after a fire, friend needs a new PC....
wants a pc, not gonna talk her into a mac...if you had 1200 budget and needed computer and printer, what would you recommend....she needs it for school papers, email, instant messaging, cd burning, light gaming....she is a computer novice and wants simple and easy (like a mac, but she doen't think the mac will talk to the pc's at her daughter's school)...showed her how my iMac works with all the iApps...but she is fearful and i won't force any computer on someone...any thoughts...or should she just get a dull?? thanks g
ps. i know she will be like my wife's family and wonder why i can do all these things on my computer that they can't do on their pc...but what is a boy to do?)
ps. i know she will be like my wife's family and wonder why i can do all these things on my computer that they can't do on their pc...but what is a boy to do?)
Comments
Otherwise, the only real choice is the Dell Dimension 4550...2 GHz P4, 256 MB RAM. 1 year warranty, 30 GB HDD, DVD-ROM, CD-RW, GeForce4 MX, Office XP Small Business, 17 inch non-flat CRT...not very extravagant specs...astonishingly close to an eMac. It comes in around $1100.
An eMac would come in around the same after taxes and rebates for a 700 MHz/Combo Drive/256 MB/40 GB config. Would she notice the speed difference? Maybe a little...Office would also be missing. Maybe she'd need a floppy...
The Epson Stylus C62 and HP Deskjet 3820 should be good midrange inkjet printers.
[ 12-21-2002: Message edited by: Eugene ]</p>
She should get an iBook. The $1299 model with the Edu discount.
[ 12-21-2002: Message edited by: Steve ]</p>
If you config the $629 special PC they have on their web page with the following:
XP 2000+
256 MB DDR
Maxtor 80GB HD
Geforce4 MX
Pioneer 16xDVD, Liteon 48x CDRW
Samsung 753DF Dynaflat 17" CRT
Altec Lansing AVS300 speakers
Microsoft keyboard, and intellimouse optical
HP Deskjet 3820
Office XP Small Business
2-year onsite warranty
$1169 before tax/shipping (I think tax is only in CA)
[ 12-21-2002: Message edited by: MCQ ]</p>
<strong>I can understand when someone has valid arguments against not wanting a Mac, but in this case, you just have to keep re-assuring her that those are just false myths.
She should get an iBook. The $1299 model with the Edu discount.
[ 12-21-2002: Message edited by: Steve ]</strong><hr></blockquote>
Yeah, if this is a college, then a 12" ibook might just prove to be extremely portable and useful in both classes and in labs. Or she could always use it her dorm...
For a female, I find it hard to reccomend a computer with a big old heavy and bulky Monitor. Don't forget how often she might just have to move that thing (to school, back for breaks, to school, back for breaks...). Some Colleges have desks that are not the most accomodating for a real 17 inch monitor.
You could get her a $899 ibook, and then either set her up with OpenOffice.org, or Microsoft Office as her productivity suite. (Open Office works darn good, I've used it with much ease. But Business majors will need Microsoft office.)
If you don't get her an ibook, do consider another sub-$1000 laptop. And when you're attempting to do such, I'd like to see you really find as great a laptop at as nice a price.
An iMac, or even eMac would also be simpler for moving to and from college, and thus other viable alternative, as they are easier to transport than a computer tower and a monitor, plus external speakers and subwoofers, plus keyboard and mouse.
With an eMac, you are just moving around the eMac, a keyboard, and a mouse...
My only thinking is that it's because she only has 128mb of memory, plus the harddrive may be slow, but this thing really, really, really still runs like crud, no matter what you want to say. The Dell technicians can't figure it out, and claim it should be working. They claim the low memory should not be enough to cause this effect. I have to say that adding memory is the only thing I can think of that we haven't tried yet!!! We turned down or off pretty much everything. Be careful buying a cheap dell. No true Desktop should ship with 128MB of ram, or an ATI Rage 128.
Her system is traveling at the speed of a 133mhz PC...
I've built my last 3 computers, and I've never put less than 256 in one. 512 DDR in the last 2 (first one 266 DDR, second one 333DDR Cas-2)
I think another nice thing about buying an Apple is that you won't fall into her no support in the mainsteam, computer that doesn't work, black hole.
Um, my name is Greg, and I am a PC user... I've used Linux for the last 3 years, Windows for the 5 years, and Apples since I was 7.
If anyone here can speak against a PC, it would be me. But of course, I plan on selling my PC for an Apple within the next 1-2 years. Whenever I have shot enough digital video to reason the switch.
(Dell Disclaimer, I have 2 dells [1 a family computer, one my twin's computer] which run quite fine, minus floppy and hard drive problems, plus the systems not originally shipping with the correct pieces [they included CHEAPER pieces but charged us for the more expensive ones we ordered. That was very wrong. First they shipped with a crappy card instead of a TNT-2. Then they sent us a PCI TNT-2 instead of the ordered AGP. The whole time having taken our money many months in advance, while we wait, and wait and wait... That was not a fun Christmas (or should I say November thru Febuary)] Still, our Dell's have been very nice to us, having been $1000+ machines. I've only seen this chaos on a friend of mine (Alicia's) computer. Now, how do I tell her that she was ripped off by what's considered to be the most trustable PC Company? I can not for some time reccomend any of the sub-$1000 Dell's, even if it is only based on 1 horrible, horrible, horrible, horrible, ..., experience.)
[ 12-21-2002: Message edited by: greg123 ]</p>
if she IS a teacher... see if she can get an old computer from the school...
[quote] No true Desktop should ship with 128MB of ram, or an ATI Rage 128 <hr></blockquote>
HAHAHAHA classic iMacs anyone?
not to mention the eMacs, low end iMac and low end iBook (ram)
[ 12-21-2002: Message edited by: Paul ]</p>
<strong>$1200 is quite a bit of a budget for a PC... I'd suggest ABS ( <a href="http://www.abspc.com"; target="_blank">http://www.abspc.com</a>; ), they're a second tier PC maker but have had pretty good reviews in a number of magazines, and my 1.5 year old PC is from them, hasn't had any troubles yet.
If you config the $629 special PC they have on their web page with the following:
XP 2000+
256 MB DDR
Maxtor 80GB HD
Geforce4 MX
Pioneer 16xDVD, Liteon 48x CDRW
Samsung 753DF Dynaflat 17" CRT
Altec Lansing AVS300 speakers
Microsoft keyboard, and intellimouse optical
HP Deskjet 3820
Office XP Small Business
2-year onsite warranty
$1169 before tax/shipping (I think tax is only in CA)
[ 12-21-2002: Message edited by: MCQ ]</strong><hr></blockquote>
Yeah, ABS PCs are pretty good. My friend's got one that's almost 2 years old and it's never had any major problems.
Don't bother with a Compaq monitor, they are nothing special, just get a 17" Samsung or LG display.
In the $700 range (depending on the dealer) you can get the D315 with the Athlon XP 2600+, 256MB RAM, 40GB Hard Drive and 48x CD-RW.
That leaves alot of headroom for a monitor and printer.
The D315 is the best mainstream PC on the market these days, 3 years onsite service \\ 3 years telephone support.
You can't go wrong with the D315,
Although I don't really have any experiance with the day-to-day use of the 310, we don't carry them.
Also the 315 has a 3 year warranty, the 310 only has one year.
Also, when it comes to upgrades, there will be atleast two more generations of AMD Athlons that will be compatable with the 315 motherboard, the next generation of Pentium 4 needs an all new motherboard.
The quality of the D315 is very, very good. It has a much lower failure rate than Macs do these days, we have sold atleast 100 of them.
The Compaq Persario's are complete crap, and I don't think they are going to be around much longer as the HP Pavilions are much better.
However the corporate Compaq models, such as the D315 are very well built, and very reliable.
The D315 is the most popular model for our Mac customers who are switching to Windows.
Although if you do go with the Mac, if this is her first mac, stay the hell away from the eMac, it will also be her last Mac if she gets one of the suicidal eMacs.
I worked in an all Compaq environment, and those machines were total crap. Now I work in an all Dell environment and those machines have been 100% reliable so far. A lab full of earlier Dells, (white/beige towers) is a complete piece of shjt, but anything newer (black/grey boxes) has been perfect, both in my office and in the three new labs I've seen. Yet I hear people always claiming that Dell's suck etc etc... And now I hear that Compaqs are good and reliable, but the slightly older machines I've seen (sub GHz Celery's) sucked, badly.
look at Apple, the LCD iMac seems to have a flawless quality control record, while the eMac and G4 towers are practically suicidal.
I don't think you can appraise the quality of a certain vendors wares based on the performance of a single product,
I am sure alot of schools with Apple eMacs are damning Apple to hell over half their systems being knocked out at once and over and over again by the same monitor problem.
And I am sure there are alot of people with Compaq Persario's damning Compaq to hell because the front of their case keeps falling off.
I wonder when Apple will finally see fit to pass the savings on to the consumer?
Nothing like a $3299 computer that is less reliable than a $199 Walmart brand PC