New Computer Purchase

glup · Joined: Jul 24, 2008 Posts: 21

I'm considering a new desktop and would appreciate feedback from anyone concerning this purchase. It seems the major brands on the market are HP, Compac, Dell, Gateway, Acer and Emachine. I'm familiar with HP and Compac...not impressed with Dell and know nothing of the others. I am "an educated user" not a techie or gamer but enjoy working with pictures, videos and slideshows. My current computer struggles at times with the slideshows so I want to improve that area. There is so much to choose from and I want to make the right purchase so any suggestions will be appreciated. Thanks.... Razz

BbWindowsHelpbB · Joined: Jul 07, 2008 Posts: 15

the Emachine may not be the best for slideshows. at least not the cheaper ones. what's your budget? HP and Compaq are the same company. I use an HP-compaq and a Dell. I think Dell is good for businesses because the price is lower. I would recommend an HP-Compaq computer. they're priced pretty well and are pretty reliable.

glup · Joined: Jul 24, 2008 Posts: 21

I'm leary of the Emachines myself and no knowledge at all of the Acer. I have an HP desktop and a Compac laptop now. They are 4-5 years old. The laptop doesn't do too well with the slideshows nor online video ..... the desktop does much better, but I want to upgrade. I'm leaning towards HP/Compac. I've seen bundles advertised anywhere from $600 and up... I'd like to stay under $ 1000 but want to be able to do my slideshows. Thanks for your input.

drwho07 · Joined: Nov 29, 2007 Posts: 1546 Location: Central FL, USA

I'm not sure what a slideshow is, but I've installed several Acers lately and they seem very fast, stable and capable.

The first was an Acer notebook with a 17" screen which was picked up at Staples for $549.

The last one was an Acer desktop MINI with a 22" wide screen, 4 gigs of ram a huge HD and Vista Pro 64 bit. It was purchased at "Sam's Club" for a really good price, or so I was told. I really enjoyed setting it up, because it was so fast.

Acer is the #4 brand, worldwide. Not a newcomer to the PC business by any stretch of the imagination. I'd buy one in a heartbeat if I needed a good computer in a hurry.

Good Luck,
Doc Cool

BudDurland · Joined: Dec 05, 2002 Posts: 475

Back in day, when I worked for a computer reseller, we sold a boatload of Acers. Great machines, very reliable.

glup · Joined: Jul 24, 2008 Posts: 21

Thanks for the feedback....it's good to get some positive remarks on Acer. drw007 - I use Ulead CD & DVD Pictureshow software to compile pics (not video) with motion, titles, transition effects and music then burn to a DVD. You then have a DVD picture presentation that will play on your TV or computer using your DVD player. It's really nice for birthdays, holidays and special events. Unfortunately, I just found out this program is not and will not be Vista compatible now or in the future so I'll be in the market for a new program. I have one more question.....is Vista as bad as I hear? No one seems to have anything good to say about it....loaded with bugs and hard to use is what I hear the most. Thanks again.

drwho07 · Joined: Nov 29, 2007 Posts: 1546 Location: Central FL, USA

It's exactly the same thing we put up with when XP first came out, replacing Windows 98 on thousands of PC's worldwide.

It was much larger than 98 or ME and came with a bunch of "Services" which we'd never had to worry about before.
Then there was the hardware compatibility problem.

Same thing, different year!!!

Vista is a huge resource hog and takes up a very large amount of HD space. It consumes ram like a monkey eating bananas.
A system that ran 98 or XP pretty well, will struggle to run Vista, if it will run it at all.

EDIT: Vista is out now for over a year and a half and MS has already fixed many problems with their "Service Pack 1" which is an easy download and install. I'm running Vista Ultimate on two 'test' machines and it's running well and stable. NO BSOD's and no lock-ups.

I run Vista and XP-Pro on the same computer, and with my full package of tweaks and tunes, Vista is doing some things Faster than XP can do them.
Hard drive access to my SATA2 drives seems to be faster. Vista comes with its own SATA drivers and does not use the ones that come with the motherboard, like XP does.

I just worked on a system with XP Pro on it, that came out with only 256m of ram. XP ran a bit slow, but it ran.
Vista would puke, if it ever installed at all with so little memory.

One of the few advantages to Vista is that it comes with its own SATA drivers, so you don't need SATA drivers on a floppy disk when you install it.

When I set up a new Vista PC for a customer who's upgrading from an earlier OS, I set every screen and menu to "Classic Windows".
Then I shut down 22 Services and tweak the registry for faster shutdowns and better ram usage.

Finally, when I get done, Vista looks and acts a lot like XP-Pro.
There's just the software and hardware compatibility issue.

Many people upgrading to Vista, are also having to buy new Printers, Scanners and other peripherals for which there are NO Vista drivers.
That sux! Crying or Very sad

Cheers!
The Doctor Cool

drwho07 · Joined: Nov 29, 2007 Posts: 1546 Location: Central FL, USA

Ooops! I almost forgot.....

An elderly lady, customer of mine, called me this morning to tell me she picked up an eMachine with XP on it at Wal*Mart today.
I saw them there, the last time I was in the store and I think the SALE price was $299, without a monitor.

I'll be setting that up for her next week and transferring her data and ISP setup from her old PC, installing her fairly new Epson AIO printer, etc.

So, there's still a few PC's sitting on dealers shelves with XP on them, if you know where to find them. Wink

Cheers Mates!
The Doctor Cool

glup · Joined: Jul 24, 2008 Posts: 21

Just an update....I did it....jumped in and purchased an HP Pavillion PC/Ordinateur A6537 yesterday....4 gb RAM 650 HD, Intel Core 2 Duo Processor E7200 with a 22" monitor. Set it up last night and getting familiar with Vista today. A really different look than XP, but it's really nice. Runs circles around my laptop and older desktop. It's fast as lightening and looks like it will do everything I want (maybe a little more). Of course, in 6 months it will probably be obsolete and I'll be looking to do this all over again (if you know what I mean), but right now I'm really happy with my new toy. Thanks everyone for your remarks and feedback. Very Happy

drwho07 · Joined: Nov 29, 2007 Posts: 1546 Location: Central FL, USA

Remember what I said.....

In Vista there are at least 22 Services running all the time in the background that for 99% of home users, can be disabled or put into Manual mode.

Then, there are also some registry tweaks that greatly enhance the efficiency of the OS and ram.

Out of the box, Vista is a dog!

Good Luck,
Doc Cool

glup · Joined: Jul 24, 2008 Posts: 21

Hi Doc..So far things are going well with the new system but of course always looking for more efficiency. I know there's a lot more going on in Vista and I'm perfectly willing to disable those not necessary but not sure what they are. I've already set windows to classic (I like that better). I'm also wondering about the User Account Control (necessary or not). With just one user and no password seems like a waste of time, but like I said I'm not sure what services to disable and still keep things running properly. I'm not comfortable attempting any registry tweeks but disabling services does not intimidate me. Any suggestions appreciated. Thanks......

drwho07 · Joined: Nov 29, 2007 Posts: 1546 Location: Central FL, USA

Well, it wouldn't cost you one RED cent to do exactly what I did.

Go to Black Vipers web site and find his list of Services to disable for Vista.
http://www.blackviper.com/WinVista/servicecfg.htm

I used his advise several years back when I wanted to speed up XP.

He gives three categories of services to disable. Pick the ones in the SAFE column and you should do OK. That's what I did.
I made a list of everything I wanted to disable and then wrote them all into a batch file. Now I just run that batch file on every Vista PC that I set up for my home PC users. It takes about two seconds and the job is done.

Using his advise, I disabled 22 services in Vista Ultimate.
On my own, I added two more to his list, for my own PC.
Much of that is just personal preference and depends on what's installed on your PC that runs a Service.

I now have my tricked out Vista running as good as my tricked out XP.

If you're not willing to tweak your registry, then there's not much more I can do to help you.

Good Luck,
The Doctor Cool

drwho07 · Joined: Nov 29, 2007 Posts: 1546 Location: Central FL, USA

Oh yeah! Turn off that perfectly Worthless UAC.
It serves NO earthly purpose for the single PC home user.

Doc Cool

glup · Joined: Jul 24, 2008 Posts: 21

Thanks Doc.....I'll check out that website

drwho07 · Joined: Nov 29, 2007 Posts: 1546 Location: Central FL, USA

Works for me!

And for anyone who's going to shut down UAC on more than one PC, you might want to consider just running this little script, to do the job in about one second. Put it on your Utilities CD and take it with you.

Just copy and paste this text into a Notepad document and save as:
DisableUAC.reg

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System]
"EnableLUA"=dword:00000000

Anytime you have to do something more than twice, it's always good to commit it to a batch file or registry script.

That saves a lot of time and precludes making errors if re-typing the same thing over and over again. Wink

For instance, accessing "Services.msc" and disabling 22 services, can take up to a half hour, more or less.
Doing the same job from a batch file takes about two seconds and reduces the chance of making errors to Zero.

I don't want to post that batch file here, but I'll gladly share it with anyone asking for it, in PM or email.

Cheers Mates,
The Doctor Cool