UBB.threads PHP Forum Software Community Forums Resources and Customizing Admin Zone New desktop time

I figured I'd tap the minds of UBB brethren for this one.

My old Gateway (running XP) is really acting up and needs to be retired.

I have a nice, new ViewSonic monitor, so time to pair it with a decent desktop.

I know there is no one answer to this question, and everyone's needs are different, but what new desktops are some of you guys liking?

Thought it would be good to get a discussion going to help anyone else in the market.

Lately it's been cheaper to buy pc's than build them; I've been rolling on a dell XPS 420 (Quad Core, 4GB Ram).

I was actually at dell's website the other day comparing their offerings to building a pc from Newegg's catalog and still found them cheaper for a desktop (was looking at the XPS and Mini lines, they offer up to a 6 core processor and up to 12gb ram).

Except for the vista option at the time I chose the xps-420 with 8GB ram and I am still extremely pleased with it. That was about three years ago. Or whenever they came out.
Don't like vista to much, I am pro xp pro.

Right now I am looking at the sony 24" all in one unit. For a replacement for my home built 800mhz desktop.
Sleek small footprint with about everything you would want in a desktop at a very competitive price.
It has windows 7 which I have no exposure to.
So far the only draw back I see is every device is integrated to the board except for the hard drive and the optical drive.

I'd go Win7, even over XP... Think of it as XP with the ability to utilize newer hardware (afterall, disable all of the eyecandy and that's ultimately what it is resource wise).

I never moved to Vista, so with Windows 7 out, I figure now is finally the time.

I was sold on Windows 7 when I had to install the printers for my new dell laptop! I never tried Vista, though.

I love my Dells. I am running a couple year old Inspiron 530. It came with Vista but now runs Ubuntu 10.10 I also had Windows 7 on it for a while and it ran good. My home storage server is running on a old dell Optiplex G280 that I got from my old job for $20 and it was still under dell warranty

what's your budget?

i just built mine based upon the new Sandy Bridge chipset:

i7 2600K CPU with all the bells / whistles (Blu ray burner, SSDs, 16gb ram, water cooling) for about $2K

it literally screams, with the vertex 3 SSD as my boot drive ( no moving parts ) maxed out the windows experience index.

windows 7 64bit and don't look back!

pre-builds around the sandy bridge architecture can be had for around 1400 and up ( mine ended up @ $2000ish )

Sounds cool. Did you get all of your parts from one source or various places?

I've never custom-built a computer before, only upgraded RAM once.

I'd say around $1,000. I suppose I could wait it out a bit longer and spend more. I'm just dreading my current desktop completely crapping the bed, so I'm thinking I should act sooner, rather than later.

The good news is that I have a nice monitor, so I don't need to spring for that.

i got most of my parts from either amazon or newegg

i basically went to tomshardware.com, looked at their builds and took the parts i wanted and built it

if you aren't good at building your own, then there are nice machines that are pre-built too

and actually, the difference between a self build and a pre build isn't that much anymore..

Linky Dinky to $1000 build

that would beat your current system by a mile, even if it was healthy

and you prolly don't want 2 graphics cards, so save the money on the 2nd one and bump up the RAM and CPU.. RAM is king

I make lists on my site all the time of decent machines for the $; I know of a few friends (like Glider for example) who've built one and been happy with the results; the current one I'm looking at putting a list together for I think was about $1200 but I haven't really laid down specs yet for it...

I agree with SD, invest in Ram and the Processor, you can always upgrade...