I'm going to get a new PC for college and i want it to last for a while too. I've mainly been looking at tigerdirect.com and i found 2 pc's: HP Pavilion s7600n Refurbished Desktop PC and the Gateway GT5228 AMD Refurbished Desktop PC. I know both of these computers are pretty good and offer their own strenghts, but i look at the gateway and it's 2gb ram. But for about $200 more. I would just like to know if i would be able to buy the slim pc(mainly for how small it is, fit in dorm!!!) and upgrade the 512 ram to 1 gb or even 2 if possible. some input would be nice especially from people who have used one pc or the other. thanks
There are alot of other thing to look at in the big picture here. If everything else is similar then I'd save myself the money and just upgrade the 2nd system. It is very easy to do and and will probally save you $100 bucks or so.
Telling by that statement;;imho I think you should just build your own computer. It's easy and you know whats all going into it and you learn a thing in the process
Building your own IS probally the best way. There are pleanty of resources out there to help you and you always have the guys here at AD to help you out if you need it.
I am guessing these are the two Computers? HP Pavillion s7600n Gateway GT5228 Lets compare HP CPU AMD 64 3500+ Gateway AMD 64x2 4200+ RAM HP 512MB DDR support 2GB Gateway 2GB DDR (PC4200)supports 4GB Hard Drive HP 200GB SATA Gateway 250GB SATA II Optical Drives HP DL DVD/RW W/light Scribe Gateway DL DVD/RW Additional Both Multi media card reader Video HP Not Listed Gateway NVIDIA GeForce 6100 Op System Both Windows XP Media Center By looking at these and you saying you want them to last a while then the Gateway would be the way to go because of expandability. You will really be limited with what you can do to the HP. Pro's and Con's Gateway Pro's Bigger Hard Drive Larger Processor More Memory Better Optical drive Gateway Con's Video on board (but you do have PCI Exp X16 Slot for upgrade) No wireless card (again can be upgraded easily) Price (It is 200$ more) HP Pro's Price Portability Light Scribe DVD/RW Wireless LAN HP CON's Not much to upgrade. you are limited to no free PCI slots The DVD/RW is a slim line (laptop type) Not good Less Memory (1.5 GB less) Roughly 100$ more to upgrade Stuck with on board graphics. (That probably isn't to good) All in all neither of these systems are outstanding, but they will both work I guess the main question here is what exactly do you want to be able to do with either of these systems? Neither company gets good reviews for cutomer support so thats a crap shoot as well. Have you checked Dells website to see what they offer? I think you can get a Dimension for around the same price as these with a 17" monitor and there support is much better than any of these. Also you are getting a new computer not a re-furbished one.
