Buying a PC, made ez ;). Review on Buying a Computer

Here we go.

What specifications should you look for while buying a PC?

1. CPU:

Its speed is measured in GHz(Gigahertz). The higher is better. Good companies are:

a) Intel

b) AMD

Both companies have good processor lines. I have used both Intel and AMD and found them equally good.

Intel: Intel processors have a technology called as HT. You need not bother about it. These processors will be a bit costlier than AMD ones.

AMD: Nothing special to advertise. But lately AMD is advertising its 64bit processors. Reviews of these processors are very good. But I dont recommend them for the average home user because we arent going to stick in Terabytes of RAM. I will explain in detail about the 64bit technology at the end. Their 32bit processors are very good and are cheaper than the intel counter parts.

- How do you find out which processors are equivalent?

See Intel and AMD being rivals have adopted different naming conventions which confuse the average user. So dont worry about it because I am going to tell you how do you identify equivalent processors.

Say you have two processors Intel P4 2.8GHz and AMD Athlon XP 2800+, well these are equivalent processors. So how did I know? AMD being a smart a$ always multiplies intels clock speed(i.e. the numbers that you see like 2.4GHz, 2.6GHz, 2.8Ghz, 3.0GHz, 3.2GHz etc.) by 1000 so their numbers seem bigger.lol and adds a'+' sign after the number to indicate that the processor is equivalent to intel's processor and will yeild even higher performance.

So suppose you see Intel P4 3.2GHz and AMD 3200+ processors then they are supposed to be equivalent ones. Suppose you have an AMD processor, say a 2400+, then what would its Intel equivalent one be? It's simple, just divide 2400 by 1000 which is 2.4! Yes, its equivalent is an Intel processor with a speed of 2.4GHz.

One thing you must strictly remember while buying a processor is that not only the speed matters but other specifications like FSB, BUS(on your motherboard) also matter very much!

FSB - Front side bus. Its speed is generally measured in MHz. The higher the better. Intel boards come with 266, 400, 533, 800MHz FSB. You should pick a board with 400 or 800MHz FSB. There is no use of getting a high performance processor with a slow FSB. A processor with a 266MHz FSB is a strict no-no!.

NB:

1. Some smart a$ salesmen will try to confuse you by talking about the'Prescott' and'Northwood' line of Intel processors. Tell them to shutup. Basically both these processor families are good performers and are equivalent. Only prescott line gets much hotter than northwood. Also, they are manufactured using different technology, which we need not bother about.

2. High end Intel processors heat up a lot. They need good cooling! Please keep this in mind! AMD dont heat up that much.

1. Dont worry about specifications like'cache' etc. I have listed the most important ones.

2. Motherboard:Now that you have selected a good processor you must select a good motherboard. Prominent companies in this business are Intel, ASUS, Abit, MSi, etc. Dont go in for a VIA motherboard, they are cheap but arent very good performers.

- You should look for the following features in your motherboard:

1. Onboard graphics

   
   




2. Sound

   
   




3. LAN

   
   




4. USB

   
   




5. Support for DDR RAM(yes, its a kind of RAM <- memory) or DDR2(for those who want to go in for the bleeding edge technology)

   
   




6. AGP or PCI express graphics card slot.

   
   

Also, some important figures and parameters here are:

a) BUS: This is measured in MHz. You need to see that the FSB(of the processor) and the BUS speed match. If they dont then you will have a slow system.

3. RAM: Random Access Memory. It's speed is measured in MHz. Capacity is measured in MegaBytes. Both speed and capacity should be as high as possible. Also, remember the speed of the RAM, BUS(motherboard) and FSB(processor) should match.

• A RAM with a 400MHz speed goes with a 800MHz FSB and 800MHz BUS.

  
  




• A RAM with a 333/400MHz speed goes with a 533MHz FSB and 533MHz BUS

  
  




• A RAM with a 266MHz speed should never be used! Unless you are too short on cash;).

  
  

4. Hard disks: You wont be conned on this one. But just remember to buy either Segate or Samsung. Both these companies manufacture quality goods:).

5. CD-R/RW/DVD drives: You wont be conned on this one either. Samsung/LG/Liteon are good companies. Here are a few quick facts:

1. CD-RWs can read and write CDs only.

   
   




2. DVD drives can read CDs as well as DVDs.

   
   




3. Dont go in for a combo drive. If they break then all 3 functions are lost i.e. CD reading, writing and DVD reading.

   
   

6. Monitors: You wont be conned on this one too. Samsung is good. I just got a Syncmaster 591s and I am very happy with it:).

7. Graphic Accelerator Cards: Companies like ATi and NVidia are very well known. Their high end cards can be very costly. But their mid-range ones are very affordable for the gamer kinds;). There are two varieties AGP and PCI Express. Though the latter one is not yet launched(not sure whether its launched or not yet)/popular. Whichever you go with, you must check the compatibility with your motherboard! If its not compatible then you are left with an expensive piece of junk!

NB: You dont need a separate GFx accelerator card if you have onboard graphics and you're not a gamer. Also you dont need one to watch movies;).

Now that I have tutored you about the different components inside a PC you should be able to decide on a good configuration:).

Now we come to the eternal question - ASSEMBLED OR BRANDED?

Everyone has his own opinion about this question. My opinion is: Go for assembled PCs!

Branded PCs:

Major players include Dell, HCL, HP etc. You can get reviews about these companies from many places. For example magazines like Chip, PCQuest, etc. have carried articles about them.

Here are some of the terms I used in the review which need to be explain:

1. 64bit technology: This basically allows more memory to be transported in the CPU at one time. Also, it allows you to fit more memory in your motherboard. Remember your motherboard, operating system etc. should have full support for 64bit technology. Otherwise the CPU will run in the 32bit mode. As of now since we have only a few 64bit processors(that too for servers) none of the operating sytems(except certain flavors of Linux) support 64bit processors. AND the applications which you run on these processors should also be able to take full advantage of 64bit processors! AS OF NOW NONE OF THE DESKTOP APPLICATIONS FULLY SUPPORT 64BIT TECHNOLOGY!.

This is an AMD gimmick! Beware!

1. HT: Short for HyperThreading. This is a technology by which a single processor appears to be 2 processors for the operating system. This feature is present only in some Intel processors. The use? Well this technology is supposed to allow your processor to run simultaneous tasks faster. Also, you need an operating system to take full advantage of this(WinXP doesnt)

This is an Intel gimmick! Beware!

The HT line of processors just cost you more than their non-HT versions;).