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llama64 · 07-21-2008, 04:07 PM

If you are at all technical, build your own. If you don't want to ever crack open your box, get something from Dell or Apple. I've never seen much good come out of a branded desktop computer to be honest, but of the bunch, Dell has a decent reputation.

Intel's processors are currently the best on the market. And they aren't much more money, unlike the old days of the Pentium 4/Athlon XP. A dual core processor at about 2.0 gHz will suffice for your needs. Ensure you get at least 2GB of RAM though as it will eliminate just about all slowdowns in Vista (till you get bogged down with ad-ware/spyware).

<obligatory Apple pitch>
The Apple Mini + a nice monitor is not much more expensive then the average desktop in it's performance range. The only real drawback is the lack of video accelleration which is only important if you do a lot of gaming. Otherwise it's a stable little box that won't suffer nearly as many problems as your average Dell/HP/Compaq. Shouldn't cost you much more then $900.

The only hiccup is if you need windows specific software or if you recently bought Office. Otherwise, it's what I typically recommend to my non-gaming friends. I'm not a fan of the iMac though...

07-21-2008, 04:07 PM	#3
llama64 First Line Centre Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: /dev/null Exp:	If you are at all technical, build your own. If you don't want to ever crack open your box, get something from Dell or Apple. I've never seen much good come out of a branded desktop computer to be honest, but of the bunch, Dell has a decent reputation. Intel's processors are currently the best on the market. And they aren't much more money, unlike the old days of the Pentium 4/Athlon XP. A dual core processor at about 2.0 gHz will suffice for your needs. Ensure you get at least 2GB of RAM though as it will eliminate just about all slowdowns in Vista (till you get bogged down with ad-ware/spyware). <obligatory Apple pitch> The Apple Mini + a nice monitor is not much more expensive then the average desktop in it's performance range. The only real drawback is the lack of video accelleration which is only important if you do a lot of gaming. Otherwise it's a stable little box that won't suffer nearly as many problems as your average Dell/HP/Compaq. Shouldn't cost you much more then $900. The only hiccup is if you need windows specific software or if you recently bought Office. Otherwise, it's what I typically recommend to my non-gaming friends. I'm not a fan of the iMac though...