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"Buying A New Computer Is A Little Harder Than Expected..."

Recently inspired by how easy and cheap it is to shop online from the States and an article in a PC mag, I've decided that it's too tempting just to get a new PC, with XP for my iTunes and A faster processor for my games. However, many queries arose after just a few minutes of investigation.

1) Win XP Pro

against

Win XP Home

What's the difference? I only skimmed over the specs of a couple of comps, but XP Pro seems to merit another 20 or so dollars. What makes it more pricey and would XP Home be perfectly good for my needs (see top of page)?

2) There's a manufacturer called Acer. Never heard of them myself, but do you guys know anything useful; reliability, etc. My current comp is an Evesham, although I would have prefered a Dell, and found out a treasure chest of problems. Like ME's inefficiency with system resources and how Eveshams over heat...

3) Anyone know the HMCE site better than me and can direct me to the import tax for computers or electricals in general.

Any help would be great!

:)

gerrid wrote:

> Oh and my advice to you Clazon would be not to buy some crappy system
> for £300 and just gut it to use the case and the PSU, but buy
> everything yourself, and, if you're not confident enough to build it,
> pay someone else £50-£100 to do it for you.

I know a comp specialist, so putting stuff together wouldn't be a problem.



If I was to consider building it, then what are main parts I need?

RAM
Motherboard
speakers
screen
processor
HDD
keyboard
mouse
case

anything else?

Notorious Biggles wrote:

> As for Clazon, you won't need XP Pro.

Yeah, I know that much.

> Home Edition is the same minus
> a few features you don't need like the networking features and remote
> desktop. Save the money and get more RAM or something.

Yeah that was made clear to me yesterday.

And yes, Acer
> are pretty decent in my experience. I wouldn't touch a Dell.


Riiiight. That's just confusing. I always thought Dells were pretty damn reliable and reasonably priced. I've never heard of an Acer before, have you got any links to reviews on them, quality of backup service, company, etc?

Mav wrote:

> Not at all. Blimey - a CPU fanboy? What's the world coming to? :-)
>
> I have my reasons. I can't be bothered to go into them again, but
> they're solid.

Could you link to the previous thread where you've clearly both had your tiff?


It might help me a bit.
:)

Clazon wrote:

> RAM
> Motherboard
> speakers
> screen
> processor
> HDD
> keyboard
> mouse
> case
>
> anything else?

•Power Supply Unit if there isn't one with the case.
•Optical drives. Pretty much required to actually do anything with a PC.
•Floppy drive. They are 99% redundant - until you need to flash your BIOS or something like that. I still won't build a PC without one.
•Network card in the (rather unlikely nowadays) event that there isn't one on the motherboard.
•As above for sound card, although most motherboards nowadays have at least 6.1 surround sound. Of course high end cards will give better quality, but unless you have fancy speakers they would be handicapped basically.
•Cables if you buy OEM components. A retail motherboard will have cables with it, an OEM one won't. I would recommend getting rounded cables anyway, they improve airflow through the case which is always a good thing.
•A heat sink will be required if you don't get a retail processor. Even if you do get a retail processor I would still invest in a decent Thermalright or something similar, will cost you £15-20 but will keep the temperatures down, aiding stability and giving you room to overclock should you ever feel the need. Or want.
•A decent fan for aforementioned heat sink. Retail processors come with heat sinks and fans, but they are always just good enough, not great.
•A few case fans. Better airflow = lower case temperatures = better stability = more overclocking ability = more longevity.
•AC power lead. Not all cases come with them, though some do. Just remember to check first. I once ended up running a computer via a European power lead for a montior connected through a British-European adapter. Wasn't fun, but it worked for a day or two until I got the right cable.

> Riiiight. That's just confusing. I always thought Dells were pretty
> damn reliable and reasonably priced. I've never heard of an Acer
> before, have you got any links to reviews on them, quality of backup
> service, company, etc?

Dells are normally pretty reliable. But Dells are built for middle aged people who want to run Microsoft Office do online banking. Although, admittedly Dell now do a fancy "gaming PC", but it isn't really all that great. For anyone who wants to do as they please with their computer and the hardware, don't get a Dell. Coin mentioned some reasons why earlier, such as the lack of an AGP slot. Whilst this isn't very common now, Dell do still use some non-standard components, like difference power supplies, motherboard connectors for the power switch and LEDs etc.

You also can't overclock a Dell. Sorry, that is a big thing with me.

Acer? [URL]http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/products/index.html?action=UFNQcm9kdWN0U2VhcmNoUmVzdWx0cw%3D%3D&mfr_uid=174&cat_uid=-1&order_col=product_rating&order=DESC&keywords=&show=all&Filter=Filter[/URL] and take note of the large amount of 5 star ratings over a wide range of products. They've been around for a long time, and are one of the biggest laptop OEM makers. Only a few companies actually make laptops, most are just rebranded. Acer are one of those manufacturers.

> Could you link to the previous thread where you've clearly both had
> your tiff?
>
>
> It might help me a bit.
> :)

I'll have a look for it, then edit the link in if I find it.

EDIT - found it. [URL]http://ukchatforums.reserve.co.uk/display_messages.php?threadid=109475&forumid=206[/URL]

You'll need a power supply unit (PSU) too. Some argue that you should go for something around £50-70.

I personally just bought one for £20.

Oh well.

You'll probably want some disc drives as well (DVD / CD-ROM). They're not too expensive, and it's unlikely that you'll need a DVD-RW - £50+. Normal DVD / 48x CD drives are about £25. Also consider a floppy drive.

Then, you'll need some case fans, and maybe a CPU Heatsink and Fan too.

If you need help choosing a case... I spent last week doing research for myself. There are some new, cheap and stylish cases on the market at the moment, so treat yourself.

EDIT: Ignore me. I missed Biggles post... Take his advice.

Cheers guys. Plenty of free and relatively easy help there.

I think I get an idea of it now and the guy I know who can put it all together should be good with doing it all.



One basic query still though, what the f**k is OEM?

:D


EDIT: I know it's quite a bit of a hardship, but could you put vague prices next to each item and a general overall cost to aim for.

Thanks again.

The tiff was reasonably helpful, more of a test of what you both thought than the actual performance of the 2 things, but I had to make sure the help I was getting was coming from someone with a reliable opinion.

One more thing related to the last thing I posted- prices.

Yes please do add prices, but I fear it may start to spiral out of control. My original plan would not be possible for building a computer. Ie. building a computer, buying parts from abroad where it's cheaper, due to power conversions or compatibility?

How much is your budget? As for the performance of AMD versus Intel, AMD64 > Intel P4 where you compare similar products. I.e. 3200+ against 3.2 GHz P4.

Athlon's are better for games performance and have a better floating point unit which if you run something like Find-A-Drug (SR Team Pimpage [URL]http://ukchatforums.reserve.co.uk/display_messages.php?threadid=83829&forumid=4006[/URL] ) is a consideration. P4s were better at encoding audio and video, which is good if you do a lot of encoding, but that was in comparison to the Athlon XP. Athlon 64 which is newer easily matches the P4.

In fact, Athlon 64 also tends to be cheaper as well. So really, unless you are a hard core geek with special cooling systems to run P4s at 6 GHz, then no point in buying one.

As for importing, yeah it will all work OK. Well, maybe not power supply, but processors run at like 1.5 volts, which is delivered via the power supply. All standard around the world. All other parts have standardised power requirements as well. Many power supplies also have a switch from 110V to 230V input, so all you would then need is a different cable with a 3 pin plug as opposed to the American 2 pin.

Clazon wrote:
> One basic query still though, what the f**k is OEM?

It stands for Original Equipment Manufacturer.

It usually means that the product will be sold straight from the makers of it , so it won't have no fancy box or extra's

Case: £40-150. Good cases to look at; Antec Super Lanboy and (my very own) Cooler Master Centurion 5, which is a steal from Micro Direct. It's a quality piece of steel.

Case Fans: You may or may not need / want them, depending on the case. Well, whatever, you're looking at spending around £6-10. I recommend Vantec stealth fans (Overclockers.co.uk), as they cheap and very silent.

Power Supply Unit: Opinion about these are divided. Some think they're damn important, some think they're not. I, being cheap, hope for the later. A 500W PSU sets you back only £20 (Ebuyer). However, if you have some spare dosh, pump it into the PSU, get a good one - Antec are the best in my opinion - and around 400W. Set you back a good £55 though.

Optical Drives: Usually you'll want one or two of these, but it's better to buy one good quality drive than two bad ones. Around £20 for a DVD reader and CD 48x (more than good enough for playing games), or £50 for a DVD-RW, which I always think of as overkill.

HDD: 200GB is more than enough. £50. Good makes... Western Digital, Samsung, Maxtor. Look for something with a decent buffer, as in more than 2MB.

Video Card: I don't know too much about wether nVidia is better or ATi is, but I always go down the ATi road. You can pick up a 9600XT for under £100, which'll run almost all games, or it may well be worth shelling out for an X800, around £150-200.

Sound Cards: Not too important, in my opinion. I have sh*te speakers, and as you said you did, a Sound Blaster Live! card, around £20 is great.

CPU: P4 or AMD. Up to you. I recently picked up a 3.2GHz P4, works so well. Good thing about P4s - they're damn easy to overclock. Looking at around £150 for a 3.2Ghz P4. As for AMD, I have no clue.

CPU Cooler: Generally I go for a Heatsink and Fan combo. You get one with P4s, but I use a Coolermaster Aero 7, which works wonders for me.

Motherboard: Again, you can go AMD or P4. If you're using P4, you'll want soccet 478. I'm waiting for one to be delivered right now. A few months ago I bought a Gigabyte GA-8IK1100, which can be found for £70-80, and it's good. But if you can, get an Abit IC7-G, around £100 with P&P from Ebuyer. It has everything for a P4.

RAM: A lot of options. Personally, I would go for two sticks of 512MB, PC3200, GEIL Value. It's cheap and it's damn good.

I hope that helps... Sorry if I missed anything, or if anyone has posted all this before me (again :P).