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CleverNickName (129189)

CleverNickName
  wil@nosPAM.wilwheaton.net
http://www.wilwheaton.net/
I'm just this guy, you know?

Journal of CleverNickName (129189)

i need a new computer - advice?

[ #168583 ]
Saturday April 07 2007, @12:36PM
Supercomputing
Simple tasks like switching between Firefox and Thunderbird are driving the load on my machine up over 4, and if I'm trying to run Amarok at the same time, it drives it up to 8. In fact, my machine frequently climbs up into the 7-9 range, bringing my apps to a crawl and frustrating the hell out of me.

So I've decided it's time to buy a new computer. I'm going to replace my aging Sony Vaio desktop machine (which runs Linux) with something newer that has more RAM, a faster processor, and a bigger hard drive.

The thing is, I'm not entirely sure where to start looking. A quick walk through Circuit City a month or so ago lead me to believe I can get a rather "big" computer for as low as five hundred bucks, which further leads me to believe that if I were to buy something online, I can get a huge pile of RAM, a fast processor, and a big honkin' hard drive for even less.

I run Kubuntu, and use KDE as my desktop (though I occasionally switch to Gnome when I get bored) and I mostly use Firefox, Thunderbird, OpenOffice.org, Amarok, and run PokerStars in wine. I'm looking for something that can do all of that without slowing my machine to a crawl.

Anyone have any suggestions on where to start looking?

Edit: I don't think I have the patience to build my own machine out of individual parts. I also don't have any real loyalty to any particular company or architecture. New Egg has lots of machines with AMD processors, and though I've always had Intel processors because more things seemed to run on x86, that's not as much of an issue as it once was, right?

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  • Maybe one of those "custom rigs" you hear about ... from Alienware, etc.?

    • Ditto. If you want something that will have a long "shelf life" and will still feel powerful in a couple of years, (and if you have the cash to spend), I would go with Alienware. Or maybe one of the pro-level macs. But getting Linux on one of those is n

      • Actually, Parallels is so good, you can run Linux in a VM, and still have all the yumminess of OS X, though there's a danger that you'll never bother with Linux.

        I've had my Macbook Pro for about a year... First Mac ever. I'm not going back.

  • Pricewatch.

    Read the reviews on the store, try to find one place with generally lower prices, and go to town - go nuts, in fact. You use your computer for lots of stuff. Might as well enjoy it...
    • I have to agree here. Hit pricewatch and pick the biggest bang for your buck.

      But remember: you're not gonna get much of a computer for half a G. Hell, you'll spend a fifth of that just on shipping.
  • Mac. Being the uber geek you are, you need the latest MacPro with quad core Xeon chips to render all that Star Trek videos and stuff.
    • Honestly, you could do worse than getting a mac to run linux. I've found the build quality on the intel macs to be really great.
    • I love my Macs. I have a Powerbook and an iMac, and will probably upgrade my Powerbook to a Macbook Pro if I cover the World Series for Pokerstars again this year.

      However, I want to do this for around or less than $500 (is that entirely unrealistic? I have
      • Mac Mini? Refurbished? I have a G4 Cube that I bought that way, and it still runs like a champ. Or if you wanted to wait a week or two, you could get a Apple TV and put linux on it ;-)
      • As much as I really want a shiny new Mac Pro myself, I have to say that my Dell Inspiron 640m has been GREAT, and is in your price range. Still, you have to admit, the thought of a Mac Pro, duel quad core CPU's, and a boat load of ram... Wouldn't that be W
      • What about an AppleTV hacked to run Mac OS?
      • Under $500 but you don't wanna build it yourself is going to be tough :-) But if you are willing to plunk in a harddrive/DVD yourself you could get a barebones machine from someplace like mwave.com, which was what I did at work before we switched to orderi
      • Building a decent clone for around $500 -- yes, it can be done. I strongly recommend starting with a nice case with a quality power supply and lots of drive bays (and solid steel sides) and the best motherboard you can afford, and a gig of RAM in as large
  • In SoCal, if you don't have another clone shop you're already familiar with, PC Club or Alice Computers are two good places to go. You'll get a far better quality, *genuinely* custom-built machine for less money than at any of the big chain stores.

    PC Club
    • PC Club has several stores in the area. Alice has one that I know of on Foothill Blvd in La Cresenta, and maybe other locations that I'm not aware of.

      Heh. I grew up in La Crescenta and San Marino is real close to my place in Pasadena, and I had no idea abo
      • These clone shops don't advertise anywhere most people would see it. Yet clone/white-box machines STILL outsell any given OEM, with around 40% of marketshare. Bloody wonder, considering how invisible they are -- even to people who know the neighbourhood!

        PC
    • "Personally I would *not* buy a namebrand (OEM) computer. As the hardware guru for the local PC user group, I've had my hands inside too many of 'em, and frankly they all suck. The average lifespan is only about 3 years"

      I have found that to be the case. I
      • Some OEMs do last longer than 3 years, but there are so many that die at 2 years (usually of the weak PSU frying the motherboard) that it pulls the average way down. And even when the rest of the machine keeps going, a lot of OEMs start having problems aft
  • A MacBook is a nice suggestion, but carries a somewhat hefty price tag, for what you get. However, it can runs Windows XP (in BootCamp, which is essentially a dual boot configuration). MacBooks even run Windows apps faster than their Mac counterparts in OS

  • There are currently no compatibility issues to speak of and haven't been for many since the K5's (the predecessor to the Athlon) came out. Some things might run a lot faster on Intel, but that's likely not going to be an issue on Linux.

    Even though Intel

    • Actually the compatibility problems went on longer than that, well into the K6-2 era.

      When WinXP was in beta, I followed the issue in the newsgroups, and for several months I logged complaints of "XP crashes all the time" vs reported CPU and chipset.

      Turned

      • Oh, oops. I got my timelines wrong. The K5s had issues, but I was thinking the K6s didn't. I'm apparently wrong about this.

        And yeah, you're right about the supporting component issues. That really irritated me for awhile. It was hard to find a good,

        • Given equal choices, I *used* to buy AMD.

          Then I got a K6-2 CPU that had a fatal bug (it would crash with certain 32bit operations, including Win9x's installer AND linux) and AMD would not warranty it nor even acknowledge that there was a problem. Somewhat
  • Depending on how soon you want this and how fast Dell moves to keep their promise of Desktop Linux, Dell might be an option. I think Lenovo has Linux certified desktops.

    System 76 [system76.com] sells desktops with Ubuntu pre-installed, although you don't get as much bang

    • Dell might be an option.
      I second this. At work I bought a Dell Precision 610 three years ago. Dual Xeons running at 3.6GHz, and a pair of 80GB Barracudas in a RAID 0 config. Silent as a church, and it's so fast that I still have no desire to replace
  • I have an employer provided Dell Inspiron 9300 laptop and it runs very well. It only has 512MB, but even so, I have little trouble doing my thing on it. openSUSE 10.2 default memory footprint was a bit much for it, although it could still run aixgl/bery

  • In my humble opinion, the two things that will have the most lasting impact on your new machine is plenty of RAM and fast IO.

    Pretty much any CPU you'll get (I recommend a core2duo, any speed) will be fast enough, and even onboard audio, gfx will likely b

  • Hi Wil, Unless you want play games like Oblivion, choose a simple graphics card based (saves about $150). As you want to run linux, choose NVIDIA, it makes your life easier (I'm not an NVIDIA addict, myy last 2 cards have been ATIs). Something like a GEFO
  • Many people focus on raw speed. If you like running lots of applications at once, you will experience some paging, thus becoming IO bound. If you like using applications that need to edit many files or large files, you will once again become IO bound. The

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