Strawberryland Forum

Long story short... Ruby is in storage and Patsy got all the media creation programs. However, Patsy's age is starting to become apparent.

Although I only had her over a year, Patsy actually dates from around 2008 or 2009. Her Intel C2D E7400 may be perfectly fine for most web browsing, light gaming, and Office XP. Windows 10 seems to run very well for the most part. There is one thing that is limiting her performance, and it may actually force me into getting a far better PC... her RAM capacity.

The Dell Vostro 220's motherboard is apparently capable of only 4GB RAM, but I read on some tech support forum that one Vostro 220 user was able to beef up the ram to 8GB. The RAM Patsy uses is DDR2-800 UDIMM's and it's very hard to find an 8gb kit. Crucial only shows me the 4gb kits due to following Dell's recommendation, but I found this, and it might be compatible since it seems to match some of the requirements Crucial gave me. The price is outrageous though.. $164.99 for a 8gb kit! <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231182">http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6820231182</a><!-- m --> Even if it is compatible with Patsy, I'm not spending that much for an 8gb RAM kit.

If I were able to get Patsy to 8GB RAM, I could possibly get another year or two of use from her. However, that appears to not be the case for my particular tower unless if I want to spend nearly $165 for RAM that may not even work. Thus, I have been thinking about options for something a bit more modern.

Option 1: Rebuild Audrey. I still have her, though in a disassembled state. She has an odd 6GB RAM, but upgrading to a full 8gb would be more affordable than what I described above. Audrey's expansion possibilities are very limited in comparison. She only has two SATA ports and two PCIe slots (x16 and x1). She does make up for that somewhat with a decent amount of USB ports, including two USB 3.0 ports on the front. Gaming performance wouldn't suffer since I would be able to use my GeForce 750Ti and Corsair PSU. I would have to give up my awesome SB Audigy FX if I were to pursue this option, and the second hard drive would have to be placed inside my enclosure. Her CPU is an AMD A6-5200 quad-core. It's not high end, but it does score a bit better than an E7400 on CPUBenchmark.. getting a 2397 over the E7400's 1779 score.

Option 2: Save up for a prebuilt PC. Yes, prebuilt computers have a lot of bloatware, but if I could find something with at least a quad-core i5 or better, that would be just fine and dandy. One model I am looking at is a Gateway DX4860 series PC off eBay. They are from 2012, and some units do contain quad core i5's with TurboBoost, which are likely still capable of modern PC tasks. I could easily rebuild one of these these with existing parts and my Win10 license. If not that, then something brand new from Acer or HP will do. I sometimes dream about getting an all-in-one PC, but most affordable models only come with a Celeron or Pentium which definitely won't do for video editing. You can also forget about good gaming graphics as well. High end all-in-ones bring in powerful CPUs and graphics, but they are expensive to match.

Option 3: Get Greta (laptop) a 1tb HDD and just use her as the PC. Her Pentium B960 actually scores marginally better than the E7400 with an 1871 CPU Mark. Nvidia Optimus also seems to be a bit hit or miss with Steam games. I couldn't get Pinball arcade to run with the discrete GeForce GPU.

Option 4: Get a Mac. The least likely option since Macs are very expensive and are hardly upgradeable these days. You can run Windows on them, but if I were to get a Mac, I would rather take the time to learn macOS than just have a fancy aluminum-encased Windows PC.

So those are my options I'm exploring. Perhaps one of you could help me make a good decision here based on what I provided above?

What about a custom rig for a change? It doesn't have to be the top of the line model, not to mention that you can reuse parts from your old rig like the 750Ti and so on. It's all up to you though, well since it boils down to your current budget and needs anyway, amongst other things.

The reason why I tend to elect against prebuilts is some of the $$ spent on one goes to the bloatware, whereas with a custom PC I can pick parts that would work fine for my needs, and that I have a clean, untouched Windows installation as a starting point.

huckleberrypie Wrote:What about a custom rig for a change? It doesn't have to be the top of the line model, not to mention that you can reuse parts from your old rig like the 750Ti and so on. It's all up to you though, well since it boils down to your current budget and needs anyway, amongst other things.

The reason why I tend to elect against prebuilts is some of the $$ spent on one goes to the bloatware, whereas with a custom PC I can pick parts that would work fine for my needs, and that I have a clean, untouched Windows installation as a starting point.

Well, I guess I'm too much of a chicken to build my own rig sadly. While I do have the knowledge to build one, I worry that I might royally screw up the CPU installation, especially the part with thermal paste. You need just the right amount, not too little or too much. Laziness also is a factor I guess. Bloatware can always be uninstalled in prebuilts.

The closest thing I can get to a custom rig is the Gateway DX4860 option, since most units off eBay come with no OS or hard disk. I could just find drivers for that model and use my clean Win10 installation disc, though I would probably fetch a brand new ISO so I wouldn't have to sit through hours of Windows Updates. Same goes for Audrey. While I still have her restoration image on a USB drive, I can just use the Win10 installation here as well. Win8.1 would do just as fine too.

I'm leaning towards rebuilding Audrey, but I need some time to think about that.

cpd2009 Wrote:

huckleberrypie Wrote:What about a custom rig for a change? It doesn't have to be the top of the line model, not to mention that you can reuse parts from your old rig like the 750Ti and so on. It's all up to you though, well since it boils down to your current budget and needs anyway, amongst other things.

The reason why I tend to elect against prebuilts is some of the $$ spent on one goes to the bloatware, whereas with a custom PC I can pick parts that would work fine for my needs, and that I have a clean, untouched Windows installation as a starting point.

Well, I guess I'm too much of a chicken to build my own rig sadly. While I do have the knowledge to build one, I worry that I might royally screw up the CPU installation, especially the part with thermal paste. You need just the right amount, not too little or too much. Laziness also is a factor I guess. Bloatware can always be uninstalled in prebuilts.

The closest thing I can get to a custom rig is the Gateway DX4860 option, since most units off eBay come with no OS or hard disk. I could just find drivers for that model and use my clean Win10 installation disc, though I would probably fetch a brand new ISO so I wouldn't have to sit through hours of Windows Updates. Same goes for Audrey. While I still have her restoration image on a USB drive, I can just use the Win10 installation here as well. Win8.1 would do just as fine too.

I'm leaning towards rebuilding Audrey, but I need some time to think about that.

I understand, though while it may seem intimidating it shouldn't be that hard, not to mention that most stock heatsinks tend to have thermal compound pre-applied. Plus there's also the option of having someone else do the assembly work for you if you're chickening out of cobbling stuff up. But again it's all up to you - if you're going for that Gateway rig it shouldn't hurt to try.

I may have found the perfect candidate for my new PC.. and it's this:

It's available on eBay, and it has the same CPU as one Gateway DX4680 model I was after, an Intel Core i7-2600 quad core. It scores a 8241 on PassMark, and combined with a later 8gb RAM upgrade, this will be a very fast PC. If I do get this one, I will install my Corsair PSU and GeForce 750Ti and replace Windows 7 with Windows 10. Since this is a refurbished tower, it's likely going to be free from most bloatware, sans a few Dell utilities.

The second backup option is obtaining the DX4860, specifically the DX4860-UR11P model with same CPU. I only seen this on eBay once, and the others are lower end models. There are also other brands of refurb towers with the same CPU available as well, with some in small form factor cases.

Combined with your existing 750Ti, that rig should do just fine from what I gather. I know GTA V isn't your cup of tea, but you'll get around 40-45 FPS which is pretty respectable. Just slap it with a decent branded PSU and you'd be golden.

huckleberrypie Wrote:Combined with your existing 750Ti, that rig should do just fine from what I gather. I know GTA V isn't your cup of tea, but you'll get around 40-45 FPS which is pretty respectable. Just slap it with a decent branded PSU and you'd be golden.

Already got one... my Corsair CX450.

cpd2009 Wrote:

huckleberrypie Wrote:Combined with your existing 750Ti, that rig should do just fine from what I gather. I know GTA V isn't your cup of tea, but you'll get around 40-45 FPS which is pretty respectable. Just slap it with a decent branded PSU and you'd be golden.

Already got one... my Corsair CX450.

That should do just fine for you then.

An update on my desire for a better PC. And also to explain why I sometimes have trouble making up my mind when I get excited over something.

I have been thinking about this a lot, and perhaps I'm starting to come down back to earth about my needs. While an i7-2600 based PC is my current desire, it costs money. And with the holidays coming up, there are bound to be other more important things to purchase. I also have a desire to at least try to use what I have on hand at the moment. And that would be Audrey, the A6-5200 based PC. Her performance might only be a slight step above Patsy, but a RAM upgrade would be the only thing to worry about, plus the fact the A6-5200 is a quad core APU. And she can still use the GeForce 750Ti, which combined with the RAM would still yield far better day-to-day performance of common tasks like web browsing, something Patsy has clear trouble with.

Perhaps if the need ever comes, I could go with a higher class CPU. But after thinking about it while at my grocery store job today, perhaps I don't need that much power just yet. Magix's video rendering is a lot faster than Premiere, even on Patsy. It's mainly the RAM that is the bottleneck.

Yeah, I change my mind a lot when deciding stuff. I set my sights on one thing, but then I finally get to thinking about it and usually realize I'm better off with something I already own or something that costs less.

At least if the A6-5200 still doesn't meet performance needs, I have a certain Lenovo PC in mind.

cpd2009 Wrote:An update on my desire for a better PC. And also to explain why I sometimes have trouble making up my mind when I get excited over something.

I have been thinking about this a lot, and perhaps I'm starting to come down back to earth about my needs. While an i7-2600 based PC is my current desire, it costs money. And with the holidays coming up, there are bound to be other more important things to purchase. I also have a desire to at least try to use what I have on hand at the moment. And that would be Audrey, the A6-5200 based PC. Her performance might only be a slight step above Patsy, but a RAM upgrade would be the only thing to worry about, plus the fact the A6-5200 is a quad core APU. And she can still use the GeForce 750Ti, which combined with the RAM would still yield far better day-to-day performance of common tasks like web browsing, something Patsy has clear trouble with.

Perhaps if the need ever comes, I could go with a higher class CPU. But after thinking about it while at my grocery store job today, perhaps I don't need that much power just yet. Magix's video rendering is a lot faster than Premiere, even on Patsy. It's mainly the RAM that is the bottleneck.

Yeah, I change my mind a lot when deciding stuff. I set my sights on one thing, but then I finally get to thinking about it and usually realize I'm better off with something I already own or something that costs less.

At least if the A6-5200 still doesn't meet performance needs, I have a certain Lenovo PC in mind.

It's alright, just let me know if you decided on a PC and we'll see what we can do from there.