Who really needs a new machine ????

[AllenGG]

First off I use three machines. Road warrior Acer laptop, a Skype special with video.
A "Canadian" machine, 6 or 7 years old 750MB ram. And a 4 year old AMD64 with 1.5Gig Ram. All, of course on Ubuntu.
Here's the dilemma: over the last 10-15 years I have replaced the equipment every 3-4 years. A tech or myself built them. But now ??
My "old" Canadian machine with a 10+ year old keyboard (covered with plastic wrap) works great. The AMD64 bit unit works great with a 400 watt sound system and (only) a 19" LCD
All are fine !
Is it just the "itch" for new equipment ? A big monitor (yes!, 30")
Am I the only one ???

Sounds like a "dear Geek" letter.:confused:

Allen

[hessiess]

3D rendering is one of the few things that actialy requires good hardwere.

[Wobedraggled]

I am building a new machine shortly, and the only reason I'm doing so is to replace the older machine in my bedroom.

People who code/edit video etc do need a pretty speedy machine, otherwise there is really no need for a top tier machine unless you are gaming on it.

[SuperSon!c]

First off I use three machines. Road warrior Acer laptop, a Skype special with video.
A "Canadian" machine, 6 or 7 years old 750MB ram. And a 4 year old AMD64 with 1.5Gig Ram. All, of course on Ubuntu.
Here's the dilemma: over the last 10-15 years I have replaced the equipment every 3-4 years. A tech or myself built them. But now ??
My "old" Canadian machine with a 10+ year old keyboard (covered with plastic wrap) works great. The AMD64 bit unit works great with a 400 watt sound system and (only) a 19" LCD
All are fine !
Is it just the "itch" for new equipment ? A big monitor (yes!, 30")
Am I the only one ???

Sounds like a "dear Geek" letter.:confused:

Allen

i'm confused. you say you replace equipment every 3-4 years yet one of those pc's is 6 or 7 years old? did you get it used?

[MONODA]

no I am happy with my laptop but I would like to have an old laptop just to mess around with.

[olejorgen]

Few do. Unless you need the increased performance, invest your money in a better monitor. (Or maybe save them for later)

[keykero]

As indicated above unless you have a specific reason, there's generally no need -- if your hardware is relatively recent. In my case, the need to edit high definition video is the reason I needed another, newer PC. But my main computer (for general work & everything else) is from 2002.

[tamoneya]

i initally built my machine for running vista and now it is going to last at least 10 years. It has Q6600 with 4 GB of RAM. It will be a very long time until I need to get new hardware. I guess that is a good thing.

[dasunst3r]

I still have an itch for new things, although it's lessened over the years. My parents are right in saying that it's economically unfeasible (read: futile) to even try to "chase" technology and that it's more practical to buy stuff when you need it (they beg me to not pull the cheapest thing off the shelf as those aren't good for years of service). It's very good insight I try to live by.

[LaRoza]

Here's the dilemma: over the last 10-15 years I have replaced the equipment every 3-4 years. A tech or myself built them. But now ??
My "old" Canadian machine with a 10+ year old keyboard (covered with plastic wrap) works great. The AMD64 bit unit works great with a 400 watt sound system and (only) a 19" LCD
All are fine !
Is it just the "itch" for new equipment ? A big monitor (yes!, 30")
Am I the only one ???

Sounds like a "dear Geek" letter.:confused:

Allen

If you want more, getting a new monitor is a good bet. A larger monitor does more for than a new computer if what you have does what you want.

[mips]

If you want more, getting a new monitor is a good bet. A larger monitor does more for than a new computer if what you have does what you want.

+1

Besides a bigger monitor (24"-30") I would also love another cpu core but thats a bit hard to find for socket 939...

[aeiah]

i built mine to last a while and its doing just fine right now. amd64 3800 x2, nvidia 7800gt. sure, ive just bought new ram because one of my 1gb sticks broke, and i had to replace the motherboard at christmas because it fried (i just bought the same one for £25). i do get the urge to buy new stuff, but not a new system. ive invested in a good quiet cpu fan, and my nvidia 7800gt is now fanless with a massive heatsink. its connected to a 32" HDTV, and i have a shiny and fairly new wireless keyboard and mouse.

im always reminded of that old joke from only fools and horses where trigger, a cleaner/sweeper says something like:

"ive just got an award for having the same broom for 10 years. its had 8 new broomhandles and 12 new broomheads"

like many linux users, i cant stop myself from tinkering and customising both the operating system, and the system its self. i dont know when ill have a fully new desktop system again, maybe never, ill just keep upgrading and changing things in and out over the next 10 years until i can buy something 100 times faster and 1/100th of the size :p

[Npl]

"Supreme Commander" dint run too well on my old AthlonXP 2500+. If It werent for that game I would still be using it, but so it forced me to get a Athlon64 X2 4800+.

But while I was building I improved my system in a different way than power... I now only have a single downvolted 120mm fan which is enough to keep the whole system cool :cool:
The only thing thats barely audible are the harddrives