Is my computer good enough for what i need

I have a Gateway computer 900 meg of ram. 256 memory 10 gig harddrive with windows me and also AMD proccesore. Will my computer sufice to what i need it to do. I want to make copys of my dvd movies Full copys so i can take them when i travel. what will i need to put into my computer to do that. Thanks for all the information you can give in advance. I know i will need a dvd burner.

 

I've heard of people using the old 500 mhz pIII's w/ rebuilder but the time you will take using this program will be substantial,let's say over 6 hours on your p.c. (estimating) you may look into shrink if that is to long.

I would definately double your ram as locoeng has said but I don't know what your mobo would support above that.look into the fastest mhz your mother board can support more than size!

you can find yourself a 100 gb hd on sale for pretty cheap these day's sometimes less than 50 us$ the 10gb hd will [bold]not[/bold] be sufficient!
you could try on the fly but I doubt you will have the space available for that either.

to summarize (at least) 40 gb hd(rec. >80gb's),ram is your friend, dvd burner,and plan on a new processor it's not neccesary but you would love the benefit's

just my suggestion's
L8

 

Not enough space, minimum is at leat 15g's.

 

I get by with only 256 Rambus ram. No problems. But I have 3 HDDs with lots of gigs. 10 gigs seems to be insufficient. Is that 10gigs free? Try to get rid of stuff you don't need. You might squeak by.

 

thanks to all that has hepled me. Would it matter what kind of DVD burner i will get i Read about some cheap ones starting at 40 dallars. yes it is a 900 mhz processor

 

Directron.com has good prices and fast shipping (they are oem -no screws ,ide cable ,audio). I have bought their NEC's and Sony's burners for $40-$45 plus UPS ground- around $7 . If you order before 2 o'clock it is shipped the same day. They are out of Houston ,Tx. I hope this will help you out mrt8888.

 

thank you pernal and everyone else that has helped me. if there is more advise out there i sure would apprecate it. Thanks to all.

 

For some strange reasons,some burner specs calls for higher specs than others. Benq requires less processor and ram than other brands. Here's the specs on my benq 1620:

Processor: At least 550 mhz-p3 or higher
Ram: 128 mbs
Dvd authoring: 10 gbs free space

I've got 2 of the 1620 and a benq 1640 and these babies can burn. My third pc has very limited resources:
Celeron P-3- 598 mhz
256 mbs rimm
8 gb hd
Addition 30 gb harddrive that will hold 4 or 5 dvds.

This pc performs near flawless backups. I keep compression to as little as I can.More compression,the longer it takes. Throw in some quality enhancements and those backup times will really magnefy.

Best bet is if you have room,add another Hard drive. Staple's just had 200 gb maxtor's on sale for $40 after rebate the other week. Your specs are better than that one pc of mine so you should be ok,just slower backup times.

After using 6 different pc dvd burners,brand names and model#s do make a huge difference. The differences will be shown when you play your backups on stand alone players/game consoles/and other pc drives.

It's all about quality.Quality drives,and throw in quality media,then you'll be able to burn faster and a lot less issues.

I got 3 benqs a booktyping away and very few players that won't play their backups. I also have:

HP 640C lightscribe-backups totally suck,but I use it to read and scribe.
Khypermedia +8x: Not too bad,just a few stand alones won't recognize it's backups.Only using this drive as a reader.

I/O magic 16x: Many different brand names make these and some are crap. I ended up with 1 benq 1620 and an EMPA of middle east fizo.That empa drive was total crap and sits in a box.Be aware of I/O magic drives.

Here's some I highly recommend:

Plextor
Benq
Lite-on
LG
NEC
Pioneer
Sony

Any other brand name,stay away.Stick with the big dawgs.

 

Your system should be adequate CPU-wise, especially if you run the re-encode overnight while you sleep. Up until last month, my system was a dual 850mhz PIII with 768MB and my rebuild times ran around 7-8 hrs (4 pass CCE). Now it is a dual athlon 1600MP with 3GB and now they run ~4hrs, so I still run DVD-RB overnight.

I agree with what has been posted - that you should put at least an another 256MBin it and a larger (or second) hard drive. You will need 15GB for the re-encode process.

 

I pretty much agree with the rest. Your hdd is [bold]not[/bold] big enough. 15 gb min is needed and thats pushing it. Your cpu and memory are on the bare minimum but will suffice. Just be very slow.

Drives I recommend:

plextor
benq
lite-on
sony
lg
nec

 

I agree with all of the above replies. You'll need to upgrade your RAM, I'll say at least to 1GB (1024MB of RAM). If money is not an issue, then it's wise to build or buy a new system (at least the latest from Pentium or AMD processor), this will definitely speed up the encoding process.

As for dvd burners, I agree with Mort81, get the latest from Lite-On or BenQ and you'll be happy. Furthermore, these 2 burners support "book typing", so that should take care of all your stand alone dvd players issues when using a DVD+R disc.

Good luck!!

 

how would i go about upgrading my computer to a 1g. Now it is a 900 mgh AMD proccesor and im sorry it does have a 20 gb harddrive but i would like to get another. What will i need to do to upgrade.

Thanks

 

You won't notice enough difference between 1 ghz and 900 mhz so don't worry about that. You will benefit more by adding another stick of memory. 256 mb min, 512 mb would be even better but might be overkill for your system. I would add at least another 80 gb hdd. Most likely it will need to be IDE interface.

It would be better to start over with a faster system and probably cheaper in the long run. You can find deals on 2.8-3.0 ghz pc's with moniters with at least 80 gb hdd's and 512 mb-1 gb ram for under $500 now days.

 

I've been seeing some great deals with HP/Compaq/Emachines/dell. Avg 3000+ athlon=/80 gb hd/256 mbs pc 2700/even a dvd burner and monitor for $300 after rebates. Office depot/Office max/and staples have some great sales,but Office Depot's associates are pretty worthless, LOL

I'd have to modify some things like:
Up the ram to at least 512
Add an Antec 400 or higher powersupply-You'll only have about 250 watts in most of those pcs.
Throw in a benq burner,use the burner that came with it as a reader.
Throw in another 200 gb HD.

 

I have been seeing a lot of great deals to. The harddrives are still out of my price rang. Does anyone know were i can get a good used one for low $$$. thanks.

 

Staples has the 300 gb maxtors for $99.94 after rebate in this weeks sale. At that price,they were all probably sold out sunday afternoon.

That's about 33-34 cents a gb. That is very cheap. Anything around 50 cents a gb is a pretty decent price.

 

Just to put my two cents worth in

900mhz CPU Adequate
20 gb Hdd (Just Emough keep at least 15gb free)
windows me Adequate(buggy and limited to 4gb file limit) would recommend upgrade to win 2000 or xp on ntfs file system
256 mb ram Adequate (just enough would recommend 512mb)
dvd shrink and anydvd for backup nero to burn
benq burner

remember guys the original post was just for dvd backup

 

my specs

- 1ghz PIII
- 512MB of RAM
- 20GB running WinXP
- 80GB free space

it takes me about 660 minutes (11 hours) to backup with HC and a bit less with CCE, both at 2 pass and movie only. i use the 20GB as source and 80GB as work/output. CCE takes up much of my RAM when running so 256MB may not be enough. HC uses like 300MB+. you definetly need a bigger HD if you're planning to use DVD-RB.

hoping to build a new dualc-core rig soon. 660 minutes, even overnight, is a bit of a pain.