What will work???

[Guest]

I'm trying to get a friend of mine online. I can get a used 150-Pentium with everything but the video card. My friend has a site problem and I'm trying to save enough on the computer to get him into a 19/20/21" monitor. Most of his online time will be at E-Bay and playing bridge.

Will the 150-P have the necessary speed for online use and what video card (price is importamt) be sufficient to run the larger monitors?

Thanks

Ron D.

 

[HolyGrenade]

I would strongly advise against getting something that slow.


<font color=red>"My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and dispair!"</font color=red>

 

[camieabz]

If you're determined to keep the system cheap, at least go for a 266 or better. I've a 300 and with the exception of games on the last six months or so, its pretty good at keeping up. Bearing in mind, 256Mb RAM & 32Mb graphics.

<b>
"Now drop your weapons or I'll kill him with this deadly jelly baby."
</b>

 

[dhlucke]

If you are serious about getting something that slow then the only real way to get one (without wasting a lot of money) is to buy one off of a friend.

I think you are making a mistake though since most software that is being released, including all games, Office, and even Windows, won't run on that computer.

If all he cares about is browsing the net (but not watching movie clips online for ex), then sure why not just get him a P90? Find a friend and I'm sure he/she will sell it to you for under $50.

I have no experience running a large monitor on an old computer so that might be a problem. I don't understand your logic of spending $400-$900 on a monitor when the computer he will be using it with can do nothing but browse basic websites and word process. Once he gets online I'm sure he'll find more uses for his computer and then he'll want to upgrade right away.

<font color=red>Amd or Intel? Who cares?? Not me...</font color=red>

 

[Guest]

"I don't understand your logic of spending $400-$900 on a monitor when the computer he will be using it with can do nothing but browse basic websites and word process. Once he gets online I'm sure he'll find more uses for his computer and then he'll want to upgrade right away."

He said his friend has a sight problem so need a larger monitor.

Like the others, I think you might want to find something around the 233/266/300 mark with 32mb at least. As for the video card, try and find a card with 4mb ram. I'm guessing that this monitor will not have to run at max settings since he has the sight problem so you won't need one that is rated for 1600x1200, you'll probably just want one that can put out 800x600 or 1024x768 but if it can do higher that is great.

 

[Crashman]

The Pentium 150 will have MORE THAN ENOUGH speed for web browsing. And any decent PCI video card should be fine. You do NOT need more speed, but make sure he has at least 32MB under Win95 or 64MB under Win98 for opening multiple pages. Because of his vision problems, I'm assuming that 800x600 resolution would be the most he'll use, so look for an old 2MB PCI video card for around $10.

You do not need better video cards for larger monitors, you need them for higher resolution settings. He will not want to use higher resolution because everything on the screen will appear small. Hence, no need for an expensive card.

Cast not thine pearls before the swine

 

[Guest]

Crashman, I think you understood what I wanted. And that's pretty much what I was leaning towards. The unit has 32 meg now but I'm going to go 64 meg minimum so he can have Win98. The P150 is practically a gift so it was hard to turn down.

Thanks to everybody for the immediate responses. This is my first time here and with the responses I imagine I'll be back.

 

[Crashman]

You can get decent performance gains from it by changing the bus speed from 60MHz to 66MHz. Final speed, 166MHz. Total cost, $0.

Cast not thine pearls before the swine