Buy or Build - TODAY

[navychop]

OK, no more dithering. My office machine is about to go to that great recycling center at the dump.

I've been trying to buy a pre-built from Dell, as commented on in another thread. No trialware, free upgrade to 7 (maybe- not posted on their site) and no more of my time spent building another PC.

But Dell insists on selling me a monitor I don't want and can't use. And will not configure as RAID. I can't even determine if they support RAID. Calling my rep gets an answering machine. And they're asking a truly massive premium.

The machine will be used for office applications, mostly Office and an accounting program. However, there are times when I must do some graphics work, converting one format to another, etc. That can be a bit time consuming. It will also have, at least for a time, two monitors. I'd prefer to have HDMI output, but would accept DVI. The second, VGA monitor will probably only be in use for a short time. No gaming. Will also be used to pick up OTA broadcasts, so it needs a digital tuner. Probably get 8GB RAM for future 7 use, but will start with Vista Business 32.

I am tempted to run over to Micro Center tonight and just buy parts and start building. Any pitfalls or suggestions? Any quirks in setting up a machine with RAID? One guy suggested I set it up without RAID, and later convert to RAID. Good idea? RAID 1.

I once wanted an ASUS board that supports instant on Linux, but I'll forgo that for the office. Might go that route for home machine, which will have to be much more robust than the office machine.

We've gone over this before, I know, but this is IT. I'm doing something, one way or the other, today.

 

[wallypa]

If you configure a Dell computer online (Dell Home), you have the option of selecting a single drive or two hard drives in a raid configuration. You can also choose not to get a monitor. You'll get all the garbage they install, but all you have to do is do a clean install. I'm not sure if you can do that with Dell SM as far as a raid set up is concerned.

Setting up a raid configuration is easy. Here's a good article on setting up a raid:

How to Setup a RAID System | Hardware Secrets

Good luck!

 

[navychop]

Not in the configurations I built at their small business site. No third party s/w, just their own. But no way to delete the monitor or specify RAID. No matter. OBE.


I went to Micro Center and bought the pieces to a system. The tech there informed me that all I have to do for the RAID1 is enter the BIOS and specify. Anyway, here's what I bought:

ASUS P6T motherboard
i7 920
Corsair 750W PSU
2 500GB HDD
6GB RAM
2 Lightscribe DVD burners
media card reader
HAF922M case
ATI HD4670 1GB w/HDMI
ATI TV Wonder
Office Business
Vista Business 32 (might return if W7 dl works)
minor bits and pieces

All for about $1800, less than the much less capable Dell I was considering. And way overkill. I usually buy PC Power & Cooling or Antec power supplies, but there wasn't a big enough PCP&C, and the Antec was $80 more.

Minor problem: I was going to dl the W7 RC to try on this machine (& see if the accounting s/w would run under it), but I must log in to Live, Messenger, etc to do so. I have successfully evaded setting up any of these accounts. Any way around this?

 

[Smith P.]

BitTorrent.

 

[JAG72]

BitTorrent.

I would never in the world use BitTorrent to get software for work. You are just asking for problems.

 

[navychop]

Absolutely.

Anyway, assembly is underway and going smoothly. But I'll have to stop soon, and pick up again tomorrow night.

 

[Van]

Thats a nice gaming computer you got there.

 

[wallypa]

Indeed! A kick-butt business rig. And a good choice of motherboard.

 

[Pepper]

32-bit OS with > 4GB RAM, not an ideal combination. Sign up for a throwaway Live account (or just use your existing email address to create one) and get Win7 x64.

 

[navychop]

Thanks for the support.

If I were into gaming, I'd have gotten a much nicer video board.

Current accounting program will not run under 64. Very picky. I might try to get it to work under 7/64 as a test. But we'll see. The extra RAM is for a few months (year?) from now, when the accounting s/w should be updated to run under 7/64. And then I'll buy more memory.

I'm considering setting up a Live account at work, but we currently only have 768 right now. Upping that to 3, but that will take weeks at least. At home I have 20/5 Fios, so it would make more sense to do it there. So I might set up a work Live account and just log in from home. No way I'll give a cr card # to MS Passport.

 

[Smith P.]

Ask someone to make a copy ofW7 on DVD for you. Usually IT ppl have all the software in advance.

 

[navychop]

Broke down and dl W7. 2.8GB, IIRC. Seemed to take very little time to dl, forever to burn.

I am impressed at how easily and quickly the 7 loaded and updated. And I haven't loaded a single driver off CD for the MB or cards. Seems to work very well, very fast. Works fine with my wireless keyboard and mouse. Only quirk was having to load flash manually after loading ff 3.5.

Thanks for the RAID article, Wally, but I didn't need it. VERY simple to set up. Just tell the BIOS to use them as RAID, save/exit and then press ctl-I to pick RAID 0, 1, 1-0 or 5. And the board supports Express, that ASUS feature where you can quickly get to Linux at boot.

I'm so impressed so far, I think in a week or 2 I'll duplicate the system for my home PC. I'll juice it up a bit- maybe put in that BD burner people are recommending, maybe more memory, maybe a better video card.

OH- one more thing. Case is great! Super easy to mount HDDs and opticals. No screws needed. The fans are all oversized and QUIET! I've never assembled a system so quickly.

Later this week, I'll cart it in to work and put it on the network, and test to see if I can get the accounting system to run on it. I'll report back.

 

[Zombie069]

Current accounting program will not run under 64. Very picky. I might try to get it to work under 7/64 as a test. But we'll see. The extra RAM is for a few months (year?) from now, when the accounting s/w should be updated to run under 7/64. And then I'll buy more memory.

What he's getting at is a 32bit OS actually runs worse with over 3 gig installed. If your planning on leaving it on the shelf for several months, ok.
Don't put over 3 in with XP/Vista 32bit...

And don't get too excited about Win7... It's pretty, slick, and nice to use so far, But drivers are scarce, if they work, and it will be that way for a while, just like Vista....


Also, mwave.com is who I get most of my parts from.. Not local, but prices are always great. Could have saved around $300 based on your parts list.

 

[navychop]

WONDER OF WONDER, JOY OF JOYS!

The accounting system appears to be working under W7 Ultimate 32 just fine, with no Virtual PC/Virtual XP mode at all. At least, at first blush.

 

[navychop]

For my home machine, I think I'll almost duplicate this system. Might want faster HDDs and maybe a better video card.

Any recommendations for SATA HDDs for a RAID 1 that would be faster than WD?

Would a different video card be in order for taking SDHC cards from a HD camcorder and burning BDs? I'm referring to displaying the HD video, of course. At least for the short term, it will still be a 4x3 CRT.

 

[Zombie069]

WD offers a couple 10k rpm drives, but I think the largest I have seen is 150gig. Maybe something out larger now, but short of SCSI, (or now SSD) that's the fastest you'll get.

 

[Ilya]

I've been trying to buy a pre-built from Dell, as commented on in another thread. No trialware, free upgrade to 7 (maybe- not posted on their site) and no more of my time spent building another PC.

But Dell insists on selling me a monitor I don't want and can't use. And will not configure as RAID. I can't even determine if they support RAID. Calling my rep gets an answering machine. And they're asking a truly massive premium.

I know it's a late reply, since you already bought what you wanted, but for business needs I always go with Dell, just to simplify the support. It is convenient to have a single point of support. If somethings breaks, they usually come on site and fix it next day. 3-year on-site support is standard on all of our office computers. While if you build it yourself - you will have to fix it yourself. Not a problem if you are up to that, but an inconvenience for a business.

And I never had any problems getting the exact configuration I wanted from Dell. If the option I want is not available on-line I usually call them and they build what I want. My office desktop does have RAID which was preconfigured by Dell. And the price difference if any, is usually not worth the trouble of doing it yourself.

Of course if you are looking for something extreme or unusual, or if you just like doing it yourself, that's a different story!

 

[navychop]

Thanks anyway. Need 500 at least. Probably go w/1TB. Might look at 1.5TB, if I think I might get into doing a lot of HD camcorder work & burning BDs.