-
Be sure to read this post! Beware of scammers. https://www.indianagunowners.com/threads/classifieds-new-online-payment-guidelines-rules-paypal-venmo-zelle-etc.511734/
Needing a new desktop PC, suggestions?
- Thread starter CHCRandy
- Start date
The #1 community for Gun Owners in Indiana
Member Benefits:
Fewer Ads! Discuss all aspects of firearm ownership Discuss anti-gun legislation Buy, sell, and trade in the classified section Chat with Local gun shops, ranges, trainers & other businesses Discover free outdoor shooting areas View up to date on firearm-related events Share photos & video with other members ...and so much more!
Member Benefits:
IndyBeerman
Was a real life Beerman.....
+
Actually You might want to consider Fry's Electronics, had them build my current system 3 years ago because of two things, I hadn't built a system in over 5 years and was out of the loop on current specs, and they have almost absolutely everything possible in stock, plus it only cost 75.00 for the build and they installed Win10 and all drivers. Paid for it on a Friday afternoon and picked up Sunday upon opening.
Termaltake Tower
Corsair 900 watt power supply
MSI 990FXA Gaming MB
AMD FX 8350 core processor @ 4GHZ
64gig of ram
Nvidia 9600OC video card
ASUS BluRay read/write
1TB Patriot Ignite SSD
Enermax liquid cooling double radiator w/twin 60mm fans
2 120mm fans
I also bought my monitor there, a 32inch LG 2ms gaming monitor
This is interesting. I'm looking to upgrade my desktop which is over ten years old now. I would have never considered a mini PC like that, but I'd like to get rid of the computer desk and put it all on my regular desk with two monitors (one for movies/tv and one for a browser because I can't just sit and watch something with out thinking of a million things to look up). Beyond that I don't play games because the make me nauseous.
How would one of these work? I'm prone to think buying the highest model will get me farther in the long run before it seems too old and slow, but I could be wrong about that.
https://www.amazon.com/NUC7i5BNH-i5...ncoding=UTF8&refRID=Z7QWR9PW54W8YCVQGC9F&th=1
Last edited:
This brings up the old argument of whether to spend the big money up front on the CPU to attempt future proof your system or plan to load the system with up-gradable go fast stuff like RAM, SSD's and better WIFI?
nonobaddog
Grandmaster
There is really nothing one can do to 'future-proof' a computer. The technology changes. Newer CPU's mean newer sockets and chipsets which means new motherboards and probably memory unless you are lucky and upgrade often. If you wait a while between upgrades pretty much everything will change.
Power supplies might be compatible a little longer and optical drives as long as blu-ray is around.
One might be better off selling the old computer whole instead of trying to cannibalize it for parts that are almost certainly going to be obsolete soon if not already.
I just go with the best bang-for-the-buck and upgrade to a new build as needed. There are lots of websites with lots of opinions about the current hardware sweet-spots. Of course if you need the absolute best performance available you are kind of screwed for cost and upgrade schedule.
Power supplies might be compatible a little longer and optical drives as long as blu-ray is around.
One might be better off selling the old computer whole instead of trying to cannibalize it for parts that are almost certainly going to be obsolete soon if not already.
I just go with the best bang-for-the-buck and upgrade to a new build as needed. There are lots of websites with lots of opinions about the current hardware sweet-spots. Of course if you need the absolute best performance available you are kind of screwed for cost and upgrade schedule.
I disagree with Nono. You can futureproof somewhat, but it requires some upfront investment.
14 years ago, I used to do a LOT of gaming. FPSs that required LOTS of CPU and expensive graphics cards. I "bought once, cried once" and bought the second fastest Core i7 CPU I could. (only because the difference between 3rd and second was 20% and 2nd and 1st was 120% increase in cost) Due to several factors (mainly changes to the games that turned me off if it) I quit gaming and just used the PC for surfing the web.
I finally retired that PC last year because the motherboard finally died. It was still running strong even though I went from windows 7 to 10. Still cheaper than buying a new "good enough" PC every 3-4 years.
Correction: I bought the PC 16 years ago. It was when Battlefield 1942 came out in 2002.
14 years ago, I used to do a LOT of gaming. FPSs that required LOTS of CPU and expensive graphics cards. I "bought once, cried once" and bought the second fastest Core i7 CPU I could. (only because the difference between 3rd and second was 20% and 2nd and 1st was 120% increase in cost) Due to several factors (mainly changes to the games that turned me off if it) I quit gaming and just used the PC for surfing the web.
I finally retired that PC last year because the motherboard finally died. It was still running strong even though I went from windows 7 to 10. Still cheaper than buying a new "good enough" PC every 3-4 years.
Correction: I bought the PC 16 years ago. It was when Battlefield 1942 came out in 2002.
nonobaddog
Grandmaster
I see your point and I agree somewhat. But a couple of things to add -
- I wouldn't call the best bang-for-the-buck machine "good enough", you still want to get the "bang", typically they would be performance machines without paying for the last few steps where the prices go up fast. Kind of like you described - the last few steps are expensive but just under that level are the best performance-to-price ratios but still a serious performers - ie right now maybe an 8th or 9th generation i7 or i9 (I haven't done the homework recently) maybe even a 10th generation - I don't even know those prices.
- 3-4 years is overstating the replacement schedule, I sure get more than that out of a new one.
- Windows 10 is no more resource hungry than Windows 7, many people saw better performance in 10 than 7.
- If you had kept gaming your machine probably would not have satisfied you that long.
- I wouldn't call the best bang-for-the-buck machine "good enough", you still want to get the "bang", typically they would be performance machines without paying for the last few steps where the prices go up fast. Kind of like you described - the last few steps are expensive but just under that level are the best performance-to-price ratios but still a serious performers - ie right now maybe an 8th or 9th generation i7 or i9 (I haven't done the homework recently) maybe even a 10th generation - I don't even know those prices.
- 3-4 years is overstating the replacement schedule, I sure get more than that out of a new one.
- Windows 10 is no more resource hungry than Windows 7, many people saw better performance in 10 than 7.
- If you had kept gaming your machine probably would not have satisfied you that long.
If you're just watching movies in 1080 and surfing the web, about any modern $300 pc will be fine for the foreseeable future. Adware/virus'/software issues are what plague most users before any sort of hardware failure/bottleneck. Especially now that most are m2 or solid state drives.
Most any higher end computers, $600+, are overkill if you're not gaming or running gpu intensive applications like CAD or video editing.
Last edited:
Agreed. And I never meant to say it would have. My point is a gaming level rig today (without the high end video card) will work well as a general purpose rig 4x longer than a lower powered, "appropriately sized" system will.
Its only overkill for the first half or so of its longer than normal life. Then when it has the power of a future entry level PC it will still function acceptably well.
So lets look into the future. Assuming in the future a general purpose PC will have a performance rating of 500 MonkeyUnits. That will do what needs to be done at an acceptable level for general computing. If you wanted to play games in the future you would need a PC rated at 1,000 MonkeyUnits. However from that vantage point looking back into the past, today's entry level system would rate at only 50-100 MonkeyUnits, far slower than required to do a good job running that latest 3D AI powered word processor and predictive internet browser of the future. But That gaming rig of the past (today) actually scored at 400 MonkeyUnits. That older system wouldnt be able to play the games, but it would still hold its own running internet apps and word processors.
And not only do you have the pain of buying repeated computers over that 10-15 year life span, you have the headaches of moving all the data to the new PC, resetting the settings the way you like repeatedly, etc.
But, some people wont be able to swallow that higher cost up front, so they will just end up buying PCs more frequently. And that's OK.
nonobaddog
Grandmaster
For a gaming system you need most of your MonkeyUnits in the GPU.
For load testing developed applications and databases you need the CPU.
For load testing developed applications and databases you need the CPU.
How much power is overkill for the OP? Other than running a couple monitors and multi-tasking some programs, which seems like a pretty mundane issue in the modern day, he doesn't seem to have high end needs?
Please correct me if I'm wrong, but if the OP's upgrading from a years old system, wouldn't even a base system that could accommodate two monitors be plenty for him?
Please correct me if I'm wrong, but if the OP's upgrading from a years old system, wouldn't even a base system that could accommodate two monitors be plenty for him?
Last edited:
nonobaddog
Grandmaster
Probably - for right now. Then new versions of the operating system and other software comes out and the demands might go up. Plus storage fills up and new software is added. I think the only 'future proofing' available is to buy more than the bare minimum you need right now. I guess the OP could answer that best since he knows his performance expectations best.
Faster systems are just a better and more fun experience too, for many people.
The Intel NUC units are nicely packaged. That checks all the boxes and should serve you well for many years. It also has Thunderbolt 3 so you can use an external GPU if you find you need it in the future.
I don't think anyone has suggested the latest and greatest hardware, just advised not going bargain basement.
It's not future proofing so much as life span planning. Buy a $300 system and you'll be buying another in short order or complaining about a slow system. Be more selective in your purchase and you'll be good for a decade.
This is the way to do it.
Biggest problem with a $300 system is that you're going to be buying another $300 system in a few years.
No $400 system is going to have anything resembling the specs you just listed. It will have a bargain basement i3/Pentium or AMD equivalent processor with a high GHz number in the marketing materials. What people don't understand is that CPU will have only 2 cores (critically low for multitasking) and is less powerful than mid tier processors and architecture from 5 years ago. They will also include a spinning laptop hard drive to slow things down even further.
Building won't help you either:
CPU (Gen 7 i5 or AMD Ryzen 7): $170
MB: $100
NVME SSD: $100
RAM: $100
Case: $50
Power Supply: $50
GPU?: $100
Windows License: $80
There could possibly be some general sales that make a mid tier system less expensive than it is now but most of the "deals" in the ads are going to fall into the poo poo category.Great info here gents! Thanks for the professional contributions.
Are we seeing anything advertised that might be in line with the OP's needs? Maybe as we get towards black friday?
Sheriff Dave
Marksman
I sent the OP a link to the same unit I bought for 125, for most people it is more then should be needed for a few years.
https://slickdeals.net/share/android_app/fp/511495
This is really a powerhouse of a system laptop or desktop. Pair it with a USB-c dock and you can turn it into a great workstation. Slightly more spendy than the refurb units but it has the latest gen architecture.
This is really a powerhouse of a system laptop or desktop. Pair it with a USB-c dock and you can turn it into a great workstation. Slightly more spendy than the refurb units but it has the latest gen architecture.
Last edited:
