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floodcasso2
March 9th, 2007, 04:30 PM
Hey everyone, I was thinking about picking up one of the MadTux Freespire PC's as a decent second computer that I can fiddle around with. They have "OK" specs but are pretty damn cheap. Has anyone around here purchased one? What is the quality like? Just curious. It doesnt have to be stellar, for the price, id be happy if it boots up!

I was thinking about getting their "freespire" pc, and wiping it to put ubuntu on it, adding another 512 stick of ram, and popping in an Nvidia card for some beryl fun.

the specs are:

3.3ghz celeron D processor
512 megs ram
80 gig hard drive
16x dvd burner
onboard graphics
onboard audio
onboard lan
4 usb ports..

for $289

doesnt sound like a terrible deal to me. What do you guys think? have any of you had experience with them? what was it like? Let me know! thanks!

floodcasso2
March 9th, 2007, 05:47 PM
then again, how much worse can it be than my current linux box?

P3 600mhz
256mb ram
40g hard drive

lol

im gonna purchase the 3.3ghz madtux box, and report my unboxing and results when i recieve it :) if anyone else has purchased a pc from them, feel free to report your findings here as well!

mips
March 9th, 2007, 06:08 PM
What is your budget ? Tell us this then we can give you some options.

floodcasso2
March 9th, 2007, 07:03 PM
no more than $350 really. Im just looking for a new "sandbox" computer. My work and laptop pcs are already set up. Im just looking for something inexpensive at home that I can tinker with, install some different linux distros, play around with beryl, etc.

mips
March 9th, 2007, 09:08 PM
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/searchtools/item-Details.asp?EdpNo=2948212&sku=I69-2142%20B&CMP=ILC-FPM08

Add a $50 or less HD and you have a pretty good spec system ! It's all genuine Intel so it should work 100% with linux.

More options:
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/category/category_tlc.asp?CatId=31

mips
March 9th, 2007, 09:19 PM
The thing is you have no idea what is inside the madtux pc component wise.

The Intel one I listed above has a much better spec and more future life in it. Has PCIe X16 vs AGPPlus. 4 SATA vs 2 SATA, much better CPU Pentiun D 940 3.2GHz Dual-Core (4MB cache!) vs Celron D 3.2GHz

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/searchtools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=2477872&Tab=2&NoMapp=0

floodcasso2
March 10th, 2007, 03:56 AM
Thanks for the tips! Though after adding a hard drive and a dvd burner to that rig, its a little above my budget, not to mention I just dont have the time to put together a computer these days.

After consulting the people on the Freespire forums who have purchased this computer, the raving compliments about the customer service and the quality of the product, I placed an order with them. Hopefully when the system comes in a week or so , I'll be happy with my purchase. I'll let you all know.

maniacmusician
March 10th, 2007, 04:37 AM
Thanks for the tips! Though after adding a hard drive and a dvd burner to that rig, its a little above my budget, not to mention I just dont have the time to put together a computer these days.

After consulting the people on the Freespire forums who have purchased this computer, the raving compliments about the customer service and the quality of the product, I placed an order with them. Hopefully when the system comes in a week or so , I'll be happy with my purchase. I'll let you all know.
Wait, so which one did you buy? The one with the Celeron processor?

If so, I feel sorry. Celeron's are the worst type of processors imaginable. I hate them, with a passion. They've ruined my computing experience many a time.

teet
March 10th, 2007, 05:58 AM
Wait, so which one did you buy? The one with the Celeron processor?

If so, I feel sorry. Celeron's are the worst type of processors imaginable. I hate them, with a passion. They've ruined my computing experience many a time.

I have a Celeron D 3.06 Ghz with 512 mb DDR 400 RAM, Geforce FX 6200, 200 GB PATA harddrive, and DVD burner.

I built it as a cheap ~$300 machine about a year ago. I have no complaints. It works. I really didn't want to build a massive new machine until all this dual/quad core and 32/64 bit junk got sorted out a bit.

$289 seems a bit steep to me, but it's not a horrible deal or anything...I just think you could get into the P4 category for that amount of money.

-teet

floodcasso2
March 10th, 2007, 07:00 AM
i think the price is pretty fair, and like i said, almost anything is better than my current sandbox rig. p3 600mhz.. talk about slow lol

mips
March 10th, 2007, 03:22 PM
If so, I feel sorry. Celeron's are the worst type of processors imaginable. I hate them, with a passion. They've ruined my computing experience many a time.

+1 I have a celeron in my laptop and it is a pig. I need to find a P4 M somewhere for it and upgrade as everything else is good.

forcesofhabit
March 10th, 2007, 05:13 PM
The Celeron I had on my old desktop computer was very slow, but the laptop I'm using right now is a Celeron M, and runs ALL variants of Ubuntu very well.

floodcasso2
March 13th, 2007, 04:20 PM
was actually just using someones pc which ran a celeron D 3.33ghz, had ubuntu with beryl running, was pretty snappy :) im looking forward to my new pc :)

mips
March 13th, 2007, 08:17 PM
was actually just using someones pc which ran a celeron D 3.33ghz, had ubuntu with beryl running, was pretty snappy :) im looking forward to my new pc :)

Does he have a proper 3D gfx card though. What onboard gfx does that pc have you ordered ?

floodcasso2
March 14th, 2007, 04:22 AM
the onboard video is crap, but i have an AGP geforce 7000 series card with 512 megs to put into the system so no biggie there :)

mips
March 14th, 2007, 09:30 AM
the onboard video is crap, but i have an AGP geforce 7000 series card with 512 megs to put into the system so no biggie there :)

That would make a lot of difference !