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cartisdm
December 15th, 2009, 01:04 AM
For anyone that was keeping up this thread (http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1348169) I think I am able to get my Grandma high speed internet so I'll will likely go with either a simplified Ubuntu or Linux Mint setup.

What do you think about this desktop:

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=5387486&CatId=119

along with this monitor:

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=4802780&CatId=12

Anybody have any personal experience with the IBM ThinkCentre hardware itself or even better, anyone installed any linux distros on it?

Bölvağur
December 15th, 2009, 01:40 AM
2.8GHz processor, 512MB RAM

sounds good.
It's not powerful and might struggle with certain things, but for a grandmother that might not be a problem unless she's going to be playing Nexiuz but doesn't want low graphic settings.

Sealbhach
December 15th, 2009, 02:09 AM
....but for a grandmother that might not be a problem unless she's going to be playing Nexiuz but doesn't want low graphic settings.

Grandma playing Nexuiz... made me lol.:D

.

earthpigg
December 15th, 2009, 02:12 AM
that system will not be very good at flash-based games and the like.

you don't think FarmVille and stuff like that will ever appeal to her, do you?

it may even have trouble with flash video on full screen (hulu, youtube, etc) -- something that very well may end up appealing to her when her friends e-mail her "omg look at this cute cat i found on youtube!!" links.

User3k
December 15th, 2009, 02:17 AM
Decent computer. I am a huge LG fan though but that monitor is nice.

You should plan ahead. She might get a good computer, start loving it all and get into ETQW or WoW :D

cartisdm
December 15th, 2009, 02:19 AM
that system will not be very good at flash-based games and the like.

you don't think FarmVille and stuff like that will ever appeal to her, do you?

it may even have trouble with flash video on full screen (hulu, youtube, etc) -- something that very well may end up appealing to her when her friends e-mail her "omg look at this cute cat i found on youtube!!" links.

I'm not too worried about the system speed. I know she wont be streaming video (this is her first ever computer) and just wants to send emails to her family and look at our pictures on Facebook. She doesn't even really know what a computer is but she feels out of the loop of the rest of the family.

I'm going to set up some BIG easy to use icons and shortcuts on her desktop so she wont have to do any navigating (Gmail, facebook, Pictures folder etc)

LowSky
December 15th, 2009, 02:25 AM
Be carefull: i got my mom a netbook, and now all she uses is Facebook, gtalk, youtube, etc. Now she complains how slow it is, that she can't do this and that... oh the humanity!

512 is a bit low these days, be a good grandchild and up the RAM

beastrace91
December 15th, 2009, 02:39 AM
Yea - I'd def recommend kicking up the RAM to at least a gig (if not 2). RAM is dirt cheap these days.

~Jeff

earthpigg
December 15th, 2009, 03:00 AM
Be carefull: i got my mom a netbook, and now all she uses is Facebook, gtalk, youtube, etc. Now she complains how slow it is, that she can't do this and that... oh the humanity!

exactly. my mom was perfectly happy with her p4 256mb of ram... until i encouraged her to get broadband and she came across her first random facebook invites/requests/video links/etc.

srt4play
December 15th, 2009, 03:16 AM
I have that exact model and run opensuse 11.2 on it. It ran Ubuntu 9.10 for a while just fine. For just web browsing it's ok but I wouldn't recommend it because flash performance sucks on it.

hoppipolla
December 15th, 2009, 03:39 AM
sounds good.
It's not powerful and might struggle with certain things, but for a grandmother that might not be a problem unless she's going to be playing Nexiuz but doesn't want low graphic settings.

yeah totally man I mean we need to prepare for Nexuiz!

But what if she gets an urge to play CS: Source or Left 4 Dead? :o


seriously though, yeah bung in a gig of RAM :)

cartisdm
December 17th, 2009, 01:05 AM
Ok, you all made me feel bad so I upped the processor to 3GHz and the RAM to 1GB and the optical drive to a DVD-ROM. Happy? :)

Also, I am having a technician come out to set up HughesNet satellite high speed internet. If I get her modem installed right next to where the computer will be installed, is it safe to go straight from the modem into the computer or should I still consider a router?

MaxIBoy
December 17th, 2009, 01:37 AM
Those specs are good for basically anything a grandmother needs, but you'll want to give her a 2 Gb swap partition just in case. Also, it's very easy to just upgrade the RAM later on. As others have said, RAM is very cheap, and it's easy to add another stick or swap out a stick.

If there is only one computer in the house, then a router only has one use, which is if you want to use the firmware firewall. However, it's not hard to setup a software firewall on your Linux machine (IPtables comes with most distros, you just need to configure it.)

As others have said, once you have something, you find uses for it really quick. When I first set up my server, it was going to host printers and nothing more, now it's a game server, backup server, SOCKS proxy, and webserver as well. And I intend to make it a torrent slave in the future. Think back to when you first started driving for an even bigger example.


PS: If it's three years old, and if the hard drive doesn't come replaced out of the box, then be prepared to replace the hard drive maybe two years from now...