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why is it so difficult to pick out a new computer?
Paul Keith:
Coincidentally:
Laptops surprises me, I would think that now would be a great time to buy a previous (chip) generation laptop, as the new gen ones are just coming out (ie, Sandy Bridge this year). Maybe the April one is because it's a lull. It's almost the end of the school year, and no one buys a laptop for summer. But I still feel like now - probably more realistically in a month - would be a great time to buy a prev-gen laptop.
Or, a brand new one. I got a great deal on a Sandy Bridge Toshiba earlier this week. I'm still a little baffled at the deal I got. It was even 15% off on Amazon from like…the day it was released. Haven't gotten to play with it yet (it's being delivered today), so I guess there's still the possibility there's something wrong with it.
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@Aaron Crabtree: It's like you said - now IS a good time to buy a laptop. The article doesn't take technology shifts into account. You can now either get a laptop with a previous gen cpu cheap, or pay a bit extra for a Sandy Bridge based laptop that will last you a lot longer. Prices won't fall significantly by April, except maybe some brands/models may be slower to switch. Now is definitely the time to start looking.
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via Lifehacker
Unfortunately I don't really know how to take advantage of this opportunity either.
Too many additional apparels nowadays to figure it out.
Example, do I need a Tonido plug or not? http://www.tonidoplug.com/
or here's an Amazon review saying the laptop has no E-sata port:
Great machine and a great value for the money but no eSATA port. The specs indicate at least one USB 2.0/eSATA combo port. Bought one last week at Office Max with the expectation that I would be able to directly connect my older eSATA external drive. No such luck. The computer does has a USB 3.0 port so I had to buy a BYTECC eSATA to USB 3.0 adapter from Amazon (which by the way works great) to retain the speed of the eSATA connection.
The machine is noticibly faster than my 6 month old i3-350 Toshiba. I will give it 5 stars because of the outstanding value even though the lack of a direct connect eSATA port was a small problem.
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Stoic Joker:
A dell Vostro (basic business machine) with close to those specs shouldn't be to hard to get for around $500 if you get it without the monitor. If they just need Email an web (this is the "close to" part), go with a 32-bit OS and 2GB or RAM.
Avoid HP if at all possible (it never ends well), they tend to garbage up a machine with multimedia frills that break, and most of the parts are astronomically priced. I've yet to see an old one that somebody was still happy with (toaster level disposable).
app103:
A dell Vostro (basic business machine) with close to those specs shouldn't be to hard to get for around $500 if you get it without the monitor. If they just need Email an web (this is the "close to" part), go with a 32-bit OS and 2GB or RAM.
-Stoic Joker (January 23, 2011, 08:35 AM)
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I have a Vostro...fantastic machine! I would recommend it to anyone that was looking for a PC and didn't want to build it themselves. They are built to last and Dell is willing to stand behind them for a long time, especially if you pay for the option of an extended warranty...much longer than most companies. That was part of the reason why I bought a Vostro.
Avoid HP if at all possible (it never ends well), they tend to garbage up a machine with multimedia frills that break, and most of the parts are astronomically priced. I've yet to see an old one that somebody was still happy with (toaster level disposable).
-Stoic Joker (January 23, 2011, 08:35 AM)
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I have owned both a HP consumer grade PC (Pavilion a847c from tigerdirect) and a business class one (dc7600sff from geeks.com) and I will agree with you as far as the consumer grade ones goes. Not a good experience and it died a horrible premature death due to inferior parts that were made of plastic when they should have been metal. Not only that, but their software bundle they force on everyone really stinks, they install hidden crap that should not be on a pc without the user's knowledge and can cause problems (outdated versions of Python), and the CD burner they included wouldn't work with any software other than the outdated demo they provided in their crappy bundle. It didn't come with OS and drivers disks and instead had a restore partition.
I have been happy with the business class machine though. I am not sure if it was HP's doing (probably not) but the included software bundle was a good one that actually made sense (OpenOffice, AVG free, CD Burner XP, VLC, etc), had OS & driver disks instead of a restore partition, the burner works with up to date versions of popular burning apps, and the parts that should be metal, are.
I have purchased from Geeks before. It looks like most of their stuff is refurbs, which in my opinion are too high priced for a slightly used computer as compared to a new one.
-techidave (January 22, 2011, 09:31 PM)
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Yes, most of their stuff is refurbs, but they do also carry new stuff. My HP dc7600sff was not a refurb, was the same specs as this one, except that it also came with XP Pro, a keyboard, mouse, speakers and was $150 (over 1 yr ago). I repeat...it was new, not a refurb. Very nice little machine that was much better than the $800 consumer grade piece of HP junk that I had, with similar CPU/RAM specs.
Carol Haynes:
Try building from a barebones system upwards - all you have to add are CPU, Memory, HD and DVD drives plus an OEM version of Windows.
I have found I can build new machines very quickly and can make a reasonable profit charging similar prices to Dell and HP. Difference is my machines are higher spec: quadcore AMD CPU, 8Gb DDR3 RAM and 1Tb Hard disk. Comparably priced machines are usually dual core, 3 or 4 Gb, 0.5 Tb.
The other advantage is that I know exactly what has gone into the build.
A good barebones unit is ASUS V6-M4A3000E (about $140 US) which comes with case, PSU and motherboard with integrated Radeon 3000 graphics and 7.1 surround sound. Ideal for office work or internet machine. You just plug in CPU and heatsink, memory and attach a hard disk and DVD drive (one SATA cable supplied and one PATA cable supplied with a few screws). Could do with a slightly more powerful PSU if you want to add a separate graphics card but is perfectly adequate as a standard build. Also runs near silent and cool. Windows 7 installs all hardware automatically so setup is quick and easy.
40hz:
There's a lot of good reasons for building a PC. But doing so primarily to come up with the lowest cost 'box o'chips' isn't one of them.
You may be able to offer your client better value at specific (usually $700 USD and up) price points. But once you go below that you really can't compete with volume OEMs. Especially when you consider a copy of Win7 costs them less than $40 per shipped machine.
For that, the solution is to get a better quality low-end machine from one of the 'big boys' and judiciously upgrade and tune it for your client. I've had good luck with HP and Dell for that. Catch them on sale and you'll never be able to match their price for what you get.
Many of these inexpensive "business" machines work quite well once you clean out the crapware and do some performance tweaking. HP in particular benefits hugely from that. I have a client that just bought a few inexpensive HP biz desktops. Performance was meh despite having fairly powerful AMD multicores. Some driver and OS updates combined with wholesale crapware elimination turned these little guys into a pack of very sprightly workstations. Add in an inexpensive RAM upgrade plus some system tweaks, and now they almost sing!
Which further reinforces my conviction that on low to low/mid level hardware, setup and system maintenance are as (or even more) important than the hardware. This is where a small computer business can best add value.
You can't compete with the big OEMs on hardware or OS pricing. They can't compete with us for doing all the things you need to do to pull maximum performance out of the hardware. It's too time consuming for them. That's why they take the easy way out by cutting hardware prices to the bone; do the simplest (bordering on braindead) system setup imaginable; and boost revenues by collecting bounty payments for installing junk.
For them, it's all about volume. But for us it's all about performance and customer service.
To which I say: Vive la différence! :Thmbsup:
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