…… Computers: what to buy

hunybee

hunybee

Veteran Member
Hello all!

Our computer pooped out. The timing of that is impeccable!

Just....superb.

We must get a new computer from dell.

I know there are other places, and possibly better, but that is where we must buy it from. That won't change.

The biggest priority is the home/family computer. I think I prefer a desktop for that.

We had also been looking at laptop and tablets for the kids for school.

I need recommendations that i can get from dell. Trying to look on my phone is not very nice lol. Difficult would be the word.

Laptops:

I went to look at Walmart for laptops. I was confused by the 256 sad and 1T hdd stuff. When looking online to try and explain what those are and the reasons for them, it just made it more confusing.

We are not big gamers, so we don't need that factored in. We do stream stuff. These are allowed to play some games that one can find in the Amazon app store, but not anything else really, but only once a week.

The laptop would mostly be for school and projects for adults and kids.

As fast and good of a processor as possible, and good amount of storage as well.

We want them to be bought with usefulness and longevity in mind. We don't buy the newest tech all the time that it comes out. We need an overall solid and long lasting product, both in tech and quality.

Desktop:

Same thing in regards longevity.

We need a good amount of storage. The Most we can get.

Speed is important as well. I am guessing we will be getting a windows computer as that will be the easiest for all family members to use.

Again, not gamers, but we do stream stuff.

Are there basic things one would want in regards performance and longevity?

With the selection at dell, does anyone have recommendations?

Also, in regards laptops and tablets:. Are the differences very big? Is it worth it to get one over the other?

Please remember that I am not a techy. I can do ok and gave figured out a lot, and if shown or explained, I do alright. But it is not a strong point for me.

I am the resident techy lol. Fezzik (the life of my life and the best guy i know) is fairly helpless when it comes up computers. Ease of use is kind of important.

Thank you, everyone!
 
Meemur

Meemur

Voice on the Prairie / FJB!
Won't copy correctly, so click on the link. Has pro/cons of the top 5 models

bestreviews.com

5 Best Dell Desktop Computers - Sept. 2023 - BestReviews

Our team of experts has selected the best Dell desktop computers out of hundreds of models. Don't buy a Dell desktop computer before reading these reviews.
bestreviews.com

My opinion on tablet vs. laptops: if I'm on the road and only surfing and checking Google maps, a tablet is fine.
If I want to post, do email, or write, it's too much work. I'd rather have my laptop.
I take both when I'm on the road if I have work to do. Otherwise, it's just the tablet. If I had a better phone, that
would work, but I got the tablet for almost free at a garage sale.
 
Blacknarwhal

Blacknarwhal

Let's Go Brandon!
SSD and HDD.

SSD is Solid State Drive. Also known as "flash memory", solid state drives are basically hard drives but with no moving parts. They're likely to last longer, but also be more expensive and store less.

HDD is Hard Disk Drive. The storage media you're probably most used to, it's less expensive and stores more, but since it has a little spinning wheel and an arm that moves to portions of the wheel, it's more likely to break down.

I'm quite fond of Dell myself, so I say you're making a good call there.

As to what you need to buy, ask what you need to do. Based on what you've presented here, a moderately-powered PC should cover you. I like laptops myself as they're all-in-one and can be moved if necessary, plus they come with their own backup power supply. If the power goes out suddenly, you haven't lost all your work. You can work from the battery included until you can shut down. Desktops tend to offer more power for less money, however, and you can get an uninterruptible power supply (UPS) system separately to serve the same function as a laptop battery.

Hope this helps!
 
Macgyver

Macgyver

Has No Life - Lives on TB
I'm a big fan of Lenovo laptops.
For a desktop look at these guys.
www.pugetsystems.com

Homepage

Puget Systems offers custom workstation computers for content creation, design, engineering, scientific computing and more. We build for your workflow.
www.pugetsystems.com www.pugetsystems.com
Everything perfectly optimized and tested. But just took a quick peak and it seems like there getting a bit pricey.
 
hunybee

hunybee

Veteran Member
Blacknarwhal said:
SSD and HDD.

SSD is Solid State Drive. Also known as "flash memory", solid state drives are basically hard drives but with no moving parts. They're likely to last longer, but also be more expensive and store less.

HDD is Hard Disk Drive. The storage media you're probably most used to, it's less expensive and stores more, but since it has a little spinning wheel and an arm that moves to portions of the wheel, it's more likely to break down.

I'm quite fond of Dell myself, so I say you're making a good call there.

As to what you need to buy, ask what you need to do. Based on what you've presented here, a moderately-powered PC should cover you. I like laptops myself as they're all-in-one and can be moved if necessary, plus they come with their own backup power supply. If the power goes out suddenly, you haven't lost all your work. You can work from the battery included until you can shut down. Desktops tend to offer more power for less money, however, and you can get an uninterruptible power supply (UPS) system separately to serve the same function as a laptop battery.

Hope this helps!
Click to expand...


It does help. Thank you!

Why was that so hard for websites to explain?! Lol

You did that very well!

So then another question:

I see computers with both sad AND hdd.

Is that a good thing, especially in my needs, or is it overkill?
 
hunybee

hunybee

Veteran Member
Macgyver said:
I'm a big fan of Lenovo laptops.
For a desktop look at these guys.
www.pugetsystems.com

Homepage

Puget Systems offers custom workstation computers for content creation, design, engineering, scientific computing and more. We build for your workflow.
www.pugetsystems.com www.pugetsystems.com
Everything perfectly optimized and tested. But just took a quick peak and it seems like there getting a bit pricey.
Click to expand...


I have to stay with dell.

The computer that just died is a Lenovo.

It has given me the dreaded error 1962.

I have tried all the fixes I could find online. It won't work. There is one fix i found this morning, but it makes me really nervous as it is opening it up and moving some things.

I am really thinking I need an external hard drive for pictures. I have pictures in a few different computers that have died in the past and there are a ton of pictures on them. I try not to think about it because they are the kids pictures and it makes me want to cry and be sick lol
 
Blacknarwhal

Blacknarwhal

Let's Go Brandon!
hunybee said:
It does help. Thank you!

Why was that so hard for websites to explain?! Lol

You did that very well!

So then another question:

I see computers with both sad AND hdd.

Is that a good thing, especially in my needs, or is it overkill?
Click to expand...

Some might say overkill. Some might say good backup. One of the other big differences about SSD and HDD is speed. Solid state drives have no moving parts so they can access data more rapidly. That's especially good for gamers who want the games stored on disk to be more rapidly accessed.

For what you have in mind, it might actually be overkill. You'll likely get by with a hard drive alone.
 
hunybee

hunybee

Veteran Member
Blacknarwhal said:
Some might say overkill. Some might say good backup. One of the other big differences about SSD and HDD is speed. Solid state drives have no moving parts so they can access data more rapidly. That's especially good for gamers who want the games stored on disk to be more rapidly accessed.

For what you have in mind, it might actually be overkill. You'll likely get by with a hard drive alone.
Click to expand...


Any recommendations for any desktops of laptops?
 
Jeff B.

Jeff B.

Don’t let the Piss Ants get you down…
As things have gone with my company, I decided last year to get a laptop of my own. After all was said and done, I got a MS Surface.

Costco had a special on them, but when I reviewed the specs on them, I ended up ordering on from them which was a lot higher performance than the in store models.

So far I’m happy with it and with my impending departure from “the company” have ordered a docking port so I can use it with multiple displays as I did my actual laptop.

Jeff B.
 
Blacknarwhal

Blacknarwhal

Let's Go Brandon!
hunybee said:
Any recommendations for any desktops of laptops?
Click to expand...

Based on what you've said so far, I'd favor a desktop over a laptop. The odds of you going out to a coffee shop to work or the like seem slim. If you do plan to do such things, you might want to look into a used or refurbished laptop for just such a purpose; they're widely available on eBay and make great backups for when your main goes down. Inexpensive, too; fully usable models can be had for under $200. You'll likely get more for your money with a desktop, too. Consider a UPS system like I mentioned before, especially if your power grid has been known to go down periodically.
 
hunybee

hunybee

Veteran Member
Jeff B. said:
As things have gone with my company, I decided last year to get a laptop of my own. After all was said and done, I got a MS Surface.

Costco had a special on them, but when I reviewed the specs on them, I ended up ordering on from them which was a lot higher performance than the in store models.

So far I’m happy with it and with my impending departure from “the company” have ordered a docking port so I can use it with multiple displays as I did my actual laptop.

Jeff B.
Click to expand...


Hmmm

That is good to know!

What is this docking port you speak of?
 
hunybee

hunybee

Veteran Member
Blacknarwhal said:
Based on what you've said so far, I'd favor a desktop over a laptop. The odds of you going out to a coffee shop to work or the like seem slim. If you do plan to do such things, you might want to look into a used or refurbished laptop for just such a purpose; they're widely available on eBay and make great backups for when your main goes down. Inexpensive, too; fully usable models can be had for under $200. You'll likely get more for your money with a desktop, too. Consider a UPS system like I mentioned before, especially if your power grid has been known to go down periodically.
Click to expand...


Oh, I need both!

And also, thoughts on tablet vs laptop.

If you could.

Even though I am not a gamer, you guys know your stuff.
 
Blacknarwhal

Blacknarwhal

Let's Go Brandon!
hunybee said:
Oh, I need both!

And also, thoughts on tablet vs laptop.

If you could.

Even though I am not a gamer, you guys know your stuff.
Click to expand...

I would say not to bother with a tablet. They're all fine and well if you plan to read things, or just surf the web, but they don't do much else. Sure, they're decent for streaming and if you get one with an HDMI port you can plug it into a TV, which can be especially nice for streaming. But you're more likely to get a laptop with an HDMI port, and they do more in general than tablets.
 
Knighttemplar

Knighttemplar

Veteran Member
I have bought systems from Comprenew. They have referb stuff. I'm lovin my dell m6600. Comprenew has a web site and also sells on ebay.
 
Macgyver

Macgyver

Has No Life - Lives on TB
hunybee said:
I have to stay with dell.

The computer that just died is a Lenovo.

It has given me the dreaded error 1962.

I have tried all the fixes I could find online. It won't work. There is one fix i found this morning, but it makes me really nervous as it is opening it up and moving some things.

I am really thinking I need an external hard drive for pictures. I have pictures in a few different computers that have died in the past and there are a ton of pictures on them. I try not to think about it because they are the kids pictures and it makes me want to cry and be sick lol
Click to expand...
Dead computer does not necessarily mean dead hard drive.
Pull the disk and get your self an external drive adapter. You can then pull off the data via usb.

1620831204253.png
 
Meemur

Meemur

Voice on the Prairie / FJB!
hunybee said:
I am really thinking I need an external hard drive for pictures. I have pictures in a few different computers that have died in the past and there are a ton of pictures on them. I try not to think about it because they are the kids pictures and it makes me want to cry and be sick lol
Click to expand...

This is what I use for photo storage. There are other, cheaper models at different stores.

www.target.com

Western Digital My Passport 2TB - Black

Read reviews and buy Western Digital My Passport 2TB - Black at Target. Choose from contactless Same Day Delivery, Drive Up and more.
www.target.com www.target.com

Here is a 7 minute youtube explaining them

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o6ZwbYRJSwg


If you still have those computers, a geek at Micro Center can probably get the photos from them. If the computer won't boot, they can pull the hard drive and access them that way, transfer them into your new external portable storage device if you want.
www.microcenter.com

Store Locations for Micro Center

Micro Center Store Hours, Location, Maps, Employment, Repair Service. Thousands of computer products including hardware, software, upgrades, accessories, books, and more.
www.microcenter.com www.microcenter.com
 
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M

marsofold

Veteran Member
If you establish a business account at Dell, you can probably get what you want from them at 25% off the regular price. We did and they have periodic sales. During one sale just after our printer died, we received an email of a 12 hour event that got us a new color laser printer at half off the usual price. Wife was thrilled and it still works fine after six years or so.
 
hunybee

hunybee

Veteran Member
Meemur said:
This is what I use for photo storage. There are other, cheaper models at different stores.

www.target.com

Western Digital My Passport 2TB - Black

Read reviews and buy Western Digital My Passport 2TB - Black at Target. Choose from contactless Same Day Delivery, Drive Up and more.
www.target.com www.target.com

Here is a 7 minute youtube explaining them

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o6ZwbYRJSwg


If you still have those computers, a geek at Micro Center can probably get the photos from them. If the computer won't boot, they can pull the hard drive and access them that way, transfer them into your new external portable storage device if you want.
www.microcenter.com

Store Locations for Micro Center

Micro Center Store Hours, Location, Maps, Employment, Repair Service. Thousands of computer products including hardware, software, upgrades, accessories, books, and more.
www.microcenter.com www.microcenter.com
Click to expand...


I was hoping!!!

The person I would normally ask about this stuff and get help with these issues is no longer with us. He passed the end of last year. He taught me a lot, but there is much I don't know.
 
L

lolabelle

Contributing Member
Meemur said:
This is what I use for photo storage. There are other, cheaper models at different stores.

www.target.com

Western Digital My Passport 2TB - Black

Read reviews and buy Western Digital My Passport 2TB - Black at Target. Choose from contactless Same Day Delivery, Drive Up and more.
www.target.com www.target.com

Here is a 7 minute youtube explaining them

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o6ZwbYRJSwg
Meemur said:
This is what I use for photo storage. There are other, cheaper models at different stores.

www.target.com

Western Digital My Passport 2TB - Black

Read reviews and buy Western Digital My Passport 2TB - Black at Target. Choose from contactless Same Day Delivery, Drive Up and more.
www.target.com www.target.com

Here is a 7 minute youtube explaining them

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o6ZwbYRJSwg


If you still have those computers, a geek at Micro Center can probably get the photos from them. If the computer won't boot, they can pull the hard drive and access them that way, transfer them into your new external portable storage device if you want.
www.microcenter.com

Store Locations for Micro Center

Micro Center Store Hours, Location, Maps, Employment, Repair Service. Thousands of computer products including hardware, software, upgrades, accessories, books, and more.
www.microcenter.com www.microcenter.com
Click to expand...



If you still have those computers, a geek at Micro Center can probably get the photos from them. If the computer won't boot, they can pull the hard drive and access them that way, transfer them into your new external portable storage device if you want.
www.microcenter.com

Store Locations for Micro Center

Micro Center Store Hours, Location, Maps, Employment, Repair Service. Thousands of computer products including hardware, software, upgrades, accessories, books, and more.
www.microcenter.com www.microcenter.com
Click to expand...
I’m trying to figure out how to setup an external hard drive for my Mac. My scratch disks are full. I need an idiots version of how to do this. Any suggestions?
 
Dennis Olson

Dennis Olson

Chief Curmudgeon
_______________
Blacknarwhal said:
SSD is Solid State Drive. Also known as "flash memory", solid state drives are basically hard drives but with no moving parts. They're likely to last longer, but also be more expensive and store less.
Click to expand...
I’m going to take exception to the bolded parts of your statement above. SSD drives, under “consumer use,” will last a long time. HOWEVER, SSD drives will ALL FAIL EVENTUALLY. This is because of an inherent property of the memory. It can support only a finite number of state changes (that is, writing new data.) Reads are not a problem. After “x” number of state changes to a given memory cell, it fails. That is, it will no longer change states (allow its data to be modified.) When that happens the address of that cell is placed in a special “bad memory cell map” in the SSD. A “spare” cell is then used to store the dead cell’s data.

In fact, an SSD has about double its rated capacity on-board, with the “extra” being for bad cell replacement. Now, all that being said, once the SSD runs out of spare cells, it dies. No warning. It just dies. You may or may not be able to retrieve your data. Now, I’ve not said all this to scare you. A modern SSD memory cell can handle billions (if not more) state changes before it fails. I just felt you (and others) needed an understanding of the limitations of SSD drives.

As far as storing less, you can get SSD drives up to 10TB these days, though the price is extreme (roughly $1200) I bought a 4 TB SSD in anticipation of getting my new Xbox, back in November. I paid $450 for it. Spinning media is much less expensive. NOTE: TB2K runs entirely on SSD drives.

Blacknarwhal said:
HDD is Hard Disk Drive. The storage media you're probably most used to, it's less expensive and stores more, but since it has a little spinning wheel and an arm that moves to portions of the wheel, it's more likely to break down.
Click to expand...
I disagree with this as well, for a couple of reasons. First, if a spinning platter HDD is going to fail, chances are highest that it will fail quickly after being placed into service. That’s why whenever I buy a new PC, I leave it on 24/7 for 6 months. That allows everything to “burn-in.” If it passes that milestone chances are it won’t fail for 10 years or more. Second, I haven’t had a HDD fail on me since about 1998. That’s a pretty good track record. YMMV of course. Finally, when a HDD is in the early stages of failure, you usually have time to get your data off before it finally dies altogether. The same cannot necessarily be said about SSD drives.

Now, as to speed, SSDs are typically about 100 times faster than HDDs. That’s why some higher end PCs have both. The operating system lives on the SSD for faster boot-up, while the applications live on the HDD. These days, my primary PC is a Microsoft Surface Pro. Totally SSD driven. My boot up time is about 8-10 seconds from power-off. Were it using a spinning HDD, that time would be 60-90 seconds.

Bottom line: you pays yer money and makes yer choice. My next post will address what PC specs you should be looking for.
 
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Dennis Olson

Dennis Olson

Chief Curmudgeon
_______________
Searching for the right PC

I’d go to eBay, at least for the laptops, and buy refurbed (used) units. I’ve done this multiple times, and I’ve never gotten a lemon yet.

Specs:

Memory: 8 GB minimum
Drive space: 1TB minimum
CPU: Core i5 or equivalent minimum
SSD vs HDD: Unimportant

Those are the main specs you should be looking for. A laptop with those specs will be adequate for anything but games. The same specs can be used for the desktop, though you might want more HDD space, up to 4TB.

There are a buttload ton of refurbed Dell machines that have been used in business and sold off as they were upgraded. They work perfectly.
 
Meemur

Meemur

Voice on the Prairie / FJB!
hunybee

hunybee

Veteran Member
Dennis Olson said:
I’m going to take exception to the bolded parts of your statement above. SSD drives, under “consumer use,” will last a long time. HOWEVER, SSD drives will ALL FAIL EVENTUALLY. This is because of an inherent property of the memory. It can support only a finite number of state changes (that is, writing new data.) Reads are not a problem. After “x” number of state changes to a given memory cell, it fails. That is, it will no longer change states (allow its data to be modified.) When that happens the address of that cell is placed in a special “bad memory cell map” in the SSD. A “spare” cell is then used to store the dead cell’s data.

In fact, an SSD has about double its rated capacity on-board, with the “extra” being for bad cell replacement. Now, all that being said, once the SSD runs out of spare cells, it dies. No warning. It just dies. You may or may not be able to retrieve your data. Now, I’ve not said all this to scare you. A modern SSD memory cell can handle billions (if not more) state changes before it fails. I just felt you (and others) needed an understanding of the limitations of SSD drives.

As far as storing less, you can get SSD drives up to 10TB these days, though the price is extreme (roughly $1200) I bought a 4 TB SSD in anticipation of getting my new Xbox, back in November. I paid $450 for it. Spinning media is much less expensive. NOTE: TB2K runs entirely on SSD drives.


I disagree with this as well, for a couple of reasons. First, if a spinning platter HDD is going to fail, chances are highest that it will fail quickly after being placed into service. That’s why whenever I buy a new PC, I leave it on 24/7 for 6 months. That allows everything to “burn-in.” If it passes that milestone chances are it won’t fail for 10 years or more. Second, I haven’t had a HDD fail on me since about 1998. That’s a pretty good track record. YMMV of course. Finally, when a HDD is in the early stages of failure, you usually have time to get your data off before it finally dies altogether. The same cannot necessarily be said about SSD drives.

Now, as to speed, SSDs are typically about 100 times faster than HDDs. That’s why some higher end PCs have both. The operating system lives on the SSD for faster boot-up, while the applications live on the HDD. These days, my primary PC is a Microsoft Surface Pro. Totally SSD driven. My boot up time is about 8-10 seconds from power-off. Were it using a spinning HDD, that time would be 60-90 seconds.

Bottom line: you pays yer money and makes yer choice. My next post will address what PC specs you should be looking for.
Click to expand...


Thank you!

You did scare me, but I would rather know all the info, and then make my choice.
 
Dennis Olson

Dennis Olson

Chief Curmudgeon
_______________
In “commercial use,” SSDs should be swapped out about every 5 years. In “consumer use,” an SSD should last 10 years or more. But too many people are completely ignorant of SSD technology. It’s important to understand it.

The more writes your machine does, the shorter the life. For example, a computer used for video editing would have its SSD drives die a lot sooner than a home user. Why? Because the home user typically does very little writing. Mostly stuff is installed and then sits there forever.
 
Macgyver

Macgyver

Has No Life - Lives on TB
If you specifically want dell look at their refurb section as well.
I don't know if its still true but they used to still carry a decent warranty.
 
Sozo

Sozo

Insignificant Contributor
Here's a current sale on a Dell Laptop:
deals.dell.com

Top Deals

The Dell Back to School Sale is live now! Limited time deals on select Dell laptop and desktop PCs and electronics! FREE DELIVERY ✓
deals.dell.com


More Laptop deals:
deals.dell.com

Laptop Deals

The Dell Back to School Sale is live now! Limited time savings on top selling Dell XPS and Inspiron laptops! FREE DELIVERY ✓
deals.dell.com

And Desktop deals:
deals.dell.com

Desktop Computer Deals

The Dell Back to School Sale is live now! Limited time offers. Save now on ready-to-ship Dell XPS & Inspiron desktops! FREE DELIVERY✓
deals.dell.com
 
hunybee

hunybee

Veteran Member
Dennis Olson said:
Completely inadequate SSD/HDD:

Hard Drive
256GB M.2 PCIe NVMe Solid State Drive
Click to expand...


Are you saying that ....

Wait....what are you saying?

Are you talking about a laptop, or a desktop, or both?


And I appreciate everyone being so patient about the capitalizations.

I will get a regular computer and get off this phone soon and things will return to normal.
 
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hunybee

hunybee

Veteran Member
Dennis Olson said:
A 256 GB HD (regardless of what technology it employs) is ENTIRELY inadequate for today's computers. ABSOLUTE MINIMUM would be 512 GB. Nothing less should be seriously considered.
Click to expand...


Got it! Thank you! That explains a few things about what I saw yesterday.

I suspected that even though the prices seemed okish, they were actually overpriced for what they could do, and what they could do was not actually very much.

What you just said proved I was right.
 
Meadowlark

Meadowlark

Has No Life - Lives on TB
When I was consulting, I purchased a game system. Really fast with good graphics which I needed since I was working with a lot of graphics (microphotographs for reports).
 
Freeholder

Freeholder

This too shall pass.
My old laptop had died a couple of years ago, and I finally replaced with another laptop (the desktop is still going fine). My reasons were prepping-related: I have enough solar panels (two camping types and one that needs to be mounted in the yard) to keep a laptop charged; not sure it would run the desktop machine. And, if we had to leave here, the laptop would be easier to carry and use in limited space; we should also be able to keep it charged in that situation. These might be things for you to keep in mind, too, as you decide whether to get a desktop or a laptop. If you can get both, fine, but I do think a laptop is a good prep item.

Kathleen
 
Tex88

Tex88

Veteran Member
Dennis Olson said:
Searching for the right PC

I’d go to eBay, at least for the laptops, and buy refurbed (used) units. I’ve done this multiple times, and I’ve never gotten a lemon yet.

Specs:

Memory: 8 GB minimum
Drive space: 1TB minimum
CPU: Core i5 or equivalent minimum
SSD vs HDD: Unimportant

Those are the main specs you should be looking for. A laptop with those specs will be adequate for anything but games. The same specs can be used for the desktop, though you might want more HDD space, up to 4TB.

There are a buttload ton of refurbed Dell machines that have been used in business and sold off as they were upgraded. They work perfectly.
Click to expand...

Bragging time? Yeah why not.

Processor Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-9300H CPU @ 2.40GHz 2.40 GHz
Installed RAM 32.0 GB (31.8 GB usable)
Two Crucial P5 500GB PCIe M.2 1TB SSD drives.
GeForce GTX1050 and Intel UHD 630

Hooked to a Targus dock, to which a 24" Dell monitor, Bose speakers and Razer gaming keyboard and mouse are connected.

Best of ALL worlds!

The Leonovo I had before for six years still worked fine for anything but gaming, so I sold it to a member here, and I haven't heard any complaints.
 
Sozo

Sozo

Insignificant Contributor
hunybee said:
Laptops:

We are not big gamers, so we don't need that factored in. We do stream stuff. These are allowed to play some games that one can find in the Amazon app store, but not anything else really, but only once a week.

The laptop would mostly be for school and projects for adults and kids.

As fast and good of a processor as possible, and good amount of storage as well.
Click to expand...

Dennis Olson said:
A 256 GB HD (regardless of what technology it employs) is ENTIRELY inadequate for today's computers. ABSOLUTE MINIMUM would be 512 GB. Nothing less should be seriously considered.
Click to expand...


Seriously?
I have a 512 for my main drive & a 256 I only use for backup.
I have all sorts of books, video's, music, pictures, photo & video editing software, 2 office suites, everything I could possibly need and I'm not even using 120Gb.

I could stand to do a cleanup and free up some space, but I'll never use a full 256Gb drive.
 
bw

bw

Fringe Ranger
hunybee said:
I am really thinking I need an external hard drive for pictures. I have pictures in a few different computers that have died in the past and there are a ton of pictures on them. I try not to think about it because they are the kids pictures and it makes me want to cry and be sick lol
Click to expand...

I encourage you to take a long look at your backup discipline. I back up EVERYTHING to thumb drives, and I have four sets of them that I use in rotation, one every two weeks. So in addition to the PC, I have four complete copies going back two months, and backups are stored in the fireproof safe.

Been a programmer since the 70's, and regular backups are a religious observance. I suggest you get your backups organized so that if any computer goes toes-up you can be entirely complacent about your data security.
 
hunybee

hunybee

Veteran Member
bw said:
I encourage you to take a long look at your backup discipline. I back up EVERYTHING to thumb drives, and I have four sets of them that I use in rotation, one every two weeks. So in addition to the PC, I have four complete copies going back two months, and backups are stored in the fireproof safe.

Been a programmer since the 70's, and regular backups are a religious observance. I suggest you get your backups organized so that if any computer goes toes-up you can be entirely complacent about your data security.
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Very good idea. Thank you.
 
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