How fast should my computer be?

Gregadd

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Apr 20, 2010
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It's been almost ten years since I purchased my last computer. Bless me father i have sinned
I am thinking about one of those combo tablet laptop things. How mcuh Ram shold I have? What MHZ speed should I get. How much memory storage? Especiaally if I decide to use for digital downloads.
 

NorthStar

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Feb 8, 2011
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- 8GB of Ram is a good number.
- A quad-core processor (around 3.0Mhz) is not bad.
- One terabyte or even half of that (just buy external storage as needed).

Budget? Screen size? Touchscreen? Ask Mike (Blizzard) for audio cards (best DACs),,,for your digital downloads...he knows some of the best.
And he knows some too about "happy tops" (tablet, laptop, notebook, ...).

? http://www.laptopmag.com/articles/laptop-buying-guide
? http://www.laptopmag.com/articles/important-laptop-features

P.S. You have few typos in your sig Greg. ...First time I ever noticed.
 

Johnny Vinyl

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May 16, 2010
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If you're not a fan of touch-screen stay away from tablets, unless perhaps one of the top line Microsoft Surface 3's as you can add a keyboard.

I had a 9-yr old Toshiba Satellite that I upgraded to a 17" Dell i7 Core laptop with 8gb RAM and 1TB hard drive just last year. I love it! I don't use mine for a lot of downloads, but if I did I would bulk up on the RAM and reduce the Hard drive capacity as external hard drives are cheap and more convenient.

Get the fastest processor and the most RAM within your budget, and buy external drive space. JMO.
 

Gregadd

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I would like to have touch screen.
 

FrantzM

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amirm

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If you are going to download to it, make sure you get at 256 Gigabyte SSD (stay away from hard disk). Mine is four times bigger and it is almost full :). So bigger would be preferable.

As Bob mentioned, minimum memory you should get is 8 Gigabytes. Fortunately most these days should come that way.

CPU is a mess. There are so many different models from Intel that will make your head spin. It is not like the good old days of picking the speed in Ghz and be done with it.

My advice is always get the latest CPU model which now is the "skylake." "Core i5" is good enough. Core i7 would be a good splurge.
 

Folsom

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I'm not a fan of tablet/notebook convertables. I prefer Thinkpad laptops because in general they're the most reliable out of every machine made. But I only go with the editions meant for being bought by the lot for government and corporate entities (T and W series, maybe a few others work). I'm using a W atm, it's not the smallest and lightest but it's from 2012 and I can run whatever your new stuff can run. Northstar has good recommendations with 8gb ram min for a regular OS. Also I'd avoid "Celeron" CPU's. Once in awhile there's some good ones if you want to research it but I'd avoid them just to make it carefree.

As far as a tablet device goes the iPad's are nice. But I don't like iPhones. In general I prefer to use one or the other for laptop to tablet. Convertables are heavy and cumbersome for when I'm on the couch.

Digital downloads have no real requirement for specifications these days. A 10 year old computer can do that with ease. You need storage for them, lots of that. Also a fast internet connection and decent router for wireless will make it go better.
 

Gregadd

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Budget-modest
Microsoft
 

amirm

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What kind of money are we talking about Greg? $500? $1,000? $1,500? These are the rough steps in laptops last I looked.
 

Old Listener

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naturelover.smugmug.com
It's been almost ten years since I purchased my last computer. Bless me father i have sinned
I am thinking about one of those combo tablet laptop things. How mcuh Ram shold I have? What MHZ speed should I get. How much memory storage? Especiaally if I decide to use for digital downloads.

Always good to define your requirements in detail.

What are you going to do with the new computer? Heavy photo editing in Photoshop is more demanding than web surfing or playing music (unless you upsample with a demanding algorithm.) Editing videos can be very demanding of CPU resources.

How much storage do you need? Does it need to be on the computer's internal drive or can some of the storage be on a USB drive or a NAS on a local network?

Laptop, tablet or desktop? How about size and weight?

How quiet must it be?
 

NorthStar

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Feb 8, 2011
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What kind of money are we talking about Greg? $500? $1,000? $1,500? These are the rough steps in laptops last I looked.

Yes Greg, Amir is right.

• $500 = Core i5 (no SSD) Ram 8GB
• $750-1,000 = Core i7 (SSD yes) Ram 8-12GB
• $1,500-2,000 = Core i7 (biggest SSD) Ram 12-16GB

* American list prices (street = less...of course). ...Roughly.
 

NorthStar

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Feb 8, 2011
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Vancouver Island, B.C. Canada
Always good to define your requirements in detail.

What are you going to do with the new computer? Heavy photo editing in Photoshop is more demanding than web surfing or playing music (unless you upsample with a demanding algorithm.) Editing videos can be very demanding of CPU resources.

How much storage do you need? Does it need to be on the computer's internal drive or can some of the storage be on a USB drive or a NAS on a local network?

Laptop, tablet or desktop? How about size and weight?

How quiet must it be?

In his first original post:

"It's been almost ten years since I purchased my last computer. Bless me father i have sinned
I am thinking about one of those combo tablet laptop things. How mcuh Ram shold I have? What MHZ speed should I get. How much memory storage?
Especially if I decide to use for digital downloads."


_____________

Last line suggests to me; digital "music" downloads.

A $500 one will do what he wants to use it for.
 

audioguy

WBF Founding Member
Apr 20, 2010
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Flexibility (but no touch screen). MacBook, MacBook Air or MacBook Pro. And if you are a Windows guy, add Parallels and it runs both OS's (actually, LOTS of OS's and simultaneously.) I have a few audio apps that only run on Windows but am not a fan. Just some options (but not inexpensive ones).
 

Gregadd

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My clients are very good bargain hunters.
 

NorthStar

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Gregadd

WBF Founding Member
Apr 20, 2010
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Metro DC
I am mulling over the questions presneted.
 

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