Until the first Vista service pack comes out at least, if you have choice, stick with XP, service pack 2.
2 Processor. Single, Core 2, Quad? What speed?
If its a portable and if you are into to any type of strong processing, go duo, and I would go Pentium Duos. If a laptop, then use the mobile versions, up to 2 ghz or a little more. I personally like the duo 3 ghz in my XPS 600.
3. Hard drive. Size? Two on board or just one? Portable back up?
I'd use a RAID configuration giving 320 Gig first line, and 320 Gig backup.
4. Graphics Card? I'm more of a Civilization-type/Strategy gamer than anything else. I don't need bleeding edge graphics but would like room for growth.
I'd make sure, if its a desktop that you had at least two PCI-E 16 slots so you can SLI if you ever need to. I personally like the NVidia cards, 7900 or higher.
5. Networking. Probably will use the new machine as the hub of network and use the old one as a kids machine. I'm inclined to worry about this later, so all I really want are expansion slots and (I'm guessing) some kind of network card.
I'd stay wired as opposed to being wirelss and use a good 10/110 card and a decent 10/100 hub.
6. Monitor. The 19" flat panel seems like a good trade between cost and screen size. Thoughts?
I'd get a 20" or 22" wide screen flat panel. That's what I sue on my XPS and it's great and reasonable price.
7. All in one. HP is offering All-in-one printer/copier/scanner/fax machines for $100-$200. Does anyone have any notable experiences with these?
If you are going to have a network, get an HP networkable color all in one, either inkjet or laserjet. I have four compuers networked in what my kids call the "control room". Mom, Dad, two sons. Lots of gaming, lots of surfing, lots of music and movies. We use the HP Photosmart D7260 and REALLY like it. It';'s a network, phot, all in one.
8. Data transfer? HP pushes a Belkin transfer cable. Is this anything more than a USB cable? Or should I just set up a network and deal with data transfer that way?
I always take care of this myself over the network.
1. XP or Vista? If Vista, what flavor?
If that is what you are limiting yourself to, hands down...XP. Vista is just not ready for prime time, the EULA is a nightmare, and many applications just cough up hairballs on it.
2 Processor. Single, Core 2, Quad? What speed?
Depends on your intended usage. Since you mentioned Media Center, I’ll use that. Core 2 Extreme. Best all around processor on the market today.
3. Hard drive. Size? Two on board or just one? Portable back up?
I always prefer two hard drives in a mirrored array. This provides complete backup of all of your data, programs, settings without a performance hit. You’ll need to specify that in your order, or buy software after the fact.
4. Graphics Card? I’m more of a Civilization-type/Strategy gamer than anything else. I don’t need bleeding edge graphics but would like room for growth.
Graphic cards have come a long way in the last several years. What you buy depends a lot on the manufacturer of your machine and/or motherboard. No matter what you wind up with, you’ll want a graphics card that has it’s own GPU on board.
5. Networking. Probably will use the new machine as the hub of network and use the old one as a kids machine. I’m inclined to worry about this later, so all I really want are expansion slots and (I’m guessing) some kind of network card.
I’m old fashioned and security consciences (hey, I still use NetBEUI internally LOL). So, for me, any backwards compatible 10/100/1000 card will do. I haven’t noticed any functional differences in the lot of them.
6. Monitor. The 19” flat panel seems like a good trade between cost and screen size. Thoughts?
19” is the largest I’d go. To be honest, even at 19”, I find myself physically turning my head left and right to see everything. I much prefer two or three 17” flat screens to work with.
7. All in one. HP is offering All-in-one printer/copier/scanner/fax machines for $100-$200. Does anyone have any notable experiences with these?
I have grown away from mainstream HP Printer products in the last few years. They just don’t seem to last as long. Their commercial stuff is still up there, but consumer level has dropped in quality. I prefer Brother or even Lexmark.
8. Data transfer? HP pushes a Belkin transfer cable. Is this anything more than a USB cable? Or should I just set up a network and deal with data transfer that way?
If you’re staying with windows, just configure your network, prepare the files and settings you want to migrate, and use the transfer wizard. It does work well and it’s simple.
I can’t be more strong in my caution of Vista. That’s all I have to say. LOL
Good luck! :O)
Have you considered Unix or Linux with VMware ?I would recommend that you to get Root !
I have an HP V40XI printer/scanner/copier/fax.
I am very happy with it, but get ready, the color cartridge was 39 bux.
ping
All of the above.
Tech Support Ping..
XP is better but going forward, new games will be Vista only. Gamers might as well resign themselves to Vista and getting a Direct X 10 video card. And Vista is slow so you’ll want a Core 2 Duo processor and at least 2 GB of Ram.
1) May I ask why you are swearing off Apple or Linux? If I *had* to choose between XP and vist I would go with XP, Vista needs an SP or two befreo the kins are worked out.
2) Depends on wht youre going to do with it, if were not talking processor intensive thins you might better invlest in a mid line dual core and get a better video card or more memory. I still have P3 systems that work fine for me but im up to a few gig of memory.
3) Again its gets to the usage, I usually do well with ne lage drive but I also have a low end nas device at home for backup storage
4) I dont use anythig but on baord graphics cards so I cant really tell you what to use here but I get by fine for civ with lower end cards..
5) Unless you have a major! sweet pipe coming into your house any old network card will do.
6) definatly go flat panel if youre going to want to use a KVM staty away from DVI otherwise DVI is the way to go (youll need your graphics card to match)
7) Ive had alot of luck with teh HP photosmart all in one C5800. Its a usb or network printer which is nice becuase if your kid and you are going to have systems on your network you can print and scan over the network to your machine.
8) How much are we talking about transferring?
What do you want to do with it and how much do you want to spend?
I see several mention a network card above. Pretty much every motherboard I've seen in recent times has built in Ethernet, usually 100 Mbits. You don't need a separate network card. It's built in.
For processor, I'd recommend an Intel Core Duo. My favorite PC has a 6600 (2.4 GHz), but that shifts over time. I am a bit of cheap skate, but do enjoy fast computers, so I look for the "knee in the curve", being the point that getting a little more performance starts to cost alot more dollars.
Two cores is probably enough for most desktop work, as it allows one to have one compute intensive application going, and still be able to get quick response from secondary apps such as ones email, instant messenger or calendar, while running some background apps such as malware and trojan detectors.. Most Windows apps won't make much use of multiple cores, so it is mostly just the usage pattern of the one primary user that determines the benefit of multiple cores. Specifically coded computationally intensive applications that have more inherent parallelism can gain much more from higher core counts, but that's not common in typical desktop usage. Two cores are -much- nicer for desktop usage than one; they feel quicker because background and secondary apps don't intrude on the main app (or game.)
Big Civ III games like alot of memory. I'd go with two GBytes.
I haven't looked at video cards laterly not being a gamer myself, but I'd think that insisting on dual PCI-E slots for SLI is overkill for most users, other than gamers pushing the hottest graphics intensive games. I'd be content with a single PCI-E graphics card slot (16 channel PCI-E), plus perhaps some smaller channel count PCI-E slots.
There is a surprising performance gain from higher speed disks such as the Western Digital Raptor. And there are some good gains to be had from using more than one disk spindle, so that your disk head is not spending its life seeking from the C: drive to the D: drive (if you have apps on a different Windows drive). I'd consider various combinations of drives, such as C: on a Raptor and a RAID'd pair of bigger slower drives for your multimedia files that eat alot of space but are less frequently accessed. Then do disk-to-disk backups of the C: drive to another partition on the big slow pair.
The Belkin Transfer Cable looks to be a Windows Vista thing. Agreeing with the warnings of others above to stay away from Vista, that implies this cable doesn't help you any. To transfer stuff from an old PC's disks to a new PC, I usually just move the disks into the new PC as secondary disks, and copy over stuff as I find the need for it.
The monitor size, between 19" and 22" is a personal tradeoff of money versus perference, in my view. If you like having two full text windows (a common practice for programmers such as myself) then the higher resolution such as 1600x1200 that comes on some of the wider 20" inch screens is worth the price difference. Typical Windows apps and games only want one big window on the screen at a time, and for those, a 19" is fine.
I wouldn't try to use a Windows box as a network hub. Rather, I'd buy a separate router (aka home firewall) and connect all your PC's to that.
I've stopped using cheap color ink jet printers and switched to black and white lasers (easy for me to do, as I don't need color printing.) The Lexmark E342n in front of me cost a little more, but is holding up much better than the cheap printers. It's plugged into the router using Ethernet, and appears as a network printer to all my Windows, Mac OS X and Linux boxes.
Yes! I bought the HP Photosmart C4180 for $119 when it was introduced last year and I love it. One hell of a machine.
I wouldn't hesitate to buy another. I have friends and family who own Photosmart C series all-in-ones and they love them too.
Just had a similar request from a friend. She got a Everex 1.5Ghz Intel Celeron notebook with WinXP for less than $400 after rebates. If browsing is all you want to do, cheap is good enough. She is happy with the machine. Most applications aren’t multi threaded and can’t use the extra cores.
As to Vista, MS gave me a Beta copy, I used it like I promised for six months, then deleted it. They sent the full version, it’s still in the box. It was way too slow and ponderous. I now use Dell/Ubuntu full time on my $400 3GHz Dell 400SC box. Works fine for net browsing and all other chores.
You want windows, use XP. You want free, use Ubuntu.