new desktop PC needed for elderly dad

indigospooky

Elderly dad needs new desktop PC. He is actually pretty computer literate and doesn't want anything too basic (i.e. that will just cause problems in a year's time), although it's mostly for online banking, emails, playing around with Linux etc.

He won't consider anything refurbed, which is annoying. Budget is £500-£600. So the spec he needs is (I think):

Tower not laptop
512GB SSD 
16GB RAM
Windows 11

I was looking at Dell and HP but have been warned off them, so now looking at Acer, ASUS and Lenovo. But some Acers seem to get terrible reviews. Struggling to find something new within his budget. Any ideas? Or should I be looking at something else altogether? Thanks for any advice.

Mark_d

I would go for something like this:

https://www.lenovo.com/gb/en/p/desktops/thinkcentre/m-series-towers/lenovo-thinkcentre-m90t-gen-4-(intel)/len102c0041

Go for the cheapest and configure it to get 16GB RAM

indigospooky

Thank you! The only problem with that one is that delivery takes weeks and weeks. I've been looking at something similar on laptopsdirect though. Not allowed to post a link here but they have

Lenovo ThinkCentre M75s AMD Ryzen 5 5600G 16GB RAM 512GB SSD Windows 11 Pro Desktop PC

for £479. Is there anything obvious I'm overlooking that would make this problematic?

Neil_Jones

indigospooky said:

Elderly dad needs new desktop PC. He is actually pretty computer literate and doesn't want anything too basic (i.e. that will just cause problems in a year's time), although it's mostly for online banking, emails, playing around with Linux etc.

He won't consider anything refurbed, which is annoying. Budget is £500-£600. So the spec he needs is (I think):

Tower not laptop
512GB SSD 
16GB RAM
Windows 11

I was looking at Dell and HP but have been warned off them, so now looking at Acer, ASUS and Lenovo. But some Acers seem to get terrible reviews. Struggling to find something new within his budget. Any ideas? Or should I be looking at something else altogether? Thanks for any advice.

Why have you been warned off Dell and HP?

My Acer laptop lasted 12 years of daily use (including gaming on it that it was never really designed for which made the fan go crazy) and the only reason I replaced it at all was because one of the processor security flaws for the one it had was never going to receive an update, and Windows had to mitigate it, which was painfully slow.

A local library used to have HP computers, that were still mostly working best part of 15 years after they were first installed.  Yes they were old and crap but they worked...

indigospooky

Oh, interesting, thank you. Was warned off Dell & HP because of bloatware. I always thought Acers were pretty ok but the only ones I can find within his budget seem to not get brilliant reviews because they're a bit basic.  

IvanOpinion

Not sure who warned you off Dell and HP but I would be seriously questioning any computer related advice from them.

As a work from home employee I am using my trusty 8 year old HP on a daily basis (averaging about 9-10 hours per day). Never given me a single problem.

Neil_Jones

indigospooky said:

Oh, interesting, thank you. Was warned off Dell & HP because of bloatware. I always thought Acers were pretty ok but the only ones I can find within his budget seem to not get brilliant reviews because they're a bit basic.  

"Bloatware" is not exclusive to any particular brand.

In fact it is more of a trend in Windows than anything else.

indigospooky

This is all really good to know, thanks for your contributions. I really need to sort this out for him in the next couple of days but am trying to combine research with doing my own full-time job so I'm trying to narrow down the options as efficiently as possible and present him with two or three for him to choose between. It's hard not to go round in circles and I really need to make the right choice.

400ixl

Is it just a base unit he needs, or a complete unit with screen, monitor etc?

You say playing around with Linux, but then want Windows 11. So does he use Linux in Virtual machines?

All windows machines come with bloatware from the manufacturers, and Asus / Acer / Lenovo are as bad as HP and Dell for it. So whoever told you to avoid some and not others on that basis has no clue.

Does he need components like CD-DVD drive? 

Tower PC's are now really the domain of gamers or business users, so mainly not in the cheaper end of the market. You can often get a normal user spec cheaper in a laptop that a desktop these days. That doesn't stop you plugging a monitor, keyboard and mouse into it and using it as if it were a desktop, with the advantage of being able to be mobile with it when you need to be. Worth considering.

indigospooky

So helpful, thank you.

Just a base unit. He has monitor etc, but obviously if there were any good deals that came with the whole caboodle that would be fine. He's viusually impaired so needs a fairly big monitor and he likes the one he has so no point paying for a new one unnecessarily.

He does use mainly Linux (which I don't know the first thing about - he's 85 but way ahead of me in this respect) but I think partitions his hard drive to run both??? Honestly, I have no clue. Just going by what he tells me he wants.

Doesn't need CD-DVD drive.

I agree that a laptop would be better but I don't think he sees it that way and that might open up a whole new can of worms ... I'm hoping I can find something around £500-£600 that will do the job but not be so basic that I'll end up having to fix problems for him further down the line.

PRAISETHESUN

Can't really help with recommendations, as I only really ever build my own PCs these days. But WRT to the bloatware issue, just do a fresh install with a clean windows iso file (you can download directly from Microsoft), rather than using the version provided by the manufacturer. After you do this it basically makes all manufacturers equivalent, so you can focus on pricing and components you want to get the absolute best deal. If he has installed and uses Linux on his current machine, then sorting out a Windows install should be fairly straightforward for him to sort out himself.