Considering this second-hand system, opinions sought

frc · 21 Nov 2011 at 19:26

Hi, this system is available to me for £200. The specs themselves are fine for me and it will be replacing a very old laptop (40GB HDD, 800MHZ cpu, <500MB RAM) which barely moves these days, so I presume it will seem a great improvement?

AMD Athlon II X2 260 (3.2GHZ)
bio star n68s3+ motherboard
4GB DDR3 RAM
2 dual layer DVD-RW drives
500GB HDD
wireless card
19" acer LCD monitor
+ speakers, webcam and peripherals (I already have these, but it still adds value)
+ software possibly. W7 is installed currently, no disks with it though.

So for £200, what do you think? Is it a good deal, or over-priced? I struggle to value things like this.

Thanks very much

SMed · 21 Nov 2011 at 20:49

tipsy · 21 Nov 2011 at 20:58

seems ok for a basic cheap machine, go for it

AberystwythLAD · 21 Nov 2011 at 22:53

frc said:
Hi, this system is available to me for £200. The specs themselves are fine for me and it will be replacing a very old laptop (40GB HDD, 800MHZ cpu, <500MB RAM) which barely moves these days, so I presume it will seem a great improvement?

AMD Athlon II X2 260 (3.2GHZ)
bio star n68s3+ motherboard
4GB DDR3 RAM
2 dual layer DVD-RW drives
500GB HDD
wireless card
19" acer LCD monitor
+ speakers, webcam and peripherals (I already have these, but it still adds value)
+ software possibly. W7 is installed currently, no disks with it though.

So for £200, what do you think? Is it a good deal, or over-priced? I struggle to value things like this.

Thanks very much

Thats quite a good deal considering you're gutting a monitor and peripherals thrown in as well. Definitely worth going for unless you're looking at upgrading in the future. If you want to get an upgradeable machine then go for something pricier now.

If you're after a cheap deal on a computer that is quite well specced for the money spent and will provide you with game playing time at the current time then grab that.

I like to build a machine that I can easily stick another stick of RAM in or upgrade the GPU with ease in but thats me, some people live for the moment and go for the cheaper alternative and then splash out on another second hand model down the road. Each to their own I guess.

BluSky · 21 Nov 2011 at 23:00

It will definitely seem a huge improvement over your old laptop. And while not the best computer by any stretch, it is a very good deal at £200... especially with the monitor and peripherals. Bottom line, if it will do for you, go for it!

frc · 24 Nov 2011 at 15:59

AberystwythLAD said:
Thats quite a good deal considering you're gutting a monitor and peripherals thrown in as well. Definitely worth going for unless you're looking at upgrading in the future. If you want to get an upgradeable machine then go for something pricier now.

If you're after a cheap deal on a computer that is quite well specced for the money spent and will provide you with game playing time at the current time then grab that.

I like to build a machine that I can easily stick another stick of RAM in or upgrade the GPU with ease in but thats me, some people live for the moment and go for the cheaper alternative and then splash out on another second hand model down the road. Each to their own I guess.

Thanks - I wonder why this isn't very upgradable, though?
What components are a dead end here, would you say?

N$X · 24 Nov 2011 at 16:45

fine for surfing and general word processing.

you don't mention a graphics card, is it on board?

frc · 24 Nov 2011 at 18:59

N$X said:
fine for surfing and general word processing.

you don't mention a graphics card, is it on board?

There's no separate one.

frc · 24 Nov 2011 at 19:00

By the way my particular reason for upgrading is so that I won't have such a terribly hard time with video editing and music work (composing and synthing stuff). Will I be able to work with HD video on this machine?