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Re: [LUG] New Computers

 

On Wed, 13 Oct 2010, Henry Bremridge wrote:

Any opinions on which is cheaper for a non cutting edge desktop running
Windows 7 and MS Office (mainly for office work but with some old games). I
would like to dual boot but doubt I will be allowed to:

- Buying a complete PC: if so any stores that people recommend?

Depends. If it goes wrong you've got the sale of goods act on your side - even if PCW, currys, etc. will all tell you otherwise...

A friend of mine really likes Novatech (mentioned earlier this morning), but he lives 10 minutes from their HQ in Portsmouth...

- Buying parts and making it yourself. If so any recommended parts /
 suppliers

I buy most "normal" stuff from Aria.co.uk (and some server stuff too) Personally, I almost always use Asus motherboards (my desktop is Intel however, but it's an Atom)

Big choice though - but if you've got the time...

Sometimes really hard to beat pre-built deals though, but the issue you'll then have is that of doing a Windows install from scratch which I hear is harder then Linux these days...

 My only feeling is that 4Gb of Ram and 500 Gb harddrive , but no idea on
 what processor / graphics card to go for.

As fast as you can afford. Set a budget... And you might find that "green" 1TB drives are only a few quid more...

Also consider low-power, so core 2 duo types, or even Atom, but I guess an Atom might be a shade slow for the average user these days.

 Looking at AMD I came across

 http://products.amd.com/en-us/comparison/DesktopCPU.aspx which leads me
 to a AMD Athlon X2 or the Intel equivalent

Finally: I am having trouble getting an Nvidia graphics card to work under
Debian. Ubuntu works with restricted drivers. Any recommendations for a
debian friendly graphics card? The only list I have seen is:

http://www.fsf.org/resources/hw/index_html/video

Dunno. Never really had issues, but then I don't need all the gory 3D stuff either..

Gordon

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