Processors and MBs - Is there a Difference?

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TheScullster

I am looking at the upgrade/replacement of a number of office PCs and would
appreciate general comment on motherboards/processors/RAM etc.
There are of course numerous ads around quoting prices for PCs typically:

2.8GHz processor
256Mb RAM
40Gb hard drive

My questions relate to what the ads don't say - these are:

Does the processor make such a difference these days Athlon/Pentium?
Is there a best of class motherboard that the better quality PCs have
installed?
What type of RAM is currently favoured?
Who makes a fast reliable hard drive?

In other words, are there recommended manufacturers who assemble good
quality components which work well together for a reasonable price?
Do all suppliers just use the cheapest crap they can get away with to meet a
given spec?

Thanks in anticipation

Phil
 
TheScullster said:
I am looking at the upgrade/replacement of a number of office PCs and
would
appreciate general comment on motherboards/processors/RAM etc.
There are of course numerous ads around quoting prices for PCs
typically:

2.8GHz processor
256Mb RAM
40Gb hard drive

My questions relate to what the ads don't say - these are:

Does the processor make such a difference these days Athlon/Pentium?
Is there a best of class motherboard that the better quality PCs have
installed?
What type of RAM is currently favoured?
Who makes a fast reliable hard drive?

In other words, are there recommended manufacturers who assemble good
quality components which work well together for a reasonable price?
Do all suppliers just use the cheapest crap they can get away with to
meet a
given spec?
Click to expand...


I can recommend Mesh and Evesham for build quality and good components,
never had problems so I can't comment on their service.
 
I am looking at the upgrade/replacement of a number of office PCs and would
appreciate general comment on motherboards/processors/RAM etc.
There are of course numerous ads around quoting prices for PCs typically:

2.8GHz processor
256Mb RAM
40Gb hard drive

My questions relate to what the ads don't say - these are:

Does the processor make such a difference these days Athlon/Pentium?
Click to expand...

These look like lower-end, budget boxes based on the specs.
At lower price-points, the best performance from office apps
would be with an Athlon XP. If you want Intel, the
Celeron-D series. Unless there is some demanding use you've
not mentioned the CPU won't make a lot of difference, but
the earlier non-"D" Celeron is the worst choice.

Is there a best of class motherboard that the better quality PCs have
installed?
Click to expand...

One of the major manufacturers: Asus, MSI, Gigabyte, Abit,
but NOT PCChips/Amptron/ECS/etc unless the only relevant
factor is lowest cost.
What type of RAM is currently favoured?
Click to expand...

Name-brand budget grade PC3200. Generic memory is a gamble,
but if system integrator guarantees it with fair on-site
warranty, you have some recourse and (hopefully) minimal
system downtime. This is often the largest difference for
office boxes, what the warranty includes. Try to avoid 3rd
party service companies unless you're a very LARGE company
with some leverage to get 3rd party motivated to handle any
problems.
Who makes a fast reliable hard drive?
Click to expand...

Most are, but Seagate was already good before they started
their 5 year warranty, so that'd be a good choice.

In other words, are there recommended manufacturers who assemble good
quality components which work well together for a reasonable price?
Click to expand...

Avoid local clone builders unless they give you latitude on
parts selection. It's too common to find boxes with generic
motherboard, heatsink, power supply, being sold for little
or no less than it should cost for better parts. Or, if
they warranty whole box long enough, that's might be an
acceptable compromise, provided it's on-site repair, nobody
wants to be lugging a bunch of boxes back and forth,
especially since any common component problem may effect
several boxes.
Do all suppliers just use the cheapest crap they can get away with to meet a
given spec?
Click to expand...

Some yes, some no.
Were you leaning towards large OEM or local shop or what,
exactly?

I prefer Dell over HP or Compaq, but of course the
particular series matters too, a standard sized box rather
than one highly-integrated and proprietary would make it
easier for service and upgrade after the warranty, but it
may not matter as much as the volume price or
warranty/service.

If dealing with a local shop, get a proposed parts list and
ask questions about vague, generic/unbranded parts. Ask to
see/use a sample, representative system.
 
TheScullster said:
I am looking at the upgrade/replacement of a number of office PCs
and would appreciate general comment on motherboards/processors/RAM
etc. There are of course numerous ads around quoting prices for PCs
typically:

2.8GHz processor
256Mb RAM
40Gb hard drive

My questions relate to what the ads don't say - these are:

Does the processor make such a difference these days Athlon/Pentium?
Is there a best of class motherboard that the better quality PCs
have installed?
What type of RAM is currently favoured?
Who makes a fast reliable hard drive?

In other words, are there recommended manufacturers who assemble
good quality components which work well together for a reasonable
price? Do all suppliers just use the cheapest crap they can get
away with to meet a given spec?
Click to expand...

You are omitting some crucial factors. Are the mouse and keyboard
using normal connections, or are they using the USB facilities
(bad)? Are there normal printer and serial ports, again not using
the USB facility? Is there ECC memory available (you DO want
reliability, don't you)? Are the components industry standard, so
you can easily replace any failures? If you need a commercial OS
supplied, do you get a proper installation CD, rather than a
restoration system? Is that OS free of unreasonable conditions
and security hazards, such as that imposed by the Windows EULA.

The various speed/disk capacity questions probably have little
bearing on office applications. HDs are inherently unreliable, so
you must have a backup policy. The quickest, and thus the most
likely to be performed regularly, is a second identical HD which
is maintained as an image of the first. Properly designed this
will allow a failed HD to be discarded and replaced by the backup,
with a new backup drive installed, and thus recovery will take
about 15 minutes.

Off site backup is another matter, and will be slower.
 
TheScullster said:
I am looking at the upgrade/replacement of a number of office PCs and would
appreciate general comment on motherboards/processors/RAM etc.
There are of course numerous ads around quoting prices for PCs typically:

2.8GHz processor
256Mb RAM
40Gb hard drive

My questions relate to what the ads don't say - these are:

Does the processor make such a difference these days Athlon/Pentium?
Is there a best of class motherboard that the better quality PCs have
installed?
What type of RAM is currently favoured?
Who makes a fast reliable hard drive?

In other words, are there recommended manufacturers who assemble good
quality components which work well together for a reasonable price?
Do all suppliers just use the cheapest crap they can get away with to meet a
given spec?

Thanks in anticipation

Phil
Click to expand...

Just go for a the cheapest deal you can get from a big company
that way you get best value, you won't notice a faster processor
or more/better RAM, a bigger hard drive is good value.
 
I am looking at the upgrade/replacement of a number of office PCs and would
appreciate general comment on motherboards/processors/RAM etc.
There are of course numerous ads around quoting prices for PCs typically:

2.8GHz processor
256Mb RAM
40Gb hard drive
Click to expand...

256MB is *not* enough for business/office use.
Especially if your workers use multiple apps at the same
time and keep their e-mail and web browser open all the
time. Add 128MB if you're running WinXP instead of
Win2000. The minimum for machines that we buy for the
office is 1GB, and we're currently upgrading all
machines in the office to have at least 512MB. (Adding
memory to an aging machine can give you another year or
two of use.)

In general, CPU power doesn't really matter unless
you're doing content creation (video / graphics) or
really heavy number crunching. My rule of thumb is to
go with the slower CPU (usually the slowest) and double
the RAM.

Make sure that you're getting the "pro" version of WinXP
("home" doesn't network well in an office environment).

ECC RAM is nice, but you'll pay about another 5-15% for the
system. For a business, I'd say that's cheap insurance
to avoid common memory errors with regular RAM. (Plus,
ECC RAM isn't usually made by the lowest bidder... so
there's hopefully a better quality baseline.)

Hard drive size doesn't matter much, if you're keeping
all data files on a central server (good idea). 40GB is
fine, 80GB is overkill. Speed and capacity only matter
if you're doing content creation (video) or heavy data
(gigabytes of sample data or databases on the local
box).
 
256MB is *not* enough for business/office use.
Especially if your workers use multiple apps at the same
time and keep their e-mail and web browser open all the
time. Add 128MB if you're running WinXP instead of
Win2000. The minimum for machines that we buy for the
office is 1GB, and we're currently upgrading all
machines in the office to have at least 512MB. (Adding
memory to an aging machine can give you another year or
two of use.)
Click to expand...

256MB is enough for most gen-purpose office boxes. 1GB is a
waste for anything but a specialized system. Task Manager
can show memory peak loads, there's no point in having 128MB
more memory than the peak load figure for "typical" office
box.

After a certain point the reliability of the box is
questionable, trying to add years more life to a box you
seem to be paying a premium for, is a gamble. Better to
stick to replacement interval of 3-5 years and leave the
boxes stock at least until the warranty + service contract
has expired.
 
Many thanks to all respondents - particularly expansive answer from Kony!
May try a RAM upgrade on single machine to test viability.
Number of recent failures/errors suggests this may buy only a brief respite!

Thanks again

Phil
 
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