong) I thought I'd go down the buy-a-replacement route.

So... assuming I have up to c £100 available..?

LHW99

Dell Computers often have a recovery partition. And often came with a recovery disk.
As long as you have backed up the important files you should then be able to reset the machine to factory condition.

GunJack

Alan_Cross wrote: »

Just hoping for a few more replies.

I just can't clear my current pc of various faults. Rather than spend £100 on getting someone to do this (allegedly, only to find that there's still something wrong) I thought I'd go down the buy-a-replacement route.

So... assuming I have up to c £100 available..?

ok, so

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/121149838534 £23 delivered

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/400809767250 £13 del

so, £36 for the machine, leaves plenty for a W7 key, so total around £50-£60 ;D

googler

Alan_Cross wrote: »

I just can't clear my current pc of various faults. Rather than spend £100 on getting someone to do this (allegedly, only to find that there's still something wrong) I thought I'd go down the buy-a-replacement route.

So ... there's something wrong with the DATA on your hard disk, everything (everything) else is working fine, there's nothing wrong with the hardware, and you want to replace ALL of it?

If you have the install disks that came with your 531, then you can fix this for way less than £100. You can still do it for less than £100 if you don't

Get an SSD from Amazon or similar. Doesn't need to be huge, 60Gb will do for £30 or so.

In short, take the current HDD out, and put it to one side. Install the SSD as a primary drive, install OS and drivers from your disks. Once it's working, install your old HDD as a secondary drive. All your data will still be on it, and anything causing your current problems won't get accessed by the OS. Result - speedy PC

There are guides all over the internut to help you do this.

Oh, and I'm typing this on a 531 that has been upgraded with the very process I describe above..... 60Gb primary SSD with OS only, two 1Tb HDDs with data only

Cisco001

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/HP-COMPAQ-TOWER-6200-INTEL-i3-3-30GHz-4GB-RAM-250GB-Windows-7-Pro-Value-PC-/161934030123?hash=item25b405352b:g:vbIAAOSwQPlV~TlB

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/DELL-OPTIPLEX-390-CORE-i3-DT-PC-3-10GHZ-4GB-250GB-DVD-ROM-WIN-7-PRO-INSTALLED-/201506329624?hash=item2eeab69418:g:9icAAOSwpDdU4zul