How many of you have PC's surplus to requirements?

King Damager

King Damager

King Damager

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I realised something this morning.

In my cotniual quest to have an Aestehtically pleasing rig, I was going to go full watercooling. Thing is after modding and sutff, I looked into it and it would set me back about £1k. Now I thought about this, and you can get some very nice things for that kind of money. Realistically the only issue I have with my current pc is minor aesthetic issues - can be fixed for £100, and some issues with noise - again looking at about £100 + £300 for a new GPU....

So, that's £500 I could save, and the GPU isn't necessary due to performance requirements, I want a GPU upgrade for the fact that the 480 is far too noisy...

Considering 90% of the time I use my pc for browsing the internet, writing essays, and generally absorbing media, I can actually use my iPad to successfully do most of these. The dual screens are useful for writing essays I must admit..

The other 10% of time I probably harness the pull potential of the PC playing games etc... but realistically, as I've already said, my 480 can already stick over 100FPS in most of the games I play (Racing and Skyrim/Anno 2070...)... So why on earth should I bother with some massive watercooling loop...

So yeah, that's a bit of my background I guess. The Epiphany this morning was to work out how to sort out my PC that I currently own to fix the small niggles I have with it. It'll cost me a lot less anyway...

Now I imagine some of you; the folders, the renderers, graphic designers and the hard core gamers, actually do need your PC for it's full potential. But I imagine that's actually a relatively small percentage of the population...

So how many of you have a PC surplus to requirements?

kd
 
I have a good 4 "spare" PCs and 3 "spare" laptops. My actual desktop is probably overkill for my needs, and my laptop is "about right".

If I take into account my Mac-Pro (which gets used literally once a month, if that), and my laptop dedicated to car diagnostics, then +1 to each of the above numbers.

EDIT: As with stulid, I now have a spare case ;)
 
im assuming you mean how many of us have a computer more powerful of with features we dont use as opposed to a computer sat there not being used.

i am outgrowing my laptop, thats why i am planning a desktop build
 
Taking this as having a pc that is too powerful for its use then I guess it depends how much you use it for each task. I think a lot of people would have things that overlap, i.e. for me having it watercooled makes it silent for movies but also means temps are kept down for gaming with slight advantage of lower overclocked temps for that little extra encoding performance. I agree that for things like internet browsing and movies it is far too powerful but I ended up with the choice of watercooling or building a htpc for internet and movies and they came to roughly the same price and water won haha.
 
Well, my Laptop only gets used about once or twice a month as I do most of my gaming and web browsing on my DT and iPhone. But I don't consider it surplus to requirement or a waste as it's useful to have as a backup in case my DT ever fails. The 2nd GTX 260 I have could also be considered surplus to requirement as I only run SLI when gaming, as it causes odd crashes and lock-ups from time to time. (and quite often I forget to enable it :mad:)

People tend to buy the best they can afford, not what is most practical for them at that point in time. When I next upgrade my rig, I will most likely put a GTX 680 in there, even though something like a GTX 660Ti (or whatever they call it) will be more suitable.
 
Too many

Hmm. Well. My households hardware:

Asus single core netbook
Asus dual core netbook
Alienware m11x R1 netbook
Dell M6300 mobile workstation
Dell Vostro 1500 laptop
HP Probook 4530s
HP Proliant Microserver
Home built - Core 2 Duo E6420 / 8GB / HD6570
Home built - i5 2500K / 8GB / 480 SLI

1x spare ATX case

There's 2 people in the house, there's probably some surplus there.
 
I3 htpc 2120
I7 920 game rig

I spent way more than i needed to when i first built it. I even got 2 ssds for raid.having come to my senses i now realise i have gone overkill, so one ssd got sold, back to 1 gpu (encouraged by xfire issues) and wont be upgrading for no reason anymore, would ratger waste money on the car! :p

One thing i dont regret is £800 of monitor. Two ips monitors might be overkill, but i love the u27, infact my next upgrade ..long time away..might be to swap the u24 for Nother 27, love the colours and the res. But 2560 DOES make gpus squeal! But i would much rather spend more on screen than internals.

I never get why people spend Ks on a pc then 100 on a monitor, same way as people have a ipod with 5£ headphones

My tv is fairly overkill but is one of those i would wonder 'what if' if i had gone with the lower model
 
Mines pretty much right for what i use it for. 60% the time it's just web browsing and performing basic network sharing tasks, 30% gaming, 10% as a hypervisor running ESXi and several servers on top. Triple screens (two for acutal PC use and the third as in internet tele when exercising. So although looking at one senario vs the hardware it may seem over kill, considering the wide range of use it gets it's pretty much bang on.
 
My rig's used for gaming, video encoding, fraps/dxtory'ing, 3D Rendering, full use of the adobe creative suite, etc etc.

Ideally i'd want more RAM, but i'm content with what I have. I'd like to believe i built it to suite my needs. So far it has done just that.
 
Me. :p

Everyday PC is a 2500K which 90% of the time is internet & office tasks.
Other 10% is media of which 1% is encoding blu-rays/DVD's.

I only 'upgraded' that 'cos my sister's PC was getting old & slow so I gave her my old E7400 setup.

Also got a PIIx2 555BE & 6870 rig for gaming which last went on b4 Xmas.

A laptop for my volunteer work, I last used that on Friday.

& there's me thinking about getting a tablet to watch films on when I'm not at home & I can't make my mind up about whether to get a reduced ipad or a cheaper android one.....:rolleyes::cool:
 
Used mainly for web browsing and gaming. (DVD and BLU ray ripping to commence in summer! and some light CAD work for uni in the coming years)

Current PC in my signature

Phenom 9550 in ASUS crosshair with 4gb RAM (no PSU or GFX :p)

e-machines 2.7ghz celeron with 512 RAM and 80GB HDD (fully working but unused)

MBP 13" for uni work (my last PC was too unstable for me to trust my new one :( )


SO yeah, thats for one person, maybe i need to sell the 2 pcs i dont use. But each one has lasted around 4 years so im not wasteful :D
 
Current machine is fine for me (over clocked i7 930 @ 4GHz) since I do some video conversion here and there but it is mostly used for emails, web browsing and of course gaming. I have a GTX480 which is perfect for me at the moment since I run 1920x1080 and max out every game (more or less) that I play.

I won't be upgrading this year or even next year... though that is subject to getting a job and stuff in which case IvyBridge-E here I come :D

Stoner81.
 
Mine is adequate for my needs, and in most cases performs with little difficulty in relation to the tasks. I would see great benefit if I upgraded, but it does everthing I want. I always try to get every last ounce out of my rigs before changing the cpu and mobo etc.
 
I believe mine may come under the heading "complete and total overkill" although for the 10% of the time I am using it to its potential, it really comes into its own!

However my GTX580 I still love! The only high end card I have ever had!
 
I am probably like KD and only use my PC for gaming about 10% of the time. Rest of the time is for work/browsing/porn etc etc.

I built another PC for the wife and both my girls have a laptop each for school work and I have a laptop I use for work but don't need it.

I find it a hobby though so I don't mind spending money on it.
 
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