We went round and round with this after a windows PC died, ended up with a used iMac modded with an SSD, never looked back. Wires all gone, does what we need, power to spare and everyone loves it, more importantly.
On the windows side, several colleagues have Lenovo and HP stuff at home, they are pleased if you need a windows machine and seem very reliable.
If youāre considering buying second hand, make sure the hardware AND operating system are 64bit.
Some software will not run 32bit.
Where did you get it?
How the heck do you do stuff on an iMac?
Like save or open a file, or delete characters in front of the cursor, etc?
All the family found it intuitive after an hour or so, never looked back, we used āweb search provider of your choiceā āMac Repair Bristol Laptop Repair Bristol Aapex ITā Save / open a file is the same, ctrl click, list of options, bin, open, āopen with allā easy.
Like save or open a file, or delete characters in front of the cursor, etc?
Fn, function key and the delete (back space key)
I am no fanboy but since the swap and me working in Germany with family in UK, its been rock solid, no printer issues, drivers donāt even seem to be a topic in the mac world. No freezes, blue screens, green screens. I know PCs can be the same but not so solid IME.
Also the remote machine sharing is brilliant too, sure this is similar on Windows, but couldnāt be easier when someone in the family says ācan you take a look at thisā quick and easy.
Good luck
I can thoroughly recommend the HP computers well made and good backup if needed.
I currently use a HP Desktop with a B&O sound card wired out to M-Audio AV42 monitor speakers and to be honest the sound at times is better and more engaging than the main HIFI set up downstairs!
The main issue with A-brand PCās from Lenovo, HP etc is that usually they are more focused on business applications, and not so much on for instance gaming. So if this computer is going to be used to play games such as Fortnite, this would have to be a point of attention. For gaming the quality of the video card is the most important part of the computer.
As around 95% of PC components are generic and sourced from the same few places (and I include Apple in that) all youāre really buying with a name PC is a guarantee and different levels of customer service. With a second hand PC thereās unlikely time be a reliability issue but youāre forgoing the guarantee for a local relationship.
Yes, Iām struggling to check whether some of the PCs Iām considering have the 2 criteria in bold type:
Fortnite: Recommended Requirements
CPU: Core i5 2.8GHz.
RAM: 8GB RAM.
HDD: 16GB Free Space.
GPU: Nvidia GeForce GTX 660 / AMD Radeon HD 7870 or equivalent video card with dedicated memory of 2GB or higher VRAM.
OS: Windows 7, 8.1, or Windows 10 64-bit.
DirectX: Version 11 or better.
The answer is probably that I need to find something that looks like it fits the bill and then call the supplier to confirm the details.
My daughter gave me her old 2014 mac book pro (intel i5 processor). I tried the mac os and I could not get used to it. And was slow to boot compared to my i5 Windows machine. So I installed Windows 10 using Bootcamp. Great mac hardware now running Windows like a champ. Being able to install and run windows is what impressed me the most about the machine! I can boot to mac os too if I want to spend more time with it.
If the model number of the video card is not listed with the PC specifications, then you can usually be certain that it will only be a generic card that would underperform in gaming. When the model number is listed, a quick Google search will usually bring up itās specifications. The amount of memory is a good indication, 2GB (or more) memory generally means that it was intended to be used for gaming.
DirectX 11 is a 3D rendering standard that was introduced about 5-7 years ago, so you can expect all modern cards to support this. These are the cards from Nvidia and AMD that support it:
Generally speaking any DirectX 11 compatible card with 2GB or more memory should be capable to play Fortnite without problems.
yep
And PS, perhaps a silly suggestion, but it could also be a totally reasonable option to consider a basic and affordable business desktop/laptop for serious work, plus a Playstation 4 to play Fortnite and other games. The PS4 is currently for sale from around 300GBP, and for another 250-300 it should be no problem to find a basic midrange (or refurbished) business machine. The 100GBP Raspberry Pi keyboard computer that @robert_h mentioned could perhaps also be an interesting option for this, you would only have to add a monitor.
I built my own PC about 5 years ago. I selected the components based on what Scan computers where supplying described as a basic gamer PC. (Presuming they know which components work well together). The GPU is part of the CPU, you donāt need a dedicated graphics card
Their current spec. is shown below. The Ryzen 3 is Ā£506 ex Display.
Lots of opinions here. I provide several thousand PCs per year for clients, so hereās my 2p worth.
Get a SSD, absolutely no way should you use a standard hard drive as the performance difference is simply huge. I say again, get a SSD, its the biggest single item of important hardware. Windows 10 does a lot of disk and file scanning, as does a lot of antivirus software, this literally kills PCs with standard disks.
A 10th Gen i5 processor is a quad core and ideal for most things and you need at least 8GB of memory. Other than that it hardly matters unless you want to play games or do video / graphics work, in which case you need to double the budget and look seriously at graphics cards.
When it arrives uninstall all the trial software and avoid loading the machine up with junk and kids games, it should then serve you well.
Phil
Thanks - good advice.
What do you mean by ātrial SWā?
I used a company called pcspecialist (I wonāt post a link in case) for my last office PC. I wanted a mini-PC to sit on the desk and they will custom build you whatever you want. I went for an i5 with, at the time, a 1TB HD and 8GB RAM. Itās been on 24/7 on my office desk for 5 years now. In that time Iāve added some more RAM and swapped to an SSD. The only thing thatās gone wrong is the CD drive died but a new one was something like thirty quid and a quick fix.
Iāve just been on their site and they can do a very nice i5 mini-PC for c. Ā£600 inc. a good monitor,
Hi Jim, most PCs will come with a 30 or 90 day trial of things like antivirus, clean up, driver checks, security this and that etc. I suggest dumping the lot and then either installing a mainstream free antivirus only or in fact the built in Microsoft Windows Defender is actually pretty good these days and you wonāt go far wrong just using that. If you remove other AV software then Windows Defender becomes active again.
When you install any new software chose the ācustomā install option and de-select any of the extras manufacturers try to drop in. They are all trial or light versions or helpers to save you having to open things manually and all will slow the PC down in some way, these little extras are just not needed and over time will kill your PC performance.
Regards
Phil
Thanks Phil.
On my existing PCs, is there any way retrospectively to get rid of those types of trial or light versions of apps that are slowing those PCs down?
Hi Jim, in Control Panel you can go to Programs and Features, from there most can be removed. Some plugins are not so simple but thatās a great place to start. Thereās likely loads in there and some you may not be sure about, just do a bit of Google research to find out what things are before you remove them. Phil
Hi, Mac Finder is also a very god source for S/H Macs, used them myself & also a couple of clients used them, no probs.
Just search for Mac Finder dot co dot uk
