| Author | Message | ||
     Kevinfromwebb |
I going to order a new puter this afternoon, my old one is fried... I mainly use it for surfing,email, and plan on keeping it for a while. I'm planning on getting the office software with word,powerpoint,excel,etc. I also use it for my digital camera stuff. Here's my question: would it make any difference staying with the XP home edition or going to the XP Professional. I didn;t know if there was much difference between the two??? Thanks, Kevin | ||
| Josh_ |
Stay with Home unless you need a Windows domain logon. What type of system? If you just want something basic, Dell has a Dimension 3000 with a Celeron processor, 80GB drive, 256MB RAM and a 17" flat-screen for $349. I'd add the P4 2.8 for $50, and 512MB RAM for $40, and the 1 year onsite for $29. Should be about $500 shipped. Nothing to brag about but a decent system for a home user. If you have the extra cash, look at the 4700 series. If the system has a rebate in Small Business make sure you list your name as the business name. If you want a CD/DVD burner, go to NewEgg and get the NEC CD/DVD burner that includes Nero ($70 value). | ||
| Kevinfromwebb |
Thanks Josh... | ||
| Scitz |
Get a MAC Mini. It's the best with Digital images and video. You can also get the MS Office Suite for the MAC and less threat of Viruses. XP Pro is suited more for a computer in a network infrastructure environment and includes more features for communicating on large networks with servers. XP home should fill all your needs. Another suggestion for people upgrading and what to do with your old computer there is an open source DVR recorder called MythTV for Linux that is out. I found a download that has the software packaged with a Linux kernel I'm going to try on an old PIII 700 I have. You also need a TV capture card compatible with Linux. http://www.mythtv.org http://www.mysettopbox.tv/knoppmyth.html http://revision3.com/systm/mythtv/ | ||
| Reepicheep |
Not much difference. XP Home can't administer other windows boxes remotely, lacks the backup utility (that is useless anyway), and a couple other subtle differences that a home user won't care about. Grisoft (www.grisoft.com) makes a good free for home use antivirus package, and the microsoft anti spyware utility is free (for now) and works well (www.microsoft.com). How are you going to connect to the internet? A $35 firewall appliance piece of hardware makes it hard to do something stupid, can be plugged in and ignored from then on, and is money well spent. | ||
| Reepicheep |
Minor correction, the free version of the grisoft scanner is at: http://free.grisoft.com/ | ||
| Kevinfromwebb |
Thanks Yall... I just ordered a dell 9100... I just got dsl and between the dsl software and the ethernet card software it was too much for my old system to handle, it was an old dell that I had bought in '98...I had gotten pretty buggy, so I guess I"m lucky it lasted this long. I did have a couple of questions for yall 'in the know'... When I registered the yahoo dsl it had some anti virus you could down load but it said to disable any previous anti virus you had. Is the yahoo dsl anti virus any good or should I just go back to the grisoft??? And my modem/router is supposed to have a firewall built in, how would you know for sure and would it be adequate??? I think it's a '2wire unit' Thanks for the help, I'll check back in tomorrow... Kevin | ||
| Reepicheep |
If the yahoo stuff is free, then that is fine, so long as it does not serve up popups or other annoying adds. The grisoft is completely non invasive. Post a model number for your DSL router. I doubt it has a firewall. You can run a quick test at www.grc.com (follow the "shields up" link and run their test). That will tell you if you have any glaring holes (including any spyware or worm installed active listeners). It won't tell you if your OS or if the router is the firewall though, just that something somewhere in the food chain is doing the firewalling, ot at least natting (which is arguably just as good protection). Post the model number of the modem and we can probably google it and find out if it is really a firewall or not. | ||
| Cmm213 |
I would'nt pee on a dell if it was on fire in my living room- worst customer service ever!! | ||
| Josh_ |
Since Dell has easily the cheapest prices (try buying just a Pentium 4 2.8Ghz CPU and a 17" flat panel for $400 total) who cares about CS? The 2wire units do have limited firewalls AFAIK. grc.com is great if you can take the ego  | ||
| Blake |
In my experience, Dell rocks! Great customer service. ! On-site the next day, problem solved. Can't beat it in my experience. Gateway was horrendous by comparison, again, in my experience. The inflamatory language is not appreciated. Please try to avoid that in the future. | ||
| Dana P. |
I'm on my third Gateway without any problems.I just picked up this Gateway laptop about three months ago and it rocks.If I ever had any questions to Gateway they were answered. | ||
| M2me |
XP Home...lacks the backup utility I've found that the Windows 2000 Professional version of the backup utility runs fine under XP Home. Of course you'll need access to either a Windows 2000 based computer or the CD (I actually didn't even use the CD). I would guess that the XP Professional version of backup would work on XP Home too. What's the value? I don't know, but it's just interesting how you can often get things to work that aren't "supposed" to. | ||
| Chainsaw |
12 years in a roomful of Mac's at work, I have yet to call Apple's Customer Service for anything.  | ||
| Cochise |
In my experience, Dell rocks! Great customer service. ! On-site the next day, problem solved. Can't beat it in my experience. Gateway was horrendous by comparison, again, in my experience. The inflamatory language is not appreciated. Please try to avoid that in the future.\blue My good friend H.P. bought him a computer from Dell, paid with his credit card, waited four weeks, no response, he finally called and after talking to a few people from another country, somebody named Hocktoee, and a few others, they found out that his credit card was entered wrong and they didn't have his money, how's that for customer service? Sometimes people get good P.R. sometimes they don't | ||
| Scitz |
With Dell I know it just depends on your level of service or warranty purchased. I worked for a company that had purchased different levels of warranty service at time of purchase until they eventually set up a corporate account. When I called support depending on the warranty type sometimes I would get an American and didn't have any problems, then sometimes I would get someone in India and it took for ever. The same company also had an equal amount of MACs and we very rarely had to call for any service. I'm a computer tech and after I started to support MACs I fell in love. For multimedia, home, and internet use it's much better than than the PC. Windows and PC is still better for and office and enterprise enviroment. But MAC OSX is built on a Unix kernel and can run any Linux open source apps which are free. I Also think that Apple is looking at using Intel proccessors in it's next generation of computers, then OSX may port over to the PC. So if your frustrated with having problem with your PC all the time and warranty work maybe you should look into switching. Not to start a MAC or PC is better war, just MAC is sometimes forgotten about as an alternative. | ||
| Steve_mackay |
Scitz, I agree about the Macs. For average home use, they rule! I've got two at home, and one at work used as a web/ftp/file/ftp server. | ||
| Kevinfromwebb |
I'll let yall know the model number of the router/modem... Thanks for all the help. I had good luck with my other dell which was my first 'puter so I went with them again. I like that you can get just what you want and get to pick just about everything about the system... Kevin | ||
| Josh_ |
did no one else think this was hilarious? >if it was on fire in my living room >inflamatory language is not appreciated Scitz, guys already have hacked developer copies of the next MAC OS running on cheap $300 PCs. They say i's faster than any MAC on the market today. | ||
| Steve_mackay |
Josh, I wouldn't say EVERYTHING is faster on it. Some things are faster on my Dual 1GHZ G4, than the developer x86 OSX running on a 2.8GHZ Dell 4700. But the rosetta stuff(PowerPC emulation) works. And works quite well. | ||
| Blake |
Josh, | ||
| Jeremyh |
ONE WORD..................ALIENWARE!!!! ok so they cost a lot but they are awesome and they are getting more competative in their pricing. right now the dell laptops are super over priced over the ALienware's | ||
| Jeremyh |
i run a dual Xeon Workstation with 4 gigs of ram a 1200 dollar Quada Fx graphics card and dual monitors...........i have no complaints about performance....it was only 3800 bucks too. Although i did spill coffee all over my keyboard yesterday an now i need a new one because all the keys are sticking. | ||
| Henrik |
Jeremy; I've successfully cleaned keyboard by just unplugging them (important ) and rinsing them out with luke warm water. Shake as much water out as you can, then leave to dry for several days. Henrik (not that I'd do something so stupid as dropping a bowl of cereal + milk into my keyboard - or a cup of coffee, not to mention soda.... uh, but I must've read about it on the internet | ||
| Reepicheep |
Minor revision to Henrik's suggestion... don't use the water, use isopropyl alchohol (as pure as you can find, no less then 70%). I put it in a plant mister so I can really blast it into the nooks and crannies. Or use the water, preferably distilled, and then follow that up with alchohol. Dry it in a warm place, or hit it with an air compresser followed by a hairdryer. So long as the thing has not been run for long in the wet state, I can almost always recover dunked electronics this way. (Message edited by reepicheep on September 07, 2005) | ||
| Jeremyh |
but you guys.........its more fun spending th company money. Geese you guys sure know how to take all the fun out of a hard days work.  | ||
| Reepicheep |
Well, isopropyl alchohol *is* very flamable, and I did mention a hairdryer, so there is the chance to spend some company money yet... If you are willing to give up the "safety donuts". | ||
| Davegess |
How about aerosol contact cleaner? | ||
| Henrik |
I think it would evaporate too quickly to effectively flush away the sticky crud left by say coffee or soda ... Henrik | ||
| Typeone |
Full-time Mac user since ~1991 here too, I'm a graphic designer/creative dir. I could care less about the Mac/PC war these days because I think people are finally waking up to the fact that Apple actually cares about it's user base. Just don't ever take away my Mac! I can't wait to see what happens when we go Intel. It's not like anyone really cares whats inside as long as the thing is good. My wife has had to deal with HP desktops at work for years, she's on the phone with terrible customer support like every week. Most of it has to do with MSN I think but they have hardware issues all the time. All they do is regular office stuff, type in Word, send an email, etc. A few years ago I got her a Lime 2nd Rev iMac and she fell head first in love. She now has one of those pretty iMacs with the 'floating' screen and works that thing like a pro. Digital camera, email, iTunes you name it. It really is her little 'digital hub'. And she hates computers... go figure. | ||
| Reepicheep |
It'd be expensive as well, at least for big stuff. But if you used enough, it would work even better then the alcohol. If you are trying to salvage a $2000 laptop, $50 worth of contact cleaner might make sense though... | ||
| Davegess |
more for the beer on the keyboard | ||
| Josh_ |
>Apple actually cares about it's user base. Right, which is why they force you to install the 20MB iTunes app when all you want is the 4MB Quicktunes player... | ||
| Reepicheep |
They did not care about the Wallstreet powerbook I had. First the self exploding hinges, then the OSX won't support the video card. I really wanted to like the thing, but the more I used it, the more if felt like BSD done badly. |
