Buying a computer

country_gurl

Hi,
My sister wants to get a new computer and wants me to help :eek:
Anyway i was just wondering what sort of GB memory and hard drive would be needed for a basic family computer to look up internet and maybe play few games and use the microsoft packages. And is there any other specs i should look out for?
Sorry for asking but the pc world website is down.
Thanks

tman

If you're using Vista, then 2GB is the minimum memory that you'd want to have
For hard disk space, you can never really overestimate how much you'll need... 250GB should do the job nicely, but depending on how many family members you have it could soon fill up
If you want to play games, then avoid a built in intel graphics card at all costs, get something with either a proper ATI or Nvidia graphics card

Would help if you told us the budget...

Voodu Child

You don't really need much power for what you're doing.

2Gb ram is fine, and it's hard to buy a PC with less these days. Also, even basic PCs usually come with at least 320Gb-500Gb hard-drives, which is more than enough for the average user.

There's a 10% voucher on Dell at the moment, you can get a decent enough desktop without spending too much money.
-Do you need a monitor?
-What's your budget?

country_gurl

She needs the whole package - monitor, software everything! I'd imagine its about the 600euro mark, though she hasn't rightly said. Thanks anyway, i just needed a rough idea what i was looking at as tbh i havent the first clue

daftdave

country_gurl wrote: »

She needs the whole package - monitor, software everything! I'd imagine its about the 600euro mark, though she hasn't rightly said. Thanks anyway, i just needed a rough idea what i was looking at as tbh i havent the first clue

id say you are limiting yourself to a low spec gaming machine with a budget of 600 including a monitor unless there is a v good deal doing the rounds here that i have not come across ,

Unregistered.

daftdave wrote: »

id say you are limiting yourself to a low spec gaming machine with a budget of 600 including a monitor unless there is a v good deal doing the rounds here that i have not come across ,

She said she's looking for a basic family PC - a low spec gaming machine would be more than ideal for her, since she said it may be used for a few games - so i take it she means nothing serious.

Voodu Child

Maybe a Dell Studio, I think you can get the basic one for about €600
-E7400
-HD3450
-18.5" monitor (1366x768)
-500Gb HD

The HD3450 won't be up to high-end games but it'd be grand for a family computer. The monitor isn't great (low-res), I would probably buy it without the monitor and get your own elsewhere. Although again, the average family user just checking e-mail etc isn't going to really notice it anyway.

Im not sure if there's any great deals out at the moment, but for €600 including a monitor you're not going to do much better unless you build it yourself (which isnt practical for the typical family buyer).