Which DELL computer should I buy?

[johngoodwin]

Hello,

I'm planning to buy a DELL computer and I have two options:

1. Dimension E521

PROCESSOR AMD® Athlon™ 64 X2 Processor 5000+
OPERATING SYSTEM Genuine Windows® XP Professional SP2
...
2. Dimension E520

PROCESSOR Intel® Core® 2 Duo® E6300 Processor (1.86GHz, 1066MHz, 2MB)
OPERATING SYSTEM Genuine Windows® XP Home Edition
...
The systems cost about 950 EUR each.

Which one do you think is best?

Thanks.

To stay on topic, and actually try to help you:

1) Consider the X2, or upgrading the E520 to get XP Pro. In another post you said it was for software development. XP Home will only frustrate you when it comes to setting proper permissions, or if you ever decide you want to run IIS and other development related issues.
2) The short of it is buy the machine you think will do a good job, and can justify/afford. Chances are, either one is much faster than you have, and you won't be sorry about the performance no matter if one is even 20% faster than the other, since both are probably faster than you've got.
3) I've owned both the Athlon 64 3200+, and the E6600. To be honest, if it really matters to the seconds, go have someone benchmark, but I'm not really sorry with either machine.
4) Lastly, if you don't want to build the machine yourself, go ahead and buy it premade. If you have a good relationship with Dell, go for it. Anyone who tells you that it'll only be 2 hours is kidding. When I build my own system, I don't just slap them out, and I carefuly assemble it, find/install drivers, partition my drives, configure my settings, etc. If anything goes wrong before I've backed up the first time, boom, gotta do it over.

I hope this helps,

John

 

[chuckshissle]

Yeah like they said if you can build then you can have a more powerful pc. If not then learn to, we can help.

 

[rodney_ws]

If you're not comfortable building your own system AND are willing to accept paying a slightly higher price, Dell isn't so bad... that said, neither of those rigs will do much with gaming (mainly due to the video card) ... so as long as that's off the table, either of them will serve you just fine. Intel or AMD... take your pick.

 

[Grinch123456]

Ooh, DDR2 533 Ram. Sounds like a real, not-a-bottleneck, eh? Fact being, before the Core 2 Duo, when AMD's prices were enourmous, I made a computer with an AMD 3000+, ATI X800, a gig of DDR400 ram, and an 80 gig hard drive for, that's right, 400 bucks. If we're going by that price/performance ratio, Dell is terrible. "Only" $1100... Try only 800 for a MAN.

The X2 5000+ is essentially a multiplier-locked FX60 with 2x512KB L2 cache. BTW, did you build a complete rig with those specs for $400, or did you just buy those four parts?
Complete rig. Rebates and price matches are incredible. I got an mATX motherboard for 10 (some Nvidia 6150 based chipset), a case for 10 bucks (some EATX Chenming case), an 80 gig for 20 bucks, and a 250 gig harddrive (which I got later)... for 10 bucks. The ram was 50, the CPU 100, and the Video card was 100. That's pretty good if you ask me.

 

[sweetpants]

because they do all this Propiotery format stuff which makes it expensive to replace aprts as you can only buy them from dell therefore they can charge whatever they like

Not if any parts you need replaced are needed within the warranted time. And you always have the ability to purchase a longer hardware warranty and you can also extend that warranty.

As for the system, I would go with the Intel just because I've heard nothing but raves about the new Core 2 Duo.

True you can build your own system, however, some people... a lot of people just don't have the time, know-how to do so. I am actually about to purchase a Dell myself just to use for regular office use, however I do build a lot of my own systems.

 

[quantumsheep]

Ooh, DDR2 533 Ram. Sounds like a real, not-a-bottleneck, eh? Fact being, before the Core 2 Duo, when AMD's prices were enourmous, I made a computer with an AMD 3000+, ATI X800, a gig of DDR400 ram, and an 80 gig hard drive for, that's right, 400 bucks. If we're going by that price/performance ratio, Dell is terrible. "Only" $1100... Try only 800 for a MAN.

The X2 5000+ is essentially a multiplier-locked FX60 with 2x512KB L2 cache. BTW, did you build a complete rig with those specs for $400, or did you just buy those four parts?
Complete rig. Rebates and price matches are incredible. I got an mATX motherboard for 10 (some Nvidia 6150 based chipset), a case for 10 bucks (some EATX Chenming case), an 80 gig for 20 bucks, and a 250 gig harddrive (which I got later)... for 10 bucks. The ram was 50, the CPU 100, and the Video card was 100. That's pretty good if you ask me.

Where the hell did you get all those parts from for those prices?!?!?!

I wana go to that shop!

 

[sweetpants]

that's kind of what I was wondering.

 

[Grinch123456]

Ooh, DDR2 533 Ram. Sounds like a real, not-a-bottleneck, eh? Fact being, before the Core 2 Duo, when AMD's prices were enourmous, I made a computer with an AMD 3000+, ATI X800, a gig of DDR400 ram, and an 80 gig hard drive for, that's right, 400 bucks. If we're going by that price/performance ratio, Dell is terrible. "Only" $1100... Try only 800 for a MAN.

The X2 5000+ is essentially a multiplier-locked FX60 with 2x512KB L2 cache. BTW, did you build a complete rig with those specs for $400, or did you just buy those four parts?
Complete rig. Rebates and price matches are incredible. I got an mATX motherboard for 10 (some Nvidia 6150 based chipset), a case for 10 bucks (some EATX Chenming case), an 80 gig for 20 bucks, and a 250 gig harddrive (which I got later)... for 10 bucks. The ram was 50, the CPU 100, and the Video card was 100. That's pretty good if you ask me.

Where the hell did you get all those parts from for those prices?!?!?!

I wana go to that shop!
There are 2 websites which are your best friends above all else: Fatwallet and Pricegrabber. www.fatwallet.com/forums and www.pricegrabber.com for everything that's not at fatwallet. In Fatwallet, go to hot deal discussion, and start jumping on deals! Just remember though, Circuit City is evil, and doesn't like both PM and MIR, and Coupons.
For example: here: http://www.fatwallet.com/t/18/646879/
That's a free 400 watt Ultra powersupply after MIR. It supports ATX12v and 2.03 specs. Excellent for a media system.

 

[quantumsheep]

Ooh, DDR2 533 Ram. Sounds like a real, not-a-bottleneck, eh? Fact being, before the Core 2 Duo, when AMD's prices were enourmous, I made a computer with an AMD 3000+, ATI X800, a gig of DDR400 ram, and an 80 gig hard drive for, that's right, 400 bucks. If we're going by that price/performance ratio, Dell is terrible. "Only" $1100... Try only 800 for a MAN.

The X2 5000+ is essentially a multiplier-locked FX60 with 2x512KB L2 cache. BTW, did you build a complete rig with those specs for $400, or did you just buy those four parts?
Complete rig. Rebates and price matches are incredible. I got an mATX motherboard for 10 (some Nvidia 6150 based chipset), a case for 10 bucks (some EATX Chenming case), an 80 gig for 20 bucks, and a 250 gig harddrive (which I got later)... for 10 bucks. The ram was 50, the CPU 100, and the Video card was 100. That's pretty good if you ask me.

Where the hell did you get all those parts from for those prices?!?!?!

I wana go to that shop!
There are 2 websites which are your best friends above all else: Fatwallet and Pricegrabber. www.fatwallet.com/forums and www.pricegrabber.com for everything that's not at fatwallet. In Fatwallet, go to hot deal discussion, and start jumping on deals! Just remember though, Circuit City is evil, and doesn't like both PM and MIR, and Coupons.
For example: here: http://www.fatwallet.com/t/18/646879/
That's a free 400 watt Ultra powersupply after MIR. It supports ATX12v and 2.03 specs. Excellent for a media system.

Living in the UK sucks. 7900GT costs around £200 ($340), 7600GT £130 ($200 dollars ish) (found one for £85 on www.overclockers.co.uk though). The pricing here is ridiculous, might have to move to the US of A.

 

[kukito]

Find the post where i spread uncertainty about Intel.

I'm not going to dig through your thousands of FUD posts. Anybody who reads these forums regularly knows about your predictions that Conroe wouldn't be available until November or December because the OEMs would suck them all up. Or that Pentium D inventory would keep Intel from fully stocking Conroe. What you will find is plenty of honest people who will expose your deceptions at every single turn and there's absolutely nothing you can do about it. Get used to it.

 

[Grinch123456]

Ooh, DDR2 533 Ram. Sounds like a real, not-a-bottleneck, eh? Fact being, before the Core 2 Duo, when AMD's prices were enourmous, I made a computer with an AMD 3000+, ATI X800, a gig of DDR400 ram, and an 80 gig hard drive for, that's right, 400 bucks. If we're going by that price/performance ratio, Dell is terrible. "Only" $1100... Try only 800 for a MAN.

The X2 5000+ is essentially a multiplier-locked FX60 with 2x512KB L2 cache. BTW, did you build a complete rig with those specs for $400, or did you just buy those four parts?
Complete rig. Rebates and price matches are incredible. I got an mATX motherboard for 10 (some Nvidia 6150 based chipset), a case for 10 bucks (some EATX Chenming case), an 80 gig for 20 bucks, and a 250 gig harddrive (which I got later)... for 10 bucks. The ram was 50, the CPU 100, and the Video card was 100. That's pretty good if you ask me.

Where the hell did you get all those parts from for those prices?!?!?!

I wana go to that shop!
There are 2 websites which are your best friends above all else: Fatwallet and Pricegrabber. www.fatwallet.com/forums and www.pricegrabber.com for everything that's not at fatwallet. In Fatwallet, go to hot deal discussion, and start jumping on deals! Just remember though, Circuit City is evil, and doesn't like both PM and MIR, and Coupons.
For example: here: http://www.fatwallet.com/t/18/646879/
That's a free 400 watt Ultra powersupply after MIR. It supports ATX12v and 2.03 specs. Excellent for a media system.

Living in the UK sucks. 7900GT costs around £200 ($340), 7600GT £130 ($200 dollars ish) (found one for £85 on www.overclockers.co.uk though). The pricing here is ridiculous, might have to move to the US of A.
Eh, I'd rather live with higher prices and an easier work schedule. Trust me, the USA sucks major league everything. Our freedoms are slowly eroding under Bush's "leadership", abortion is fading away, there are anti-game laws at every turn, and, worst of all, we're hated by just about every other country known to man, and those that don't even exist! We're in all sorts of pointless wars for pointless reasons (Iraq, Vietnam). There were 3 good wars: The Revolutionary War, WWII, and the Star Wars Trilogy. That's it.

 

[quantumsheep]

Ooh, DDR2 533 Ram. Sounds like a real, not-a-bottleneck, eh? Fact being, before the Core 2 Duo, when AMD's prices were enourmous, I made a computer with an AMD 3000+, ATI X800, a gig of DDR400 ram, and an 80 gig hard drive for, that's right, 400 bucks. If we're going by that price/performance ratio, Dell is terrible. "Only" $1100... Try only 800 for a MAN.

The X2 5000+ is essentially a multiplier-locked FX60 with 2x512KB L2 cache. BTW, did you build a complete rig with those specs for $400, or did you just buy those four parts?
Complete rig. Rebates and price matches are incredible. I got an mATX motherboard for 10 (some Nvidia 6150 based chipset), a case for 10 bucks (some EATX Chenming case), an 80 gig for 20 bucks, and a 250 gig harddrive (which I got later)... for 10 bucks. The ram was 50, the CPU 100, and the Video card was 100. That's pretty good if you ask me.

Where the hell did you get all those parts from for those prices?!?!?!

I wana go to that shop!
There are 2 websites which are your best friends above all else: Fatwallet and Pricegrabber. www.fatwallet.com/forums and www.pricegrabber.com for everything that's not at fatwallet. In Fatwallet, go to hot deal discussion, and start jumping on deals! Just remember though, Circuit City is evil, and doesn't like both PM and MIR, and Coupons.
For example: here: http://www.fatwallet.com/t/18/646879/
That's a free 400 watt Ultra powersupply after MIR. It supports ATX12v and 2.03 specs. Excellent for a media system.

Living in the UK sucks. 7900GT costs around £200 ($340), 7600GT £130 ($200 dollars ish) (found one for £85 on www.overclockers.co.uk though). The pricing here is ridiculous, might have to move to the US of A.
Eh, I'd rather live with higher prices and an easier work schedule. Trust me, the USA sucks major league everything. Our freedoms are slowly eroding under Bush's "leadership", abortion is fading away, there are anti-game laws at every turn, and, worst of all, we're hated by just about every other country known to man, and those that don't even exist! We're in all sorts of pointless wars for pointless reasons (Iraq, Vietnam). There were 3 good wars: The Revolutionary War, WWII, and the Star Wars Trilogy. That's it.

You also missed out all the good things about living in the UK! Free healthcare, great social benefits system, very good education, low murder rate (compared to the USA anyway). And many other advantages!

 

[sailer]

Buy neither. I bought a Dell many years ago when it was considered a good computer, and it was. That is no longer true. If you're going to buy a pre-built system and not build it yourself, Cyberpower offers a good package for a lot less money, and they now offer a long warrenty. They also let you customize the computer a lot, offering a wide variety of parts.

 

[Grinch123456]

You also missed out all the good things about living in the UK! Free healthcare, great social benefits system, very good education, low murder rate (compared to the USA anyway). And many other advantages!

You're not helping...
Either way, the summation of this is simple: USA sucks, and Dells suck, because they're overpriced garbage.

 

[spanishfleee]

Ooh, DDR2 533 Ram. Sounds like a real, not-a-bottleneck, eh? Fact being, before the Core 2 Duo, when AMD's prices were enourmous, I made a computer with an AMD 3000+, ATI X800, a gig of DDR400 ram, and an 80 gig hard drive for, that's right, 400 bucks. If we're going by that price/performance ratio, Dell is terrible. "Only" $1100... Try only 800 for a MAN.

The X2 5000+ is essentially a multiplier-locked FX60 with 2x512KB L2 cache. BTW, did you build a complete rig with those specs for $400, or did you just buy those four parts?
Complete rig. Rebates and price matches are incredible. I got an mATX motherboard for 10 (some Nvidia 6150 based chipset), a case for 10 bucks (some EATX Chenming case), an 80 gig for 20 bucks, and a 250 gig harddrive (which I got later)... for 10 bucks. The ram was 50, the CPU 100, and the Video card was 100. That's pretty good if you ask me.

Where the hell did you get all those parts from for those prices?!?!?!

I wana go to that shop!
There are 2 websites which are your best friends above all else: Fatwallet and Pricegrabber. www.fatwallet.com/forums and www.pricegrabber.com for everything that's not at fatwallet. In Fatwallet, go to hot deal discussion, and start jumping on deals! Just remember though, Circuit City is evil, and doesn't like both PM and MIR, and Coupons.
For example: here: http://www.fatwallet.com/t/18/646879/
That's a free 400 watt Ultra powersupply after MIR. It supports ATX12v and 2.03 specs. Excellent for a media system.

Living in the UK sucks. 7900GT costs around £200 ($340), 7600GT £130 ($200 dollars ish) (found one for £85 on www.overclockers.co.uk though). The pricing here is ridiculous, might have to move to the US of A.
Eh, I'd rather live with higher prices and an easier work schedule. Trust me, the USA sucks major league everything. Our freedoms are slowly eroding under Bush's "leadership", abortion is fading away, there are anti-game laws at every turn, and, worst of all, we're hated by just about every other country known to man, and those that don't even exist! We're in all sorts of pointless wars for pointless reasons (Iraq, Vietnam). There were 3 good wars: The Revolutionary War, WWII, and the Star Wars Trilogy. That's it.

You also missed out all the good things about living in the UK! Free healthcare, great social benefits system, very good education, low murder rate (compared to the USA anyway). And many other advantages!
we may hav all of them things in the UK but the health care system sucks cos we gotta wait for ages. Our education systme aint that brilliant as you will see on the news every year they is gettin easier which is good for me as long as they dont make them harder for at least 2 years i'll be fine. anyway back to the topic: Dont buy dell, simple as

 

[Grimmy]

If you really think living in the USA is that bad, then move to another country.

As far as buying a dell, or building your own system, you get what you paid for.

I know at least on person with a dell, for gaming, and it does fine for what he wants it to do. And it runs a eVGA 7950GX2 video card (that he brought later on), on its own 375 watt PSU with no apparent problems. Also his dell uses PD 3.2 ghz cpu.

As with almost anything you buy, eventually the price or worth of what you paid for it goes down or dissappears.

 

[Grinch123456]

If you really think living in the USA is that bad, then move to another country.

As far as buying a dell, or building your own system, you get what you paid for.

I know at least on person with a dell, for gaming, and it does fine for what he wants it to do. And it runs a eVGA 7950GX2 video card (that he brought later on), on its own 375 watt PSU with no apparent problems. Also his dell uses PD 3.2 ghz cpu.

As with almost anything you buy, eventually the price or worth of what you paid for it goes down or dissappears.

I think a Dell system's stability and tech support can be summed up fairly easily, since that is after all what you're paying extra for.
Here: http://consumer.hardocp.com/article.html?art=MTE4MCwxLCxoY29uc3VtZXI=
This is the review of the Dell XPS410 reviews very recently by HardOCP.

 

[Grimmy]

I think a Dell system's stability and tech support can be summed up fairly easily, since that is after all what you're paying extra for.
Here: http://consumer.hardocp.com/article.html?art=MTE4MCwxLCxoY29uc3VtZXI=
This is the review of the Dell XPS410 reviews very recently by HardOCP.

I don't think my friend brought anything special that took over a month to build. He got his system within around 1-2 weeks.

and as a gaming rig from that link:

Gaming Ability – 9/10

Aside from our issues with F.E.A.R., the XPS 410 was a very impressive gaming rig. We had never tested a system with the brand-new 7900GS card before, and we were very impressed with the card’s performance. We were able to run every game in our library (except Oblivion) at 1280x1024 with practically every setting cranked as high as possible, which is totally righteous. Even though Oblivion forced us to dial things down a smidge, we all agreed that the game still looked great.

When you buy a main brand system, it will have its pros and cons. I mean taking it a step further, how many people put together or build their own... MAC machines?

I agree the best PC route (at least for me) is to build my own, but for others who don't know much (or have the desire) I wouldn't mind recommending a Dell or HP system.

I can't really say how bad their support is, when things go wrong. I think just about anything compoent that goes bad, will drive a person crazy when they want it fixed.

 

[jimbo99]

Never buy a Dell. Here are just a few reasons:

1) You get typically a 1 year warranty, unless you pay for more. If you build yourself you can get parts that each have a 3 to 5 year warranty.

2) The connectors from the case to the motherboard for the front panel are almost always proprietary. The way they mount the mobo in the case is unusual. This means that you will need special skills if you ever decide to upgrade that motherboard with something better.

3) The OS you get with it is an OEM copy (not particularly a Dell-only problem), but a Dell problem nonetheless. This means that the OS is tied to that motherboard and you can't swap the mobo and legitimately reuse that license. You can lie to Microsoft, but if you want to be legal and honest you would have to buy another license.

4) The power supplies are almost always under-powered. Not only that they have their power plug in a position which makes it difficult to replace with a better one without some sort of modification to the power supply itself. Have had to modify them myself several times.

5) Dell does everything they can to avoid honoring their warranties. I've had several instances where Dell refused to honor a warranty, and in fact, denied it due to BSODs that seemed to point to driver issues. After long protracted battles with them it was discovered that the CPU was at fault. It took alot of pushing to get them to give us parts to test with.

There are many many other reasons not to buy a Dell. But the first thing to remember is that none of their proprietariness need be there. It is put there to keep you going back to them. They could do a little and alter their designs and the whole thing could be made non-proprietary but they have done their darndest to ensure that you will go back to them for help/support.

I have a customer's machine in here. She had Dell telling her she needed this and that and that all these things were needed to make her computer work when she had virues and bad sectors on her older Dell computer. Basically I'm saying their tech support sucks and this poor older lady could hardly understand their english.

 

[Grimmy]

I have a customer's machine in here. She had Dell telling her she needed this and that and that all these things were needed to make her computer work when she had virues and bad sectors on her older Dell computer. Basically I'm saying their tech support sucks and this poor older lady could hardly understand their english.

:lol:

So would you recommend that she build it herself?

Lucky her, that she knew you to help her out, I hope.

 

[dasickninja]

There are many many other reasons not to buy a Dell. But the first thing to remember is that none of their proprietariness need be there. It is put there to keep you going back to them. They could do a little and alter their designs and the whole thing could be made non-proprietary but they have done their darndest to ensure that you will go back to them for help/support.

Well it is business, so what do you expect? For them to make it easy for you to just go out and upgrade components? And lose money while you do this?
You seem to be forgeting that the people that usually buy a Dell give no care about its proprietariness. They don't care that the motherboard placement is inversed. They don't really want know that in order to install one of their own cards you just have to flip it around. Why? Because they buy it and intend never to look inside it. They just want it to work.
Dell gives you the option of getting the media for XP for $10. Then you can install it until you run out of licenses. Then you can blame Microsoft and not Dell for that.
Dell isn't that unmodifiable. It just takes time and effort, like building a PC. Read up on the internet to find out how to do such. Start by looking in the Dell section of the forums.
If you're so incensed about Dells being so unmodifaible, you don't buy a Dell. You'd be a fool to do so and then complain about its lack of options in this area. Also if you know enough to complain about this, you know enough to build your own machine. If you just want it tto do what you bought it for, you're cool.
Would I buy a Dell? Heck no, but for many people Dell and other biult for you's are a better option.
We tend to forget sometimes people just want to buy something, turn it on, do the work they set out to do, shut it off and forget about it. Not worry about CAS, BIOS settings, chipsets, core temps and such.
Dell, HP, Gateway and the like cater to such a crowd (casue we're the minority).

 

[jimbo99]

Absolutely not.

But I would recommend she not buy Dell. There are other manufacturers out there.

I would also recommend she have me make it for her, if she wanted a new machine.

 

[Grimmy]

Absolutely not.

But I would recommend she not buy Dell. There are other manufacturers out there.

I would also recommend she have me make it for her, if she wanted a new machine.

Well, since she is your customer, I suppose you would want her to come back for any service she would perhaps need if problems arrise. Which is no different then Dell, HP, Mac, Sun, Toshiba or any other PC company.

I dunno, if Dell was that bad at support, shouldn't they be out of buisness?

I really can't believe Dell would be that bad in support for every customer who has problems, like using the CD-Rom drive as a cup holder... :lol:

 

[slim142]

NON OF THEM

unless you have money to spend on a High-end $5000 XPS

 

[bliq]

To follow on from what lots of others have said, don't buy a Dell if you can help it. They're cheap, tacky and plasticy. Plus their support can be pretty lousy too.

Why not a Dell? Some people don't have the time to waste on building a computer (or to learn how to build one). Nor do they want to deal with warranty hassles. And Dells tend to be far quieter than homebrews.

Plus a lot of Dells come bundled with (IMHO) the best line of LCD monitors out there.

There are a lot of good reasons to buy a dell.

Saving a couple bucks isn't always at the top of people's priorities when buying a computer...