tower dying, what to replace it?

[woolybanana]

Well, after many years buffeting about and faithful use and the odd upgrade, it looks as if my elderly tower is dying- it seems no longer to be sending a signal to the screen.

I would like to replace just the tower bit, not the rest of the kit as it is all fine, and to keep the hard disc drives if possible.

Can anyone suggest whether this is possible and where to get a decent tower cheap with maybe 6 -10giga memory, as well as how to plug in the old disc drives, svp.

Help and ideas much appreciated.

[Mr Coeur de Lion]

Sounds like your graphics card or the graphics controller on the motherboard may be dieing.

Probably the easiest way is to buy a new desktop (or tower), but make sure the new motherboard is able to take IDE hard drives (which I imagine your hard drives are). The new motherboards support the SATA hard drives which are a different connection to the old hard drives. Some motherboards support both the new SATA and the old IDE.

Failing that, you can buy caddies for your old hard drives and connect them up to your new computer via usb. These are very cheap on ebay, a few euros.

[pachapapa]

Make sure MB takes DDR3 for plenty of cheap RAM.

[Bob T]

A friend has just ordered a tower with PSU, AMD processor and 2 gb DDR3 memory. It comes with a SATA hard disk and an IDE plug on the board. Ideal for an upgrade and very upgradeable for €199 in France.

He will use his existing keyboard and screen and will install his copy of windows onto it as the old PC is being moved over to Ubuntu Linux to give it a new lease of life.

[Jay]

[quote user="woolybanana"]

Can anyone suggest whether this is possible and where to get a decent tower cheap with maybe 6 -10giga memory.....

[/quote]

6 to 10 Gig of memory - and cheap - you have no chance. Why would you require such a huge amount of memory?

[woolybanana]

Have a job to do. Could do with less memory though

 

[Bob T]

More than 4 GB of memory then you will have to use a 64 bit OS or the OS won't see more than 4 Gb. I do HD video editing and have never needed more than the 4 Gb that I have on a 64 bit OS.

[Jay]

I can't think of any PC that comes with that amount of memory or software that would need it. Perhaps you are mixing up RAM and hard drive storage? Anyway how about THIS . The HDD is SATA but external IDE cases are dirt cheap and just plug into a USB port - one or two of those would take your old drive(s). You could always upgrade the RAM if and when needed.

[crabtree]

I recently did exactly what you want to do.

This place will build something to your exact requirements, or you can buy one of their off the shelf 'towers'.

They will also send it to France.

Everything will be in English for you, including OS, if you need it.

[Bob T]

[quote user="crabtree"]I recently did exactly what you want to do.

This place will build something to your exact requirements, or you can buy one of their off the shelf 'towers'.

They will also send it to France.

Everything will be in English for you, including OS, if you need it.

[/quote]

Just looked at that site but the €199 system that I could get in France would work out at £188 (€229) plus postage, and have much slower DDR2 RAM rather than DDR3.

Not everything in the UK is cheaper.

[crabtree]

I never said anything about it being cheaper, I was just giving the OP another option!

[Quillan]

You need to make sure the CPU speed, bus speed and memory speed are in 'harmony' with each other. Many people seem to think that by putting, what appears to be, faster memory in their machine it will go faster, this is not the case and can actually make the machine go slower. The more 'bits' the CPU has, like 64 over 32 the more important this becomes. If you use a quality builder he/she should know this and make sure everything is at the right speed. If you have a tower box (in particular a non brand one) and the PSU is OK you can consider buying a motherboard and replace the old. If you buy it with the CPU and memory installed everything will be fine. There are some good deals to had at the moment, some I saw browsing around were £99 with 4gb of memory and integral video and network card.

[woolybanana]

thanks guys, I'll cogitate for a day or so then get the plastic to work.

[woolybanana]

what do you think to this, svp?

http://www.pixmania.com/fr/fr/4904829/art/compaq/presario-cq5325fr.html

[Bob T]

Looks fine but you are paying an extra €100 or so for a French version of Windows.

[woolybanana]

Or there is this:

http://www.rueducommerce.fr/Ordinateurs/PC/PC-de-bureau-Grand-Public/HP/3018072-PC-Compaq-CQ2510FR-Atom-D410-1Go-160Go-Win-XP.htm

[Quillan]

[quote user="Bob T"]Looks fine but you are paying an extra €100 or so for a French version of Windows.
[/quote]

Not really the OEM version costs a manufacturer very little depending on number of machines shipped, your probably looking at £35 for small builders and about £20 per copy for somebody like HP or Dell. Your never find the real figures anywhere as they are negotiated individually.

[AnOther]

If you are hoping to implant your HD straight into another tower and for it to work then you are likely in for a big disappointment. Because of the new (alien) hardware your current Windows installation will throw a complete hissy fit and almost certainly BSOD on switch on after which a clean install will probably be your only option. Do you have original non OEM media to accomplish that ?

Also, if 'many years buffeting about' is meant literally, then mechanical failure is probably not far off and with HD's the cheapest they have ever been it would be short sighted in the extreme to build a high end machine based on such ancient critical core components. The issue of IDE -v- SATA has already been mentioned.

Regarding your link, no ATOM based PC is going to cut the mustard for an application which you think needs 6-10gb of RAM. As far as I can tell the ATOM 410 only supports 4gb of DDR2 RAM anyway and would be like buying a Mini to compete in FI.

I agree with others that very few if any domestic users will ever need

or see benefit from more than 4gb of RAM, what is you want to do that

you imagine you need 6-10gb for or are you just being greedy ?

[crabtree]

[quote user="crabtree"]I recently did exactly what you want to do.

This place will build something to your exact requirements, or you can buy one of their off the shelf 'towers'.

They will also send it to France.

Everything will be in English for you, including OS, if you need it.

[/quote]

I contacted these people direct, and negotiated a price with them. If you know what you want and how much it will cost, I reckon they will build it for you at a better price. At least they did for me.

[quote user="AnOther"]If you are hoping to implant your HD straight into

another tower and for it to work then you are likely in for a big

disappointment. Because of the new (alien) hardware your current Windows

installation will throw a complete hissy fit and almost certainly BSOD

on switch on after which a clean install will probably be your only

option. Do you have original non OEM media to accomplish that ?

Also,

if 'many years buffeting about' is meant literally, then mechanical

failure is probably not far off and with HD's the cheapest they have

ever been it would be short sighted in the extreme to build a high end

machine based on such ancient critical core components. The issue of IDE

-v- SATA has already been mentioned.

Regarding your link, no

ATOM based PC is going to cut the mustard for an application which you

think needs 6-10gb of RAM. As far as I can tell the ATOM 410 only

supports 4gb of DDR2 RAM anyway and would be like buying a Mini to

compete in FI.

I agree with others that very few if any domestic users will ever need

or see benefit from more than 4gb of RAM, what is you want to do that

you imagine you need 6-10gb for or are you just being greedy ?

[/quote]

I recently moved Windows 7 Hard Disk to a new system, used Paragon Hard

Disk Manager, using their P2P adjust OS. Worked perfectly, just needed

to add a couple of new drivers. Highly Recommended.

[AnOther]

I admit that have no personal knowledge or experience or migrating Windows 7, nor Vista for the matter, as I have never tried to do it with either - nor likely would - although it's good to hear that it might not be as fraught a process as it has traditionally been in the past with XP.

[woolybanana]

You chaps know so much that we Bananas will never know. I am very much a driver and not a mechanic with only a vague knowledge of what goes on under the bonnet. 

Thanks guys.

[woolybanana]

I just pulled out the hard drive from the ols tower and it is a Seagate Barracuda 7200.9, which was installed a little while ago when the old one died. From what I can see it is a SATA disc so getting a case and setting it up to run via a USB port seems feasible. Now to find the case and give it a whirl at the end of the week.

 

[woolybanana]

Another thought: the old box has a licence strip for XP stuck on it. Does this have a value? Could I trade it for the box I need in my local computer shop I wonder?

[Albert the InfoGipsy]

I doubt if they still sell XP machines. Even in la France profonde.

[woolybanana]

One can but try Alfred, one can but try