PC died this morning :(

Community Forums/General Help/PC died this morning :(

Stevie G(Posted 2017) [#1]
Had a suspicion it was on it's last legs but thought I'd get my current project done before it fell on it's arse!

I'm looking for any recommendations on any good desktop PC deals in the UK. My budget is around £500-£600. I'm not up to speed with current hardware so would prefer a pre-built machine.

My only stipulations would be:

* Mid sized or smaller base unit
* Windows 7 64bit pre installed
* 8 GB Ram
* Decent Nividia GFX card - with HDMI connectivity to HDTV **
* SSD main drive
* 1TB second drive
* Processor - I3 or higher

** At the moment I have a a GTX8600 which was fine for my purposes.

Any advice would be much appreciated as I'd like to get something organised today.

Many thanks
Stevie


GW(Posted 2017) [#2]
My advice, Check the classifieds. there are often office pc's and servers that are coming off lease and just need a little more ram and can be had for cheap.

In the U.S. we have Craigslist.com, for personal classifieds, and newegg.com that often sell open-box or used office pc's

Often you can find a computer with a good cpu like the i7-5930K or i5-7500 for very cheap. Spend a little bit extra for a water cooler and overclock the hell out of it.


Trinosis(Posted 2017) [#3]
Hi Stevie.

Sorry to hear about your PC troubles.

If your thinking of buying a new system then i recommend CCLOnline.

https://www.cclonline.com/

I've had great service from them in the past.

Whats great is that you can pick and choose the components you want in your PC via their website and they will build and ship the machine to you.

My PC was built this way, although the graphics card wasn't seated correctly when i received the machine, so it would always be wise to take the cover off and check all connections before first running it.


BlitzSupport(Posted 2017) [#4]
I've used CCL in the past, too (for parts), and agree they're decent.


Steve Elliott(Posted 2017) [#5]
Sorry to hear, hope all data is secure.


skidracer(Posted 2017) [#6]
I kind of regret not going for a refurbished older slower clocked I7 in favor of sparkly new I3. Especially now there are good graphics cards that can fit back in small enclosures again.

If I was you Stevie I would consider delaying graphics card purchase and use mother board graphics of new PC until polymanics is published, mother board graphics are a good standard denominator and the thought of a brand spanking new nvidia 1080 could make great carrot / incentive.

There is some wishful thinking that AMD are going to kickstart a new PC performance curve but for now it feels like desktops are flat lining with a quality 5 year old PC with SSD upgrade being only a fraction slower than current generation.


therevills(Posted 2017) [#7]
I'm sorry to hear of you lost :(

My PC is over 8 years old now... and I've been meaning to build/buy a new one for the past couple of years.

Since its so close to the new AMD CPU release I've again been putting it off. (Also the thought of moving years worth of files over puts me off too ;)).


xlsior(Posted 2017) [#8]
Ms recently stopped selling win7 licenses to computer manufacturers, so depending on where you live it may get harder to find one of those.


Xerra(Posted 2017) [#9]
Strange coincidence but mine actually went as well a few days back. I use my Mac primarily, so it's not as huge a loss as it would have been a couple of years back, but I had been tinkering with it recently while playing with Blide again. Now I'm back using Parallels but would be easier to have a proper PC as well, as the Mac is a 2010 model, and doesn't like handling too much going on these days.

Not to mention I just bought a KV switcher so I could just have one mouse in keyboard to use both and the PC died before I even got that out of its box :-(


Hotshot2005(Posted 2017) [#10]
how did the pc died? just wondering because I am not expert on pc but it would be to learn from it.


Stevie G(Posted 2017) [#11]
Thanks folks. Everything is backed up regularly but it turns out I just needed a new power supply :)

Only issue now is that my internet is goosed :( Tried router / modem reset, new cables etc... but 'Internet' light is just red. ADSL, LAN1 and WIFI lights all ok and PC connected ok with ethernet cable so next port of call is the ISP. I'm hoping just a coincidence as it went about same time as power supply.


xlsior(Posted 2017) [#12]
It's possible you had an electric surge that fried both your Psu and the moderm/router


Stevie G(Posted 2017) [#13]
Nah, I have surge protection on everything. All sorted now - was just a router / ISP account password issue :)


RemiD(Posted 2017) [#14]
i also plan to assemble a new desktop computer using the parts i want, and i was surprised to see that the integrated graphics cards in recent low end motherboards have gpu/vram which are better than in medium end / high end laptops, but at a lower price.
(my current laptop is becoming low end these days...)


xlsior(Posted 2017) [#15]
i was surprised to see that the integrated graphics cards in recent low end motherboards have gpu/vram which are better than in medium end / high end laptops, but at a lower price.


That's mostly because it's easy to slap a half-way decent heatsink on a PC motherboard, but there's very little room for such a thing (and venting) in todays thin laptops...
Easiest way to reduce the heat output is to either run at lower speed/voltage, or reduce the number of cores, which both lead to reduced performance.