Strider Posted May 19, 2010 Posted May 19, 2010 Hey, basically I'm after a new computer and I don't really know if I want a laptop or a desktop. At the minute I'm using a 4 1/2 year old Acer Aspire laptop and it sounds like an aircraft taking off (the CPU fan in knackered, sometimes it doesn't even start) So to me this is a good reason to buy a new one. I'll be going to University in September so I really don't know if it's best to buy a desktop (just the tower), then possibly buy a net book once I've saved up or just buy a laptop. I'll be using the computer for Photoshop CS5 and photo editing, possible gaming and normal computery tasks. My budget is around £400. And I have no idea what's good or rubbish. I have been looking at laptops and spotted http://www.ebuyer.com/product/186603 Is it any good? I haven't actually looked at desktops yet so I don't really know how they compare (I'd be happy to build one). I would appreciate the help. Thanks
Cube Posted May 19, 2010 Posted May 19, 2010 4 1/2 year old Acer Aspire laptop 4 and a half years must be some kind of world record for a working Acer laptop. They usually self-destruct after 13 months. Anyway, for university I'd say that a laptop is probably much more convenient. As for the laptop you linked, it won't do. The video card lets it down - the requirement for Photoshop CS5 is 256MB for the Video card RAM. Which will likely bump the price up. Edit: Unless someone more tech-minded person can confirm that a shared-memory graphics chip is fine for Photoshop CS5.
Strider Posted May 19, 2010 Author Posted May 19, 2010 4 and a half years must be some kind of world record for a working Acer laptop. They usually self-destruct after 13 months. To be honest I am quite surprised myself, it's on for about 10 hours most days so it's had a good innings. Anyway, for university I'd say that a laptop is probably much more convenient. As for the laptop you linked, it won't do. The video card lets it down - the requirement for Photoshop CS5 is 256MB for the Video card RAM. Which will likely bump the price up. Edit: Unless someone more tech-minded person can confirm that a shared-memory graphics chip is fine for Photoshop CS5. Ohhh I see. These are the things I know nothing about, I just think, "ahh dedicated graphics card, that'll do." :S
Nolan Posted May 19, 2010 Posted May 19, 2010 Dedicated Graphics probably would do, but that isn't Dedicated, just an ATI integrated solution. Finding a laptop that low with Dedicated isn't going to be an easy task either.
MoogleViper Posted May 19, 2010 Posted May 19, 2010 4 and a half years must be some kind of world record for a working Acer laptop. They usually self-destruct after 13 months. Anyway, for university I'd say that a laptop is probably much more convenient. I find a laptop slightly pointless. I never need to take a laptop anywhere with me (nor do any of my laptop owning friends take theirs anywhere). Although it would be good for transporting it from home to uni and vice versa, but I'd rather get more for my money from a desktop.
Charlie Posted May 19, 2010 Posted May 19, 2010 I find a laptop slightly pointless. I never need to take a laptop anywhere with me (nor do any of my laptop owning friends take theirs anywhere). Although it would be good for transporting it from home to uni and vice versa, but I'd rather get more for my money from a desktop. I take mine all over the place. I got mine in a similar time to you, Strider, just before I went to uni. I went for a laptop which means I can easily take it to the library with me (far easier than having to get a computer in the library during exam/assignment time), take it to lectures and also when relaxing at home you can watch TV and have Facebook on at the same time. I find it's also great for when I'm traveling about the country as most trains have power sockets on them these days so you can use it on the train and use the free WiFi. The more I've gone through uni the more indispensable my laptop has become to me. Any time I go home I take my laptop as it gives me something to do. Traveling to interviews/see people in different cities it's great for the train etc. I'd definitely go for a laptop unless you could actually afford to get a PC and a netbook in which case I'd go for that. And do you really need Photoshop CS5? The chances are you won't be using all the tools on it and an older version would easily suffice.
Strider Posted May 19, 2010 Author Posted May 19, 2010 I find a laptop slightly pointless. I never need to take a laptop anywhere with me (nor do any of my laptop owning friends take theirs anywhere). Although it would be good for transporting it from home to uni and vice versa, but I'd rather get more for my money from a desktop. That was my reasoning for possibly getting a desktop. I wouldn't be taking a laptop to lectures or anywhere really. I'd be home every 2-3 weeks for the weekend, so I suppose it would be easier to have a laptop for transport (although I'd have my car anyway), but like you say I'd get more for my money with a desktop. Hmm it's a toughy.
Shorty Posted May 19, 2010 Posted May 19, 2010 I had a PC at Uni. I only went back home for long enough to want to take it back with me a couple of times, so it wasn't a big deal. It's great having a powerful desktop and much better for getting your Uni work done and watching things on. However in my second year I lived in a flat, jayseven and my g/f both had laptops which they often sat with in the Living Room. I felt a bit like I couldn't join in, and when my g/f bought me a netbook, that was great! I use it portably all the time, on trains, in hotels, wifi hotspots etc - but I only really use it for net browsing and entertainment. A laptop is not much use for Photoshop. You'd have to put it on a desk and plug in a mouse anyway so you might as well have a desktop. Also, since CS4, Photoshop has been powered primarily by your GPU not your CPU. So you need a good, fast card with a lot of memory to run it smoothly. I can't see CS5 running very well on a £400 laptop.
Strider Posted May 19, 2010 Author Posted May 19, 2010 Cheers for the advice people I think I'll go with a Desktop then. It should be fairly easy to save up for a net-book soon after, if not there's always Christmas to help towards it. Can anyone recommend a PC (tower only) for £400 ish? (I don't mind a little bit more and I would be happy to build)
McPhee Posted May 19, 2010 Posted May 19, 2010 Being happy to build opens doors If you go with slightly older tech you can get something really quite powerful for £400. That would be a good starting point. Gives you £70 to play with, which I'd suggest spending to get an AM3 motherboard, DDR3 RAM and a more powerful CPU. It's also worth shopping around, ATi 4850s have been available cheaper and I suspect it might be possible to get a better price on RAM too.
Shorty Posted May 19, 2010 Posted May 19, 2010 Going slightly off topic - That's a pretty cheap 1TB HDD, I wonder how much the 3GB ones will be when they appear on the market... really want SSDs to drop in price.
RoadKill Posted May 20, 2010 Posted May 20, 2010 Spend the pennies extra to get 4GB, but other than that, that's a nice spec
Strider Posted May 20, 2010 Author Posted May 20, 2010 (edited) Thanks for the info, cheers guys Edit - McPhee - Where did you build that PC from? Ebuyer? Edit MK2 - Aria Edited May 20, 2010 by Strider
McPhee Posted May 20, 2010 Posted May 20, 2010 Aria.co.uk - My current shop of choice. They're just beating everyone else on price these days, no two ways about it. I did make a mistake though. The Athlon II X3 is an AM3 processor. Better to go with an AM3 motherboard and DDR3 RAM; http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Components/Motherboards/Socket+AM3+(AMD)/Gigabyte+GA-MA785GM-US2H+AMD785G+(Socket+AM3)+DDR2+PCI-Express+Motherboard+?productId=37519 http://www.aria.co.uk/SuperSpecials/Other+products/G.Skill+RipJaw+4GB+(2x2GB)+DDR3+PC3-10666C9+1333MHz+Dual+Channel+Kit+?productId=37609
Nolan Posted May 20, 2010 Posted May 20, 2010 AM3 is backwards compatible with AM2+ and DDR2, since the memory controller is on the die with the CPU.
Strider Posted May 23, 2010 Author Posted May 23, 2010 Just a quick check of components before I order: RipJaw 4GB DD3 - http://www.aria.co.uk/SuperSpecials/Other+products/G.Skill+RipJaw+4GB+(2x2GB)+DDR3+PC3-10666C9+1333MHz+Dual+Channel+Kit+?productId=37609 OCZ 400W PSU - http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Components/Power+Supplies/OCZ/OCZ+OCZ400SXS-UK+StealthXStream+400W+Silent+ATX2.2+Power+Supply+?productId=39205 Gigabyte GA-MA785GT-UD3H - http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Components/Motherboards/Socket+AM3+(AMD)/Gigabyte+GA-MA785GT-UD3H+AMD+785+(Socket+AM3)+DDR3+PCI-Express+Motherboard+?productId=37520 Gigabyte GZ-X4 Midi Tower Case - http://www.aria.co.uk/SuperSpecials/Other+products/Gigabyte+GZ-X4+Midi+Tower+Case+-+Silver/Black?productId=39109 AMD Athlon II X3 Tri Core 425 - http://www.aria.co.uk/SuperSpecials/Other+products/AMD+Athlon+II+X3+Tri+Core+425+2.70GHz+(Socket+AM3)+Processor+-+Retail+?productId=38269 4850 - http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Components/Graphics+Cards/ATI+4000+Series/Arianet/XFX+ATI+Radeon+HD+4850+512MB+GDDR3+PCI-Express+Graphics+Card+?productId=38671 1TB HD - http://www.aria.co.uk/SuperSpecials/Other+products/Samsung+HD103SJ+SpinPoint+F3+1TB+SATA-II+3.5%22+Hard+Drive+?productId=37726 = £391 Is everything okay there?
McPhee Posted May 23, 2010 Posted May 23, 2010 Looks good to me. Amazing value for money with a lot of upgrade potential.
Nolan Posted May 23, 2010 Posted May 23, 2010 Won't you need more than a 400w PSU for that? http://extreme.outervision.com/PSUEngine Plug everything into that, or just believe me when I say minimum 291W recommended 341W. OCZ is a good brand, and that one is 80+ certified, 80% comes out to 320W of reliable constant power. So it's in between min and rec, but likely fine.
Strider Posted May 25, 2010 Author Posted May 25, 2010 One last question. I'm looking into the Windows 7 Student deal (http://students.pugh.co.uk/index.php?nID=productDetail&manu=50&prodID=2830) However it does say it is the "Upgrade" version of windows 7. Would I be able to install this on a PC without any OS on it?
Nolan Posted May 25, 2010 Posted May 25, 2010 This version of Windows 7 ships as an upgrade edition. In order to perform a clean install using this edition, you must have an existing valid Windows operating system licensed to your PC. For in-place upgrades from Vista Home Premium or Vista Ultimate, you will need to purchase Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate Also on that page is this, which appears to serve as a guide for performing a clean install with upgrade editions.
McPhee Posted May 26, 2010 Posted May 26, 2010 Won't you need more than a 400w PSU for that? It'll easily manage it. Got a similar set-up here but with a Q9505, all running on a 300W PSU. Works fine. When I installed the Quad I checked to see how much power it's drawing from the mains at full load, 310W. A review measured the efficiency of this power supply at 86%, so that means the PSU is supplying around 266W. That's near the limit, but the system will rarely get near full load and won't go over that figure. 400W for Strider's system will easily be enough.
uncle_buckman Posted September 25, 2010 Posted September 25, 2010 (edited) I'm looking at the HP Pavilion DM4 and it looks pretty decent to me. I don't plan to play any games on it, just use graphics/cad/web building programs and possibly video editing software *Update* HP have waay too many variations for my liking so I'm going to go for the Samsung Q330 instead. One type, job done. I'll give it a few days, sell my 3 1/2 Acer for a ton and then order away. Light laptop awaiteth Edited September 25, 2010 by uncle_buckman How many DM4's do you wanna release HP?
Ten10 Posted September 26, 2010 Posted September 26, 2010 Just answering a few questions that have cropped up. Photoshop running with integrated graphics is fine but if you're doing any tasks that require editing at very fine detail things can get a bit sluggish. And yes you can do a clean install using an upgrade version of windows 7 from the student offer. I've managed to do so myself.
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