Archived from groups: alt.comp.hardware.pc-homebuilt (
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For a basic system any name brand is ok. I recently read a rave review
about e-machines! What you get is what you pay for. If you build it
yourself you get a better box, but that's because you put in your time. If
you're not going to launch missils I think it's smarter to get a cheap name
brand one because they come with a warranty, they work right out of the box,
and the only time you put in is going to get it and plugging it in.
You can always upgrade it with more memory, better video, decent burner,
etc., if the need arises.
I bought a used Compaq Armada laptop at a computer show 5 years ago, running
win98, to use for email, internet, word, and excel. It hasn't missed a beat
in all that time and still gives good performance. It has a celeron CPU
running somewhere around 400 Mhz. You really don't need a lot of juice for
basic computer tasks. It's wifi carded to my linksys router, and with
comcast broadband there's not much difference between it and much newer,
faster, more expensive machines in terms of what happens at the keyboard.
But then again, I'm patient, and waiting a few seconds doesn't bother me.