Tech Tips
Lindy Chaffee
Ever look at one of those computer ads and been overwhelmed by the tech speak? Me too. Let's try to highlight the most important terms and work through them.
- Memory. More is better. If you get 32MB standard, good. If you can get 64MB standard, even better. Memory is most important when considering the speed of your machine. If your PC is too slow, memory is the best and usually cheapest upgrade path.
- Hard Drive. Very similar to memory. Higher capacity is better. There might be options for IDE or SCSI. IDE is simpler, though less flexible than SCSI. SCSI allows several devices and is faster than IDE, though takes a little more configuration.
- Monitors. These are usually bundled with new machines at extra cost. The sizes are expressed as inches: 15 to 21 inches are typical. Ignore those numbers. Look for the viewable area size, which will always be smaller than the monitor size. This is the actual size of the image.
- Video cards. These cards will have on-board memory. As always with memory, more is better. That's redundant, isn't it? All the better for you to remember, grasshopper. 4MB video cards are typical, but if you can get 8MB, then all the better.
- Software. Many times new machines will come with some basic software. When you are spending several thousand dollars on a machine, you should demand that the company give you as much software as possible. You deserve it.
Now let's look at some specific examples I found in the Sunday paper. Let's start with Best Buy.
Right on front is a big picture of a Packard Bell. In case you don't know, there is one main rule when buying a computer: never, ever, buy anything from Packard Bell. Sure, the price is attractive, but that's all. You will have more headaches with one of those "machines" than the price is worth.
There is also an ad for a Hewlett-Packard; it's for sale cheap. While I like their printers, the computer looks pretty cheaply made. There doesn't seem to be any room inside the computer for extra cards, which is fine if you never expect to upgrade. They probably have placed more than one device on a card, which makes it impossible to upgrade without buying two more cards to replace the one you took out.
Here is an ad for a Compaq for $999.70 (monitor included). It has: 16 MB memory, 1.6G hard drive, 14" monitor (13.2" viewable), 8x CD-ROM, 33.6 modem, and speakers. If you were paying attention to the first part of this article, you would see that the memory and hard drive and cd-rom could all be upgraded. But, spend just $300 and you'd have a nice machine. This would be an excellent starter machine that could be upgraded as you need more power.
Let's jump over to Sun and look at one of their Compaq's. This one is $1797 and includes 3.2 G Hard Drive, 32 MB DRAM (which is a little faster than normal RAM), 33.6 modem, 24x CD-ROM and speakers. First, there is no monitor, which will cost from $250-$600. More reason this machine is so high, is that there is an Intel CPU inside. These chips are the most expensive. The two clone makers are AMD and Cyrix. AMD makes a much better product, which is why it will be more expensive than Cyrix. This does not mean Intel is the best. Intel spends more or marketing, and must jack up the price in order to make a big, fat profit. This would not be a sensible buy.
One final jump to Circuit City. This had four machines on display. One was a Packard Bell. That one is quickly removed from consideration. Here is a Sony at $2399 without a monitor. It has 32M RAM which is good,4.3 G hard drive, which should be enough for most people. A 512K pipelined burst SRAM, which probably is cache memory that's used by the CPU. It is
usually 256K or 512K, but if you can get more, do so. It has a phone and fax system. Faxing comes with the modem, but who wants to spend over $2000 for an answering machine? There is also a TV tuner inside. Unless you have a large monitor, you'd rather get a separate TV. Though computer monitors should have a clearer picture than you TV. There is also a 100M Zip drive, which is nice if you need to transport large files from home to office, for example. But if you don't, it's just a extra expense you don't want to pay for.
One quick word about 56K modems. One: there is no standard yet, so why buy anything that might not be compatible. They say you will be able to download software to upgrade to the standard. Who knows how well that will work? Two: It is completely impossible to get 56K on the old copper phone lines found everywhere. The best speed you could expect is about 42K. Plus, when you upload any information it will be going at 33.6 bps! The speed increase when you download in due to fancy compression software. Three: If you are using a 14.4 modem right now, upgrade to a 33.6. They're cheap, available and work well. Besides that, if you don't chose the same type of 56K modem as you ISP you stuck with 33.6K anyway. Save your money and buy right.
Editor's note: Lindy, a PC consultant in Batesville, is a guest contributor to Tech Tips this month. You can reach Lindy at lchaffee@seidata.com.