Advice needed on a new pc or laptop

Thursday, January 10, 2008 by teddybearcholla | Discussion: Personal Computing


I am looking to purchase a new pc. I have an HP Pavilion, WindowsXP Home SP2. Intel Celeron CPU 2.ooGHz , 1.99 GHz, 504MB of RAM , Intel Extreme Graphics, which I am still very happy with. But I would like to create images that can be printed at 300dpi...and poster size, say 30"x40"...although my son wants one as long as his sofa...
Some of the programs I use are Apophysis, photoshop6, psp7, Artrage, Artrage2, twistedbrush, coreldraw9 and photopaint, dogwaffle, deep paint, Inkscape, Terragen, Contextfree, ArtWeaver...and a few more. I have a Maxtor One Touch external hard drive for back up and an Epson stylus photo 1280. From what I have been reading, many of these programs are not compatible with Vista. I have found a few XP's at Dell. I do not need Microsoft Word, and I do not play games on my pc. I'm not sure about a flat screen, I like the regular monitor...although I have used my friends laptop and I do not have the glare, I sometimes have with the monitor.
Any advice, thoughts....would be greatly appreciated.
Thank you, Barbara
First Previous Page 2 of 2 Next Last
kona0197
Reply #21 Wednesday, March 19, 2008 5:34 PM
With Vista you need at least 2 GB to make it worth using everyday...
XX
Reply #22 Thursday, March 20, 2008 2:38 AM
2 GB indeed. With 64 bit you need in least a gb more.
teddybearcholla
Reply #23 Friday, March 21, 2008 5:19 AM



Kona, I don't have Vista....and I can add another GB....

I never understood what the 64 bit,and all the other little bits means....maybe theres a link to somewhere that explains the importance of *bits*....
ama02
Reply #24 Friday, March 21, 2008 12:27 PM
maybe theres a link to somewhere that explains the importance of *bits*....


Here's a link to a FAQ on Microsoft's site, about 32-bit vs 64-bit OS... LINK
teddybearcholla
Reply #25 Friday, March 21, 2008 1:35 PM


Thank you very much ama02!!
my wall
Reply #26 Friday, March 21, 2008 3:07 PM
If you choose either laptop or desktop, I recommend avoiding anything with integrated intel "graphics" chips. Intel sucks in that department, not only are they severely deficient in comparison to their competitors, but the budget systems that come crippled with them are usually overpriced. Go with either nvidia or ati especially for the type of applications that you plan on running.
damoose
Reply #27 Friday, March 21, 2008 3:43 PM
Do crt monitors need driver updates? Now seeing the difference between my 2 monitors, this tells me that everyone sees, images differently. Obviously I have been viewing wallpapers, windowblinds, etc. darker than others. Is this the norm, or am I doing something wrong?


Both CRTs and LCDs come with 'drivers' and colour profiles. The 'drivers' tell the video card about any features you particular monitors has and the colour profile specifies the colour response of the monitor to allow you to standardize the colours of you images. You can of course use your display(s) without them as Windows supplies 'generic' versions of these files.

CRTs darken over time. The phosphors on the crt have a half life. The half life is the point at which the 'brightness' of the phosphor is half as intense as when is was new.

So you are not doing anything 'wrong' per se.

kona0197
Reply #28 Monday, March 24, 2008 3:50 PM
My Intel onboard graphics work just fine and play every game I have thrown at it...
whatwhere
Reply #29 Monday, April 7, 2008 11:58 PM
My Intel onboard graphics work just fine and play every game I have thrown at it...


even though this post is old..yes i bumped a old post...but...run crysis at full load on your intel chip...20 bucks says it locks.
kona0197
Reply #30 Tuesday, April 8, 2008 2:48 AM
Why? It plays the games that I have just fine. I'm not going to put a game on my system that does not interest me.

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