(no subject)
This just came up with a couple people: what are the optimal system specs for people who aren't rich losers?
I try to stay a step, or a couple steps behind the bleeding edge of technology. What I do is simply to scan through the price ranges to find the "price break". This is usually at an important psychological barrier - the $40 mark (resulting in a large amount of $39.99 gear) or the "Core 2" monicker, resulting in even one tiny step down being slashed in price. So here is the example gear that will maximize price vs. performance.
Memory - When I built the computer I'm working on originally, I went heavy on RAM. Back in 2006 256-512MB was pretty reasonable, my old eMachine had about 384 due to some monkey business with upgrades. I went for a full gig, and since doubled it. Memory is getting EXTREMELY cheap, and gives an amazing performance boost across everything you'll do with the computer.
There's good news and bad news. The good news is memory is rediculously easy to install. The bad news is that it's hard to choose the right chip at a glance. If you have any questions, fire me an email or reply to this post with your computer's make and model, and I'll get back to you with a chip type and perhaps a newegg link. Speaking of which, here's the example:
G-Skill 4GB dual-channel kit - $45.99
A couple things are noticeable about this pick. It more than maxxes out XP or Vista32's memory capacity (32-bit windows can only use about 3.8GB). G-Skill puts a couple nice little touches into its products, such as the blue heat spreaders on these chips (I have green spreaders). The spreaders themselves don't really matter unless you're overclocking the chips, but it does look attractive, and it signals the vendor's interest to go a little further to give you stable hardware. It's important for memory. Once again, please don't order this one blind. Find out what kind of chip will work for you and pick based on that first, otherwise you've got a $40 paperweight that doesn't even work very well.
Graphics cards are always sort of a tossup, top two picks right now are
$39 - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125242
$45 - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814187037
Note that the prices on these are also on the move, by the time you click on them, they will have changed. What's important about these picks is that they're NVidia (I do not currently trust ATI; for one they no longer post core clocks), they have a high clock, high memory, and NO FAN. Fans are noisy and generate dust. Dust kills hardware.
Unlike memory, hard drives are still not cheap. My best pick right now is:
$60 - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822145215
This is a Hitachi model, basically the cheapest disk that has both 500GB packed inside and runs at 7200 RPM. What that means is that unlike the same [samsung] drive for $55, it's much faster, making your computer chug less when you step into Dalaran. Other important details are that it's only half a terabyte - currently all sorts of vendors are asking you to buy a terabyte HDD, meaning you have to navigate downward significantly to clear all the strange price waves that technology is making. It's no good to be just below a terabyte right now, because dealer incentives have actually made the damn things worth the buy (at $85, once again the market is ruled by Hitachi at the moment).
Power supplies are one area where I'm actually brand loyal. I'm running both these models:
$37 - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817182021
$48 - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817182076
They're stylish, they have rock-solid voltages, and the fans are dual ball bearing. Many of the cheaper ones are sleeve or cuff bearings which will KIA inside of a year. This series here will outlast any two power supplies of another type, which I found to my chagrin after owning two other power supplies.
That's about it for meaningful hardware.
To sum up: Maxx out memory; it's cheap. Power supply options aren't cheap but don't cheap out. Perhaps wait on hard disks till the 1TB dust settles, and no matter what graphics card you get it's going to be obsolete or half price within a month.
Still, that doesn't mean it has to die in a month. Avoid fans where possible, get "dual ball bearing" when you can't avoid them. That more than anything will keep your computer happy and make sure it doesn't make strange noises.
That's all for now. I'm headed down to Pennsylvania cause PA rocks and all my people down there are awesome. Catch you in 3 days.
I try to stay a step, or a couple steps behind the bleeding edge of technology. What I do is simply to scan through the price ranges to find the "price break". This is usually at an important psychological barrier - the $40 mark (resulting in a large amount of $39.99 gear) or the "Core 2" monicker, resulting in even one tiny step down being slashed in price. So here is the example gear that will maximize price vs. performance.
Memory - When I built the computer I'm working on originally, I went heavy on RAM. Back in 2006 256-512MB was pretty reasonable, my old eMachine had about 384 due to some monkey business with upgrades. I went for a full gig, and since doubled it. Memory is getting EXTREMELY cheap, and gives an amazing performance boost across everything you'll do with the computer.
There's good news and bad news. The good news is memory is rediculously easy to install. The bad news is that it's hard to choose the right chip at a glance. If you have any questions, fire me an email or reply to this post with your computer's make and model, and I'll get back to you with a chip type and perhaps a newegg link. Speaking of which, here's the example:
G-Skill 4GB dual-channel kit - $45.99
A couple things are noticeable about this pick. It more than maxxes out XP or Vista32's memory capacity (32-bit windows can only use about 3.8GB). G-Skill puts a couple nice little touches into its products, such as the blue heat spreaders on these chips (I have green spreaders). The spreaders themselves don't really matter unless you're overclocking the chips, but it does look attractive, and it signals the vendor's interest to go a little further to give you stable hardware. It's important for memory. Once again, please don't order this one blind. Find out what kind of chip will work for you and pick based on that first, otherwise you've got a $40 paperweight that doesn't even work very well.
Graphics cards are always sort of a tossup, top two picks right now are
$39 - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125242
$45 - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814187037
Note that the prices on these are also on the move, by the time you click on them, they will have changed. What's important about these picks is that they're NVidia (I do not currently trust ATI; for one they no longer post core clocks), they have a high clock, high memory, and NO FAN. Fans are noisy and generate dust. Dust kills hardware.
Unlike memory, hard drives are still not cheap. My best pick right now is:
$60 - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822145215
This is a Hitachi model, basically the cheapest disk that has both 500GB packed inside and runs at 7200 RPM. What that means is that unlike the same [samsung] drive for $55, it's much faster, making your computer chug less when you step into Dalaran. Other important details are that it's only half a terabyte - currently all sorts of vendors are asking you to buy a terabyte HDD, meaning you have to navigate downward significantly to clear all the strange price waves that technology is making. It's no good to be just below a terabyte right now, because dealer incentives have actually made the damn things worth the buy (at $85, once again the market is ruled by Hitachi at the moment).
Power supplies are one area where I'm actually brand loyal. I'm running both these models:
$37 - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817182021
$48 - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817182076
They're stylish, they have rock-solid voltages, and the fans are dual ball bearing. Many of the cheaper ones are sleeve or cuff bearings which will KIA inside of a year. This series here will outlast any two power supplies of another type, which I found to my chagrin after owning two other power supplies.
That's about it for meaningful hardware.
To sum up: Maxx out memory; it's cheap. Power supply options aren't cheap but don't cheap out. Perhaps wait on hard disks till the 1TB dust settles, and no matter what graphics card you get it's going to be obsolete or half price within a month.
Still, that doesn't mean it has to die in a month. Avoid fans where possible, get "dual ball bearing" when you can't avoid them. That more than anything will keep your computer happy and make sure it doesn't make strange noises.
That's all for now. I'm headed down to Pennsylvania cause PA rocks and all my people down there are awesome. Catch you in 3 days.