New computer advice

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Far_Wanderer

Full Member
Oct 29, 2009
161
3
Lancashire, England
Just a quick note about operating systems. Microsoft are doing windows 10 for free at the moment. It was a pop up as part of an update. Seems its going to be free for the first year. I personally use both Linux and windows as both have features I use.
I personally build all my own computers as I can tailor it to what I need as I'm a bit picky about what I want plus its cheaper for the water cooling that way
 

Paul_B

Bushcrafter through and through
Jul 14, 2008
6,154
1,546
Cumbria
I take it you build up desktops not laptops. Can you even get the bits to build up laptops BTW? Serious question, I don't know and you made me wonder about it.
 

Paul_B

Bushcrafter through and through
Jul 14, 2008
6,154
1,546
Cumbria
Just out of curiosity what is Celeron like as a processor? Dual core but is it just a very cheap intel processor best to avoid? Are there any that could compete with a base version of i3 for example? What letters and number should I look for to get a good celeron (N2840 was one I saw)? Bear in mind I have a tiny budget so needs must and all that.
 

jmagee

Forager
Aug 20, 2014
127
10
Cumbria
Useless I believe. Have you looked at Argos on eBay?

I've just bought an amd A6 1tb hard drive and 6gb of ram for £200 really impressed so far and you can't tell the difference from a new one.
 

Far_Wanderer

Full Member
Oct 29, 2009
161
3
Lancashire, England
From what I've seen you can custom build laptops just more expensive. I do home pc for gaming media or general use, only real difference is amount you end up spending. Celeron are ok if your not after anything magical as they can't handle what any of the I series can. look at i3 or Pentium k for cheap but good. These in my experience tend to do what average person want. What you want to be putting your money into is power supply and motherboard as these will last you the longest. Especially if you get the right motherboard you can always upgrade the CPU if the one you pick doesn't cope with what you want at a later date.

W10 is in pre release but if you have a copy of I think win7 or up you get w10 free if you claim your copy in the first year of release I've all ready reserved my 2 free copies.as on my main rig I got w8 at around £20 when it first came as it was cheap for first 6 months or so. Not that I condone illegal software but I've been told by a couple of major companies that to get people over to w10 as a legitimate copy there even doing it free to people who have pirated windows, they where told this by a Microsoft rep
 

Paul_B

Bushcrafter through and through
Jul 14, 2008
6,154
1,546
Cumbria
TBH I'm kind of trying to justify even spending any money. So basically I've put down £300 or less but I did see refurbished i3, 4gb for IIRC £225 Rises to £265 Inc VAT. Celeron prices but hoping for i3. If I see a good deal I'll get it but if not I'll start saving too try and find £400 or more.
 

Macaroon

A bemused & bewildered
Jan 5, 2013
7,209
362
73
SE Wales
That's a decent machine, and an excellent bargain at that price; I'd snap it up if I was looking for one.
 

jmagee

Forager
Aug 20, 2014
127
10
Cumbria
Because it's "refurbished" which often means someone returned it after ordering online so it's had to be reformatted and reboxed.
 

Paul_B

Bushcrafter through and through
Jul 14, 2008
6,154
1,546
Cumbria
The link you posted refurbished, lower processor speed, 750gb for£30 more.

There's a red and blue i5 both E5-571 models for £249 and the black one that's lower spec for £279 model E1-572. I'm still missing something since all three are returns that have been manufacturer refurbished or to equivalent standards.

Colour doesn't bother me so long as not pink or purple. Prefer not white but beggars can't be choosers.
Tempted by the E5-571 in blue or red, i5 4th 1tb at £249.
 

Far_Wanderer

Full Member
Oct 29, 2009
161
3
Lancashire, England
That's not too bad. I'm not a fan of laptops as they don't have the same life span but for the money you can't complain especially if that's what your after. Last time I worked it out I could build a i3 3.6ghz with 8gig of ram for around 300 to 400.

the e1-527 seems to be a touch screen model if that makes a difference to you tho be cautious of this as not all are actually win8 comparable. Another point is you'd be better upgrading to 8gig ram especially as its shared between CPU and gpu.
 

jmagee

Forager
Aug 20, 2014
127
10
Cumbria
Sorry about the link was just doing it quickly. I took delivery on Monday of the AMD A6 one for £200. Was advised by an IT friend that A6 was more than capable for general computing. Really pleased with it so far. So much so that I'm tempted to get another as my Mrs has claimed the new one so I'm stuck with my old I3 :(

This is mine
http://pages.ebay.com/link/?nav=item.view&id=171734868678&alt=web

It had a screw loose otherwise I couldn't tell it from a new one.
 

Far_Wanderer

Full Member
Oct 29, 2009
161
3
Lancashire, England
The other option is to look at the tablet win 8 they go for less than £150 and depending on the one you get there brilliant my Mrs has a surface 2 and its one of the best tablets I've used its never messed up in over a year of use. The surface 2 is an arm based one but the Acer and other ones run full windows rather than metro
 

Paul_B

Bushcrafter through and through
Jul 14, 2008
6,154
1,546
Cumbria
This is interesting I think.

http://m.ebuyer.com/705955

A10 processor 8gb 1tb ubuntu OS though. Also £300. I thought a10 processor is pretty good and 8gb ram is pretty decent. A year or so ago I read something about A10 performing at i5 perhaps even some i7 ones. Saw a table on a review site that had Intel one side and AMD ones where the further down the table the higher performance and sure a10 was across the higher Intel ones.
 

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