Going to buy new computer (UK)


Recommended Posts

Ok basically my family has decided to finally invest in a new computer, we need it, and it should last for at least a few years. We are thinking about a desktop with flat screen, however don't know where to look. Maybe a laptop seeing as we have wireless. Atm we're tempted by Dell, but seeing as no member of the family is an IT expert, I humbly ask you guys for advice seeing as you do that for work.

Upper price margin is 2000 pounds (GB).

Thanks in advance!

Link to comment
https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/163455-going-to-buy-new-computer-uk/
Share on other sites

?2000 will get you a very decent system.

If you want to purchase a pre-built PC, go with Dell.

If you want my opinion, build one yourself. It will be cheaper and maybe even faster.

Off the top of my head, for ?2000 you should be able to get yourself a P4 3.2Ghz, 1GB RAM, Radeon 9800 Pro graphics, 17" TFT monitor.

personally i dont think laptop would have a long lasting time. *thinking future upgrade etc*

take a look here:

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/acatalog/OcUK_Systems.html

"Ultima" Pentium IV 'Northwood' 3.4C GHz (800FSB) HyperThreading System (FS-005-OC)

- Intel Pentium IV 'Northwood' 3.4C GHz (800FSB) HyperThreading CPU - Retail

- Abit IC7-Max 3 "Canterwood" (Socket 478) Dual DDR400 Motherboard

- GeIL 1GB (2x512MB) DDR Golden Dragon PC3500 CAS2.0 Dual Channel Kit

- 200GB Maxtor 8mb cache SATA 150 Hard Drive

- ATI Radeon 9800XT 256mb AGP 8x Graphics card

- Pioneer DVR-107 8x DVD?RW drive

- Creative Audigy 2 ZS 7.1 THX - Retail

- Silver Floppy Drive

- Coolermaster Silver WaveMaster Case

- Antec TrueBlue 480W ATX Power Supply

- Metal Braided Rounded Floppy Cable (0.5m)

- Metal Braided Rounded Ultra ATA100/66 IDE Cable (0.45m)

- Metal Braided SATA Cable

Price:> (?1,498.13 Including VAT at 17.5%)

or have you considerd building yourself. ?

im sure you can pick up a monitor for ?5:) :)

Well considering my actual skills in electronics I recon I better not build it myself. So are there any good pre-built systems apart from Dell? I've been told to try www.vantage-direct.co.uk, don't know if it's very good though.

Learn to build the PC yourself you will save ALOT of money and it will be better than any Dell PC for the same price

I have a Dell 8250 desktop computer and I love it. My experience with Dell desktops and laptops has been great. They're reliable computers and they have a wide variety of models to suit any budget. I'm guessing for 2000 pounds you could get the Dell 8300, which is a model that's newer than mine. You maybe could even go for the XPS which is Dell's performance computer.

I'm not sure who told you that about Alienware but thats the first time I have heard anyone (other than myself) say a bad word about em.

If you really need to buy a pre-built machine then go for a big name with a decent support package. You will be paying a lot more than you would if you were building yourself so you may as well get as much warrenty time as possible out of em.

2 grand will buy you a very nice machine from somewhere like Dell or HP/Compaq. If you go for a business model you can lose things like crappy bundled printers and usually get a nicer looking machine.

Note:

With dell major upgrades or tweaking is VERY difficult

Depends what you mean by tweaking, and even the Dell small desktops (depending on what you get of course) have an AGP slot. and a couple of PCI slots for extra hardware.

I do know what you are getting at, but thats a problem with practically any OEM...

[Edit]

This one looks alright, even had me interested for a while :)

http://www1.euro.dell.com/content/products...c=uk&l=en&s=dhs

Edited by ~Bull}{Dog~
This topic is now closed to further replies.
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
  • Posts

    • AMAZON needs to take total accountability for this.
    • Server Summit had a heap of announcements, ADCS changes are baller.
    • Nice, hope they *finally* fixed the issue with the NTFS driver where the system would completely brick during large file copies using the built in driver. It's been broken for years requiring me to use the older, slower, NTFS-3G FUSE driver.
    • Windows 11 KB5094126 BSODing, freezing, forcing BitLocker lockout, breaks OneDrive, and more by Sayan Sen Microsoft released Windows 11 KB5094126 and KB5093998 last week as the latest Patch Tuesday updates. Following that the company also published the accompanying dynamic updates under KB5094149, KB5095971, and KB5094156. While Microsoft has so far not acknowledged any major problems with the release, some users online are running into problems. These range from OneDrive and Dropbox access issues, BitLocker recovery lockouts, to blue screens and BSODs. The most common one seems to be happening with HP systems wherein affected users say they hit 0xc0430001 BSOD (blue screen of death) error code after the KB5094126 update. We wonder if this could be related to the recent bug we covered on HP devices wherein the ongoing Secure Boot certificate updates are leading to similar issues. While we are not certain, users affected by this issue likely need to ensure that the boot.stl file is included on the installation media (such as a USB installer or ISO), if the above-mentioned dynamic updates are deployed. If this file is missing, computers may fail to boot from the installation media and could display the error 0xc0430001. This STL file is used by Secure Boot to verify that the boot files are trusted, so it must match the same Windows version and system architecture. To ensure the file is included, Microsoft recommends using the Update WinPE script, which automatically updates the image and handles the required files. Alternatively, you can manually copy the boot.stl file from the Windows\Boot\EFI folder on a Windows device and place it in the matching folder on your installation media before deploying the updated image. Aside from blue screening some users also note their systems have been freezing following the update. This could be happening to Lenovo PCs specifically. In the case of the OneDrive and Dropbox access issues, a user figured out that there could be a conflict with UAC. He explained: "Okay, so I did some digging, and in our environment KB5094126 breaks OneDrive and Dropbox in Explorer. I went through all our GPOs and found out that the combination of disabling UAC and having my user being a local admin breaks OneDrive in Explorer. ... If I enable UAC again, then it works, even with KB5094126 still installed." Hopefully, Microsoft will look into these issues. Source: Microsoft forum (link1, link2, link3, link4), Reddit (link1, link2, link3, link4)
    • It is when it's a desktop in my house though for a PC that's lightly used and not really important when it is. If it was a laptop, it would be a different story. The real solution is varied and begins starting at post #22 in that thread.
  • Recent Achievements

    • Week One Done
      Jeroen Wilms earned a badge
      Week One Done
    • Week One Done
      rolfus earned a badge
      Week One Done
    • One Month Later
      Leroy Jethro Gibbs earned a badge
      One Month Later
    • Conversation Starter
      flexorcist earned a badge
      Conversation Starter
    • One Month Later
      AndreaB earned a badge
      One Month Later
  • Popular Contributors

    1. 1
      +primortal
      508
    2. 2
      +Edouard
      197
    3. 3
      PsYcHoKiLLa
      138
    4. 4
      ATLien_0
      90
    5. 5
      Steven P.
      80
  • Tell a friend

    Love Neowin? Tell a friend!