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General discussion

NEW DESKTOP

Jan 3, 2005 5:36AM PST

I'm in the market for a new desktop computer for my family. I'm looking for a high-quality one for under $3000. I have three kids and a ton of games. I want to stick with a well-known company like Dell, HP, or Gateway. Any advice would be appreciated.

Discussion is locked

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?
Jan 3, 2005 5:43AM PST

one more question, does anyone know why are there two different reviews for the dell xps?

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Try this site
Jan 3, 2005 6:28AM PST

Ibuypower.com is a user friendly site and you can build about any machine you wish, lots of helpful info and customer service and support are A+++

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$ 3000 !!!
Jan 3, 2005 7:42AM PST
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IMHO, I suggest...
Jan 3, 2005 9:10AM PST

For $3grand, you can get sveral eMachines of the $399 variety to include some rebates, etc. and have alot left over for more s/w and such. Of course once you start to look, then increasing video, ram, storage and/or unique s/w bundle(if available) will increase cost no matter whose system brand you get. Overall, you pretty much have to look at Gateway, eMachine, Dell, Sony, HP and Compaq for typical vendor offering and find what matchs your needs. Most of those mentioned will have some system that may meet your needs, but I find eMachine and Gateway, possibly Compaq to offer basic support that seems to care, while the others fall behind for whatever reason, though you can change that by the opinions expressed here and elsewhere easily, so shop for the best deal and needs and go for it. You may want to check out independant builders like Alienware, THG, Monarch, IBuyPower, Cyberpower systems for another venue to look at, google for deals from them.

good luck -----Willy Grin

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desktops
Jan 3, 2005 11:37AM PST

I have been using this old HP pc since 01, and the one time i did have a little trouble I called HP and the guy walked me through it and got the problem solved. No trouble since, it was my in-experience that was the trouble, by the way. I just bought my nephew a new Hp from walmart for 500 bucks including tax, its the a705w model and its fast, im gonna get one for myself, its great.

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New desk top
Jan 4, 2005 6:52AM PST

I just completed the same adventure you have just begun. How old are your kids and what kind of gaming are they doing? How much digital photo or video editing would you expect to do? What features are important to you?

I have an 8 yr old and a 13 yr old, and we bought an HP m1070n - it's a multimedia PC, you can burn CD'd and DVD's, you can hook up a digital camcorder and edit video, edit your digital photos, hook it up to your TV and use it like a Tivo, etc. And it has more computing power than many others we looked at, a huge hard drive and the new P4 with HT. Since the m1070n came out there are newer versions, you can compare and find one at a good price.

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NEW DESKTOP
Jan 20, 2005 5:43AM PST

My kids are 15, 13, and 10. They each have several games. I would probably use digal photo pretty often, and my kids would use video editing every once in a while for school projects. I'm just looking for a fast computer with a lot of space.

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I'm jealous!
Mar 24, 2005 4:12AM PST
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RE
Mar 24, 2005 4:37AM PST

I would suggest getting an alienware pc cuz theyre good for gaming and has a lot of performance. but since u like manufacturers, u should get a dell or sony. Since for digital arts stuff, you should opt for a sony. I had an old sony and it was great. Sony also has a variety of graphics cards and good for digital media stuff. A good sony would cost around $2500. Dell would also fall into the same price range. Both sony and dell are good options and both have pretty good customer support.

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um
Mar 25, 2005 6:08AM PST

alienware is also the most overpriced brand on the market
with horrible technical support (took them 2 months to send me a pre-sales information e-mail about a top shelf product which they have...and their supposed "care about the customer")

i'm going to speak my mind here (in a reasnonably short...*cough* full page *cough* paragraph)
and yes, i realize that john robie
but he might still be looking

since your kids seem to like gaming
you want digital media features, and you want high performance
not to mention the best bang for your buck for $3000

i'd suggest building your own computer, mainly to get nVidia SLi (which will EASILY fit into your $3000 budget)
and yeah...it'll utterly SMASH any machine's graphics

SLI is the same graphics as featured on the $7000 Alienware ALX

but
if your phobic of building your own
consider this
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=83-102-611&depa=0


i am not fond of ABS
but they usually get fairly good reviews

you could build that yourself for probably $1700

add in a 19" Flat CRT (CRT's are better for gaming, a comparable LCD would cost around 6x as much) for about $300

and you've got a top shelf gaming system
comparable to the Alienware ALX which is sold for around...hmmm...4 times as much

plus your buying from newegg, so you have their excellent sales behind it (they are an excellent etailer)

don't fear AMD
Athlon64 is faster than Pentium IV
GHZ doesn't matter

the Athlon64 is a faster, and generally better, CPU

i can gurantee that you kids would love that machine for gaming

it would/will provide gaming power far into 2006

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exact price
Mar 25, 2005 6:29AM PST

alright
i configured the EXACT same system, using all the same parts (possibly different brand HDD, but that's all)

and it comes out to:
$2023.20

meaning you could throw in that 19" Flat CRT and it'd just meet their total price

OR you could replace the 3500+ with a 3800+, do a slight cut to the RAM (that RAM is $243.27, and you could get by with generally high quality PC 3200 for $130, you don't need Overclocker RAM, so you could axe that)

but basically
if you changed the RAM to something slightly less expensive
you could get a 3800+, XP-90, and possibly dual 6800U's

let me price that
ok
it's $2319.38

you change the Corsair to Patriot (which is still good RAM) PC 3200

you get an Athlon64 3800+
an XP-90 w/92MM fan
and dual 6800 Ultra's

giving you the fastest gfx avliable in a machine
and it's still cheaper than ABS' system

Alienware would charge about $8000 for this machine
with one difference
you'd get an Athlon64 4000+ or FX-53
which you could do
but the price would come up just under $3000 w/moniotr

if you wanted the FX-53 or FX-55

the FX-53 is about $800 (the 3800+ is $380)
and the FX-55 is jsut at $1000

you'd keep all the hardware in that system though

you could get the 4000+, which is $599
it'd raise the price about $200

overall
i'd say this is a great system
oh yeah
forgot to mention
the 6800U SLI that i designed is also using an Enermax 600W PSU with dual 12v rails, so it would easily handle this system @ all stock

the whole thing + 19" CRT would probably cost..hmmm, just a tick under $2700
and it'd be comparable to $6000-$7000 alienware systems

now why again is Alienware so good?

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What about the HP m1297 media center?
Mar 26, 2005 1:34PM PST

I am going through the same thing... new computer research. I am very interested in this machine, but no one seems to know anything about it. Anyone know?
I am looking to video edit with it... is this a good system or are others better?

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cost?
Mar 26, 2005 2:36PM PST

what it's cost?

the specs aren't that impressive, standard HP box for you:

over-done CPU with decent ammount of RAM, a huge HDD and crappy graphics

not to mention the crappiest PSU i think i've ever seen as far as what it's in this thing


i believe this is the article where i posted the ABS machine, and my specs for a custom build w/more powerful graphics

i'm guessing this HP costs in the range of $1600 to $2600, i'd suggest what is suggested to the first guy, the SLI equipped rig

if you wanna video edit, pull the gfx down to dual 6800nU's and put a capture card in there

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Re: HP m1297 media center
Mar 27, 2005 2:06PM PST
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Hey jrmar.....
Mar 24, 2005 7:17AM PST

Qwerty asked on January 3rd and hasn't made a post since January 20th. He probably already bought something. Are you just trying to get a followup response from him? Wink

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Whoops...
Mar 28, 2005 7:30AM PST

What can I say? I'm a rookie! I'm also a rookie that likes to ponder what he would buy if he had $3000 to spend Silly

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NEW DESKTOP
Mar 27, 2005 11:39PM PST

Hi, qwerty1234 I just got a Gateway 9310XL for under $2400. It has 400G hard drive 2Gs mem. 256 Nvidia card DVDrom + dvd +- writer and 3.4 cpu.