Giga-what? Give me a stick!Jul 11 '02 Write an essay on this topic.
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The Bottom Line Don't gouge on the processor; splurge on things that matter like RAM.
With a few simple things in mind, you don’t have to buy an expensive computer to get good performance. These days, everything is focused in on those megahertz (and more recently gigahertz), but that’s not all there is to a PC. Things like RAM, hard drives, and video cards can make more of a difference than the CPU. Because of the battle for the market between Intel and AMD (you can read my article on their differences at the bottom of the article in the links section), the megahertz ratings have just been through the roof. 2.0-gigahertz, 2.2-gigahertz, 2.4-gigahertz, 2.53-gigahertz, all coming from Intel in a span of a couple of months, but does that jump from 2.0 to 2.5 really make a 25% increase? No. That’s the trick to their marketing. They want you to believe that bigger numbers equal higher performance, which they do (to an extremely small extent), but not the numbers are not directly proportional to the speed of the computer. The truth is, the jump from a 1.8-gigahertz Pentium 4 to a 2.53-gigahertz Pentium 4 is negligible. But, if gigahertz are what makes your computer faster, then what is it? RAM is the biggest contributor to the speed of your computer, in my opinion. Next I’d say is the hard drive, and finally, if you really want that extra speed, your graphics card. Below are sections for RAM, hard drives, and graphics cards, what they do, and what to look for in each component. Random Access Memory Random Access Memory, commonly referred to in a three-letter acronym, RAM, is the short-term memory of your PC. When you open Microsoft Word, it’s the component that keeps track of what you’re typing. When you try to open a web browser, it’s what allocates the amount of memory it can use up. It comes in modules about one inch high and approximately one-half of an inch long, also known as “sticks” of RAM. Most major vendors will include a base of 128 megabytes or 256 megabytes of RAM in their systems for the $1,000 to $2,000 systems, however you may want more than that. I’d say that if you were stuck with 128 megabytes, definitely go for an upgrade. If you are getting Windows XP with your system, you need at least 128 megabytes, however that’s just the minimum; 256 megabytes to 512 megabytes would be preferable. If all you are going to do on your system is word processing, e-mail, and web browsing, 256 megabytes should be sufficient. However, if you plan on doing gaming, programming, heavy-duty spreadsheets, mathematical or economic modeling programs, etc., you’ll probably want 384 or 512 megabytes of RAM. Most vendors will gouge you on it (they’ll charge up to a dollar-per-megabyte), however it’s worth it. But, if you believe you are a high-end user and you’ve opened up the case of the computer before (or you have a friend willing to help you), then I’d go with the minimum offering and then buy online extra RAM. It can be up to 75% cheaper than the included modules. Oh yeah, and as for the types, just get DDR. That’s all you need to know. Hard Drive I’d say the most overlooked component of the PC is the hard drive. People look at the space, and then that’s it. The speed of the hard drive (sometimes noted in fine print) can also be very helpful. For most people, you’ll want an IDE (or EIDE, anything with the letters IDE in it) as opposed to a SCSI (pronounced “scuzzy”) hard drive. SCSIs are usually for servers or high-end workstations, IDE hard drives are what you want. Anyway, they come in two different speeds (normally): 5400-RPM and 7200-RPM. You’ll want to get a 7200-RPM drive, as it spins 133% faster than the former. As for space, this is fairly simple. Most people won’t use more than 40-gigabytes of hard drive space (hell, many won’t use 20), although it’s always nice to have that extra space because it helps speed the whole system up. You may also want to hard drives if your data is important. Two smaller ones would let one be the operating system/application drive and the other being the data storage. That way, if you get infected with a virus or the main hard drive crashes, you’ll still have the data on the data drive. Graphics Card The graphics card, also known as a video card, is what turns your ones and zeros into pretty pictures. This one is fairly simple because of the apparent monopoly on the consumer video card field by nVidia (acquiring a year or two ago, their biggest competitor, 3dfx). You’ll usually get a GeForce 2, 3, or 4 card with at least 32 megabytes of RAM. You may also get an ATI card (it’s basically the only mainstream alternative to nVidia), which goes the same: get at least 32 megabytes on your graphics card. If you follow these guidelines, you should be able to get a decent PC for a cheap price. Below is an optimal configuration for a midrange computer and then links to relevant sites. 2.0-Gigahertz Pentium 4 Processor 384 Megabytes of DDR RAM nVidia GeForce 3 Graphics Card with 32 Megabytes of RAM 7200 RPM 45-Gigabyte Hard Drive Creative SoundBlaster Live! Sound Card 19” Flat-Screen Monitor 10/100 Mbit/sec. NIC 56 Kbit/sec. V.90 Modem AMD vs. Intel Comparison: http://www.epinions.com/content_1990893700 Dell.com: http://www.dell.com (go figure) Gateway.com: http://www.gateway.com (another odd one)  |
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