Got my eye on a computer, is it a good deal?

[tommyroo]

Dude, don't buy a Dell. The monitor on my laptop is screwing up a month after my two year warrenty is up.

[BLouIsGod]

For whats its worth the system had an amd 2.2 dual core processor? . A 256mb card on dell's site is 45-150 bucks... Ill keep looking around though, dont do much gaming at all, basic sound is okay for now too. and dont need a monitor. I use my 47" 1080p lcd and bose system for sight and sound

[Izzy]

Originally Posted by tommyroo

Dude, don't buy a Dell. The monitor on my laptop is screwing up a month after my two year warrenty is up.

To counter this agrument, I've had my Inspiron 6000 notebook for almost 3 years (way after warranty expired) and it still runs like new. I have burned through a few hard drives, but that was my fault.

[HondaFamilyMan]

Originally Posted by BLouIsGod

For whats its worth the system had an amd 2.2 dual core processor? . A 256mb card on dell's site is 45-150 bucks... Ill keep looking around though, dont do much gaming at all, basic sound is okay for now too. and dont need a monitor. I use my 47" 1080p lcd and bose system for sight and sound

If you are not doing much gaming or photo/video editing, a dual-core processor is more than enough.

I still use my P4 machine to do household computing like web-surfing/word-processing/finance. More than enough. Just make sure it is expandable, PCI-e is the best and with room for more memory. A fast hard-drive helps too.

Just remember that 99% of the time your computer's processor is just waiting for data to be read from or written to memory; cache, ram or hard-drive. So beef up your memory and hard-drive data transfer speeds.

[aLiLbit-Si-LLy]

i wouldn't get a dell...i work for the government that only uses dell and everday someones computer craps out and someone gets a new one at least once every two weeks dell = crap........from my experience

[BLouIsGod]

My current pc is about 7 years old, burned through a power supply and a few hd's, as long as the processors and mb can still kick around, im good with dell quality.

thanks again for the info!

[Dark.GEAR]

Originally Posted by BLouIsGod

For whats its worth the system had an amd 2.2 dual core processor? . A 256mb card on dell's site is 45-150 bucks... Ill keep looking around though, dont do much gaming at all, basic sound is okay for now too. and dont need a monitor. I use my 47" 1080p lcd and bose system for sight and sound

if your gonna use you 1080p lcd then considering getting a video card that has HD capabilities and a good sound card for your bose system

[e60.deluxe]

Originally Posted by Dark.GEAR

if your gonna use you 1080p lcd then considering getting a video card that has HD capabilities and a good sound card for your bose system

an nVidia Riva 128 from 1997 has "HD Capabilities"

[BLouIsGod]

Im not using the computer in conjunction with the tv or the system.

[vtak07]

hmm seems like a higher price for a refurbished one. i would def. get an HP if i were you. I've had them forever and never had any problems. I've heard numerouse horrible storys about dells

[BLouIsGod]

Ha, thats funny - I would say the same about my dads HP. Ive worked on that thing so freagin much, Ill never get a HP.

[strutking]

what will you be using it for?

[volvo9]

Originally Posted by e60.deluxe

an nVidia Riva 128 from 1997 has "HD Capabilities"

look up HDCP. It's a new DRM standard for HD Content Protection. Without a compatible card and monitor you will not be able to output HD video signal to a monitor or external TV. The standard is going into effect within a year I think and after that you will only get SD video on non HDCP computer hardware from those new movies.

[e60.deluxe]

Originally Posted by volvo9

look up HDCP. It's a new DRM standard for HD Content Protection. Without a compatible card and monitor you will not be able to output HD video signal to a monitor or external TV. The standard is going into effect within a year I think and after that you will only get SD video on non HDCP computer hardware from those new movies.

dude HDCP is different than HD Capable. ive got a set top DirecTV box that puts HD onto my TV...are you gonna say thats not HD Capable because it doesnt have HDCP?

also, a Blue Ray or HD-DVD drive is the only reason to have HDCP. everything else, as of right now, does not matter.

High-bandwidth Digital Content Protection by the way. the HD in HDCP is not the HD in HDTV.

sorry, its just that im tired of people thinking that High Definition resolution is something new to PCs...when theyve had them for 10+ years. its especially annoying when people are like "when are PC games gonna get HD like XBOX and PS3??"

[Izzy]

^ Yup. Actually, funnily, in order to do "real high-def" on the Xbox360, apart from the DVI cable, is actually the VGA cable.

[BLouIsGod]

Guys I got the dell system. It was 350. I had two $50 gift cards for redeeming some points from my american express. I added another 1gig of ram and a nvidia 256mb card and will be adding those to it later this week. Ive got all my old programs to run fine on vista and so far no problems. Thanks everyone for the help.