Thread: Need a New Computer

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Originally Posted by DennyW

Dave, it's really not hard to build one. Look at me. 1999 was the first time I turned one on, and the blue screen made me cuss.

I built my son's dual core gaming computer for 530.00. The like ones all done were 13-1500.00. You just have to decide what you want it to do first. Some boards are not expandable. There you have to be careful. The low priced ones new, are usually that way. I have built mine also. Not as bold as my son's, because I do not game like him. I have 450.00 in mine. That's new case, new board, pen 4 processor, 3 hard drives. (I just got a 500 gig western digital, new, for 106.50) for the added pictures. I run the case air tight. I use 2 120 x 1" fans on the side, with filters. 2 80 fans on the back for exhaust. No dust, and runs really cool.

I guess I'd best start figuring out if this is the way to go - and quite frankly, think it is. BUT, I still have to make my wife happy as well so she can do her HR thing occasionally at home. The separate monster hard drive for pictures intrigues me as well as it is eating my current one, even with putting many on CDs.

I'll spec out a set of components and run by you via PM for a sanity check - any problem with that?

I started building my own in 1985 with off the shelf hardware. At that time you could build for a lot less than you could buy. In many ways you still can if you do enough research and have reliable deep discount places to shop. Last year I was going to build a new pc, and I wanted a core 2 duo system with ram expansion capability up to 8 gb and a large 320 - 500 gb hd plus two dvd burners. After pricing the parts I found that I could buy a ready built system for less than it was going to cost me. (I paid $599, couldn't build for that price). Not as much self satisfaction, but it got me to where I wanted to be, cheap. This isn't always the case, but like I said if you do the research, it can happen.

The most important thing is the motherboard, and that is where all of research time should be spent. There are so many variables it's almost mind boggling. And needless to say, it is very difficult to find a motherboard at a reasonable price with all the bells and whistles that your heart desires. One good thing about building versus buying is that you won't end up with a proprietary system where many of the additional or replacement parts have to purchased from the OEM. I hate those bastards.

In any case, good systems can be had for under $500 or you can spend $3500 if that is what you desire. As for a laptop, I would never consider building one. The best rugged ones are Panasonic, but they are pricey. Toshiba's are the most reliable, but Dell is a close follower. With Dell you can pick and choose your components, which is a good thing.

The most reliable systems, desktop or laptops, are Apples, but they are not big sellers in the business world.

I just want to participate so I get updates on what you folks find/learn. I have a four year old Toshiba Satellite laptop which was the fastest CPU I could find then at 3.01 GHz as a monoprocessor. I use it for the Internet, WORD for writing the book and number-crunching quantum Chemistry calculations. I have run into overheating on long runs but I have a RubberMaid lap unit that I cut holes in under the PC and that helps cooling. I am worrying over a replacement unit and I am disappointed that the duo core CPUs are slower than my mono-3.01 GHz although I do see that running calculations does conflict with Internet action. I think I will look into a local company here in Virginia that makes souped up game PCs and get something fast for calculations; I don't care about super game graphics as long as I can draw still pictures. I use the laptop like a desktop but sitting in my living room recliner with the TV on in the background. The only advantage of the laptop is when I have to travel so I can take my calculations and results somewhere. I dropped a previous laptop on a gravel driveway and lost some data from the hard drive but it still ran. That means maybe the laptops are a bit sturdier in some ways. My wife has a PC which was one of the last available monoprocessor Pentiums but with VISTA. In our effort to put our main program on a CD in the book we found our program (Visual Basic V5 + WATCOM f77 code) would run on Windows 98, Windows Millennium, Windows XP Home and Windows XP Pro but choked on WINDOWS Vista (at first). Then we found that VISTA is downward compatible to a large extent if you go to the trouble to release a LOT of permissions, so that we now can run our same program(s) on VISTA as well, but it is more complicated to use VISTA. My preliminary interpretation is that VISTA has too many security restrictions and that makes it more complicated. I am interested to learn what you folks find/recommend and inparticular I am interested in the top speed in floating point arithmetic. For the nostalgia buffs with Commodore 64s we gave ours away long ago but I do have (somewhere) a Sinclair with the extra 16K memory, wow!

Don Shillady
Retired Scioentist/teen rodder