1 or 2 silly computer questions. please help

condra

Hi.

Pleease anyone help me out here coz Im gonna invest about a grand in a new machine and dont wanna mess it up.:rolleyes:

Ok Im starting to get my head around the different processors available these days and Im lookin at some desktops online.

Heres a silly question- My broadband connection [ripwave] uses the ethernet port as opposed to modem or usb etc. Do all computers come with ethernet ports?
Ive not seen it listed in most of the computers Ive seen, unless it is standard with motherboards or something?? What is LAN and GBLAN?

Another feckin idiotic question.
How often do you need to change the batterys with a chordless keyboard? I use the computer on average a few hours a day, I wouldnt wanna have to buy 4 AA batterys every week! I know you can get mice with charger docking bays. Thats pretty kool.

Also, these 10000rpm raptor drives which seem popular, considering they are much smaller in terms of capacity, whats the real benefit? I thought 7200 would already be considered pretty fast.

Finally...one more stupid moronic question, what sacrifice do you make by getting one of the compact "cube" style custom PCs? They seem pretty nice to me.


Thanks anyone for helpin out here.

DonkeyStyle \o/

I reckon onboard LAN is pretty standard these days... my last two motherboards had it whether I wanted it or not.
As for LAN (Local Area Network) and GBLAN.... LAN would be your typical 10/100 ethernet interface... GBLAN would be gigabit LAN (ie. a faster 1000 as opposed to 10/100, uses the same ethernet connection, but the cable needs to be higher CAT... can't remember which offhand... 5C or something like that)

Mac daddy

As DonkeyStyle \o/ most come come with lan ports these days, haven't seen a new board that does not have one.

Keyboard- Mouse, I have a logitech set - and all i have to do is place it back in the cradle and it gets charged, other mouse and keyboard also wireless have it 6 months haven't changed the battery's in it once.

Hard drives - they are 10k disk - and shorter seek times then the normal drives, But these days they are getting beaten by NCQ sata II drives..

Cube - They are great little compact cases - problem they can get hot, and there is not much room inside of them, i have a little antec aria and love it.

Wertz

If the battery thing is such an issue just buy a set of NiMh and a charger.
In fact if you use batteries at ALL, you should be using rechargables as should everyone here; they cost maybe 2.5-3X as much as standard alkalines, last longer per charge and can supposedly recharged about 1,000 times.

No more landfill, no more running to the shop when your other cells die....it's an obvious move.

condra

Thanks for the replies.

Mac Daddy I looked up that Antec Aria- Its the koolest lookin thing since sliced bread. I will be needing a lot of power and low noise tho so I think a tower or rackmount might be best. Shame

Hard drives - they are 10k disk - and shorter seek times then the normal drives, But these days they are getting beaten by NCQ sata II drives..

So do faster harddrives mean windows will boot faster? [sorry for being dumb]
Or is it more handy for moving around large files? Are they quieter?

Cheers again

Mac daddy

womoma wrote:

Thanks for the replies.
So do faster harddrives mean windows will boot faster? [sorry for being dumb]
Or is it more handy for moving around large files? Are they quieter?
Cheers again

Depends on the seek time the lower the seek time the faster files are found, and yes the faster your os will load and a larger buffer is also a big help.
NCQ Native Command Queu(most new sata drives) is faster then TCQ Tagged command Queue(standard ata)

Also the newer drives use fluid dynamic bearing motors which makes them quiet as older ata do not use this.

Orion

DonkeyStyle \o/ wrote:

I reckon onboard LAN is pretty standard these days... my last two motherboards had it whether I wanted it or not.
As for LAN (Local Area Network) and GBLAN.... LAN would be your typical 10/100 ethernet interface... GBLAN would be gigabit LAN (ie. a faster 1000 as opposed to 10/100, uses the same ethernet connection, but the cable needs to be higher CAT... can't remember which offhand... 5C or something like that)

But you can still use a standard Cat5 cable for your broadband or a 100Mb network.

condra

Thanks for helping guys I do really appreciate it. It seems to me like now is a strange time to be upgrading because theres so much up in the air, but maybe its always like that!


Couple more embarrassingly pathetic questions have been raised if anyone cares to help that would be appreciated.:rolleyes:

Operating System, - is windows xp 64 a bad idea considering Id want to install most of my current 32 bit software and drivers for things like my external soundcard interface?

Im presuming Ill be installing Vista along with many others in about a years time-
should that affect my choice of motherboard and processor? [im currently looking into something along the lines of an AMD Athlon 64 3000]


Thanks again:o

Thomas_S_Hunterson

As I understand, if you were to install the 32bit XP onto your AMD64 machine, you would lose the 64bit functionality as it would only be able to handle 32 bi programs, however if you installed the 64 bit xp, you would be able to run both 32bit and 64bit programs

K.O.Kiki

Also: avoid Windows Vista. At least until the tech sites/trustworthy magazines have had a year with it. I'm interested in how nastily DRM protection is applied... however, I presume that graphics card/on-board chip, DVD-drive and MONITOR will be most affected <_<

Capt'n Midnight

K.O.Kiki wrote:

Also: avoid Windows Vista. At least until the tech sites/trustworthy magazines have had a year with it.

You can consider Vista as intermediate release before they release a version with originally advertised components and technologies.

One wonders what they will drop from it next to ship on time.

condra

THanks.

As I understand, if you were to install the 32bit XP onto your AMD64 machine, you would lose the 64bit functionality as it would only be able to handle 32 bi programs, however if you installed the 64 bit xp, you would be able to run both 32bit and 64bit programs

I would be worried that theres no 64bit driver for my audio interface. Ill probably stick with xp32. That is if I dont get a mac:eek:

Everything seems to be changing so fast in the PC arena at the moment.

tuxy

womoma wrote:

Everything seems to be changing so fast in the PC arena at the moment.

i don't think so, things have slowed down
the first p4 3.2 ghz was released in 2003 (i think) and now 2 years later the fastest p4 is a 3.8 ghz
ddr pc3200 was standard then and is still standard now
2 years ago a 9800 pro was about 200 euro, today you can get a 6600gt for the same price and that card is only slightly better then the 9800 pro

sure there have been things like pci-e and sata, but as yet these new technologys have not offered a big step up in performance( unless you have about €800 to spend on sli graphics)

things are moving fast but thank god its slower then it used to be
its given me some time to breath, i havnt needed to upgrade in ages

condra

i havnt needed to upgrade in ages

nothing beats that feeling!
Thats why Im gonna try to spend as much as I can afford on the best system I can find, I wanna be able to get stuck into a new machine and not have to think about hardware upgrades for at least a year. hopefully!

how nastily DRM protection is applied

Is this like trusted computing? Or some sort of copyright protection encoding?

If vista goes down that road I can imagine people boycotting it and sticking with xp. Ive read somewhere about a proposed system which would hinder the progress of independent software developers. I dont know anything about it but its interesting. I dont like the idea of being forced to use, or not use any particular software or media on my computer.

Heres a question- If OSX becomes available as a viable installation option for PCs, will it only work with Intel mobos/CPUs or would AMD stuff be fine too?

I sold my camera today so Im getting some cash together, Once I sell my laptop my budget should be in around 1200. Its gettin exciting!:D

art

womoma wrote:

Thanks for helping guys I do really appreciate it. It seems to me like now is a strange time to be upgrading because theres so much up in the air, but maybe its always like that!


Couple more embarrassingly pathetic questions have been raised if anyone cares to help that would be appreciated.:rolleyes:

Operating System, - is windows xp 64 a bad idea considering Id want to install most of my current 32 bit software and drivers for things like my external soundcard interface?

Im presuming Ill be installing Vista along with many others in about a years time-
should that affect my choice of motherboard and processor? [im currently looking into something along the lines of an AMD Athlon 64 3000]


Thanks again:o

WinXP 64 is definitely a bad idea, there's very little driver support out there and very little that can utilise it so you're likely to just get yourself into morass of configuration hell!

I wouldn't presume you'll install Vista. It will look very nice and all but there's loads of reasons to stay away - again you might find, for example, that your brand new monitor today won't work as Vista only supports technology which it can communicate securely with (all part of the DRM blarney) and, as mentioned above, it's an OS which they got half way in, got stuck, and had to go back to the drawing board and rewrite. So it's a surprisingly "young" OS in many respects and likely so to have loads of teething problems.

astrofool

Vista in beta form has been a far more stable and usable OS than any other microsoft OS, inc. 2k.

XP64 requires 64bit drivers, this is all thats holding it back from being widely adopted really, but it does mean that software companies are at least making 64bit drivers, which means that vista 64bit will be the one to get.

XP64 is based of win2003, and is a far more stable and secure OS than XP.

Vista is also based off the win2k3 codebase. It's been redesigned in so far as it's a little bit more linux like in how it can take additions, components can be added to the OS in a far safer and secure manner.

Vista will not affect monitors. All Vista is doing is implementing the DRM spec that hollywood has come up with, they can either be compliant or not, linux and Apple OS will be in the same boat. Remember, decss was created to allow DVD's to be played in Linux, unless someone can crack the new encoding, every OS will be in the same boat. The protected content will not play in XP at all, whereas Vista will support its playback (providing its legal).

Also remember, Microsoft and Intel are pushing for Blu-Ray to allow computer users to make copies of their legally bought movies (which HD-DVD currently supports).

Capt'n Midnight

astrofool wrote:

Also remember, Microsoft and Intel are pushing for Blu-Ray to allow computer users to make copies of their legally bought movies (which HD-DVD currently supports).

Then again that is relevant only if they win the DVD wars.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/09/30/dell_hp_vs_ms_intel/

Backers of the Blu-ray Disc (BD) have hit back against "erroneous" claims from Intel and Microsoft that HD DVD is the superior next-generation optical disc format for PCs.

But there is a dark horse - had they develeoped their mobile phone system a little earlier we would not be using GSM in Europe
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/10/12/china_homegrown_dvd/

"China produced about 70 percent to 80 percent of the world's DVD players. However, Chinese manufacturers need to pay licensing fees to overseas patent holders in the DVD industry. The licensing fee accounts for 40 percent of the rough cost of each DVD player", we learn.

I'm not sure if this will be the one, but soon there will be a standards war between western companies and the chinese will offer something better and cheaper and clean up.

condra

sometimes the whole thing just makes me wanna go mac!

shame the g5 imac has no room for upgrading/expansion.

ill prolly go opteron or amd 64 x2 thingy

art

astrofool wrote:

Vista is also based off the win2k3 codebase. It's been redesigned in so far as it's a little bit more linux like in how it can take additions, components can be added to the OS in a far safer and secure manner.

Vista will not affect monitors. All Vista is doing is implementing the DRM spec that hollywood has come up with, they can either be compliant or not, linux and Apple OS will be in the same boat. Remember, decss was created to allow DVD's to be played in Linux, unless someone can crack the new encoding, every OS will be in the same boat. The protected content will not play in XP at all, whereas Vista will support its playback (providing its legal).

Isn't this assuming that we all want our PCs to be media centres? Personally, I feel they can shove their protected content up their ass, I don't want my PC to be just a glorified Sony DVD player :mad:

astrofool

art wrote:

Isn't this assuming that we all want our PCs to be media centres? Personally, I feel they can shove their protected content up their ass, I don't want my PC to be just a glorified Sony DVD player :mad:

how about you just don't use media player......

Capt'n Midnight

womoma wrote:

sometimes the whole thing just makes me wanna go mac!

shame the g5 imac has no room for upgrading/expansion.

ill prolly go opteron or amd 64 x2 thingy

or wait until Apple release OSX for Intel.

Can't wait for the first person to stick OSX on an X-Box = OSXBox

art

astrofool wrote:

how about you just don't use media player......

...what's microsoft's media player go to do with it? Its a hardware issue.

astrofool

art wrote:

...what's microsoft's media player go to do with it? Its a hardware issue.

What's a hardware issue? If you don't want to play protected content, just don't play it. All your old content will still work.

It'd be like giving out that PC's used the AGP/PCI-E spec, or were x86 compatable. You either support a standard or not, and just because you support a standard, doesn't mean you have to use it.

art

astrofool wrote:

What's a hardware issue? If you don't want to play protected content, just don't play it. All your old content will still work.

It'd be like giving out that PC's used the AGP/PCI-E spec, or were x86 compatable. You either support a standard or not, and just because you support a standard, doesn't mean you have to use it.

Its a hardware issue if you want to upgrade to Vista. Vista will look for ,I can't remember the acronym, OPM I think? devices - so only compatible graphics cards, sound cards and monitors will work with Vista. If you buy kit now, you may find that you cannot upgrade to Vista without replacing such core items in your PC. Hence my original point to the original poster that he may not want to upgrade necessarily at all, it may not be worth it.

On a second point, this move to protected hardware/OS is all being driven by the concept of PCs as media centres, which is very limiting - many of us have no wish to play "protected content" on a PC screen, yet the next generation hardware and OS from Microsoft is assuming that we do (eg note in Microsoft's recent white paper how they explained that "HollyWood" has veto rights over aspects of the Vista OS!!!). However, I think the end result will be very large numbers of people simply not upgrading at all (or at least until there is a viable hack about).

astrofool

art wrote:

Its a hardware issue if you want to upgrade to Vista. Vista will look for ,I can't remember the acronym, OPM I think? devices - so only compatible graphics cards, sound cards and monitors will work with Vista. If you buy kit now, you may find that you cannot upgrade to Vista without replacing such core items in your PC. Hence my original point to the original poster that he may not want to upgrade necessarily at all, it may not be worth it.

On a second point, this move to protected hardware/OS is all being driven by the concept of PCs as media centres, which is very limiting - many of us have no wish to play "protected content" on a PC screen, yet the next generation hardware and OS from Microsoft is assuming that we do (eg note in Microsoft's recent white paper how they explained that "HollyWood" has veto rights over aspects of the Vista OS!!!). However, I think the end result will be very large numbers of people simply not upgrading at all (or at least until there is a viable hack about).

Vista will not require any special hardware. It will have the usual min spec. requirements that all windows have had. Any PC's bought today, will run Vista.

Microsoft could not, for example, ship with a product that cracked pay per view movies. No commercial OS could.

Just because something ships with the OS, doesn't mean you have to use it. For example, XP ships with IIS, which very few XP users would use. It also ships with outlook express, which people do not have to use. It is not forcing anything upon anyone.

art

astrofool wrote:

Vista will not require any special hardware. It will have the usual min spec. requirements that all windows have had. Any PC's bought today, will run Vista.

Microsoft could not, for example, ship with a product that cracked pay per view movies. No commercial OS could.

Just because something ships with the OS, doesn't mean you have to use it. For example, XP ships with IIS, which very few XP users would use. It also ships with outlook express, which people do not have to use. It is not forcing anything upon anyone.

Well that's a pretty unfair comparison, playing media is a lot more central to people's interests then creating an internet webserver on their PC - WinXP was never sold on its IIS abilities!

condra

again.. makes me just wanna go mac. well sometimes.

that brings me onto another pondering.

Ive been led to believe that it will be possible to install Windows on the upcoming intel macs, but installing a fully functional version of OSX on a PC will most likely never happen.

Is this true, and does it mean that there will be a load of PC heads buying the new Intel Macs?

Im completely objective by the way when it comes to OS. At the present time I think there are pros and cons to both platforms.

Capt'n Midnight

astrofool wrote:

Just because something ships with the OS, doesn't mean you have to use it. .... It is not forcing anything upon anyone.

Internet Exploder

Wopping great big security hole in the OS ..