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Original post by TheDefiniteArticle


Practically speaking, uploading to file hosts (e.g. Dropbox/Mega) I get 60-70kbps, 100 on a good day.

As for CPU, money is potentially no object (i.e. I have enough savings to buy any non-supercomputer CPU), but I don't really want to spend an infeasible amount. I don't what 12 cores really means. I know that at the moment running this software, some calculations take a couple of days on a verrrrry basic computer (4GB RAM, intel core i3-3110M processor). Cutting that down to 2-3 hours would be enough; based on what I've read I don't think you can get under ~30 mins on the more complex calcs without spending like £10k.

Thanks for the rest. :smile:

Thanks for the rest.

A note worth making is if you have a problem with upload speed it's likely the ISP. Most people don't give a **** about upload but care a lot about download. I average 12.5Mbps up(speed tested) and about 10-11x that down. I'll get a reasonable speed up but I think that's the top package with virgin. You rarely get anything particularly impressive especially with the ****tier ISPs. Might be worth talking to your ISP about what speed you should be expecting for your area but beyond that id probably consider a new ISP. 40Mbps should be fine. BT does a 38Mbps package. Virgin does a 50Mbps package. Sky is rubbish frankly.

Not sure whether you've considered it but there are a few options for internet. You can get wireless to your desktop, directly connect it with Ethernet or hook up a couple of powerline adapters which allows you to connect your computer using an Ethernet but sends the signal through the house's electrical system. I'd stick with one of the latter two ideally.
(edited 7 years ago)
Hi I'm looking for a new laptop but don't really know where to start. Its going to be my christmas/birthday present so my mum said preferably under £300 but ideally closer to £250. I'm looking for something that will be easily to take to uni so have to be able to be carried on a 35min walk everyday, has quite a high memory (my current laptop has barely none even though everything is saved to usb or one drive), I will mainly be looking to use it for uni work or internet use but I wouldn't mind doing some gaming (though I know this might not be within the price range).
I want to be a pretty goodish make if possible, I have ASUS right now and my last laptop was them and they've both been so bad so wouldn't want that again.

Any laptop ideas welcome x
Original post by beccac94
Hi I'm looking for a new laptop but don't really know where to start. Its going to be my christmas/birthday present so my mum said preferably under £300 but ideally closer to £250. I'm looking for something that will be easily to take to uni so have to be able to be carried on a 35min walk everyday, has quite a high memory (my current laptop has barely none even though everything is saved to usb or one drive), I will mainly be looking to use it for uni work or internet use but I wouldn't mind doing some gaming (though I know this might not be within the price range).
I want to be a pretty goodish make if possible, I have ASUS right now and my last laptop was them and they've both been so bad so wouldn't want that again.

Any laptop ideas welcome x


You are going to need to expand the budget is the simplest way of putting it.

Anything sub £300 is not built to last, and sub £800 you can absolutely forget gaming altogether.

Not having Asus as an option also severely limits choice, as they are literally the market leaders for budget laptops nowadays.

Dell don't have anything worth buying for less than £315 excluding vat, HP are gimmick tablet combo's which are on regular RMA cycles for models below £300.

Acer are just crap below £1000 now.
Original post by iainvg
You are going to need to expand the budget is the simplest way of putting it.

Anything sub £300 is not built to last, and sub £800 you can absolutely forget gaming altogether.

Not having Asus as an option also severely limits choice, as they are literally the market leaders for budget laptops nowadays.

Dell don't have anything worth buying for less than £315 excluding vat, HP are gimmick tablet combo's which are on regular RMA cycles for models below £300.

Acer are just crap below £1000 now.


Oh really? :/ I might need to have a discussion with the mother :')
Original post by beccac94
Oh really? :/ I might need to have a discussion with the mother :')


For what it's worth, I disagree. It depends a lot on what you want to do. If gaming is important to you, and you want to play recent blockbuster titles, yeah, you're going to need a bigger budget. Same if you're doing anything like video editing. However, for your average notes/music/internet purposes, you can easily get something worthwhile on <£300.
Original post by TheDefiniteArticle
For what it's worth, I disagree. It depends a lot on what you want to do. If gaming is important to you, and you want to play recent blockbuster titles, yeah, you're going to need a bigger budget. Same if you're doing anything like video editing. However, for your average notes/music/internet purposes, you can easily get something worthwhile on <£300.


It would be nice but its not vital cause I don't really get that much time to really play games tbh :') I think a laptop which doesn't regularly have black dots running across the top of it or has more than 140Mb would be nice
Original post by beccac94
It would be nice but its not vital cause I don't really get that much time to really play games tbh :') I think a laptop which doesn't regularly have black dots running across the top of it or has more than 140Mb would be nice


Yeah, your standards for a 'good laptop' I suspect are much lower than the previous poster's. Something I would recommend is making sure you get 8GB RAM. I'm not sure how many low-end laptops are still sold with 4GB but at the lower end of the spectrum you will get problems if you're trying to run e.g. a browser with multiple tabs and iTunes or something at the same time. Past that, ask yourself what you want. If you're more serious about gaming, looking to something with dedicated graphics may be worthwhile (but likely will cost >£300), but if you're fine playing games which aren't post-2014(ish) blockbusters, you won't need it. Your CPU speed is unlikely to be a bottleneck that often but if you have budget left over after the HDD space (should be able to get 1TB pretty cheap nowadays) and the RAM, I'd really strongly consider going i5 rather than i3 just because the latter really is a pain in the arse if you change your habits later and end up doing anything computationally intensive. Things like touchscreens are pointless and you won't use them. Same goes for an UHD display.
Original post by TheDefiniteArticle
Yeah, your standards for a 'good laptop' I suspect are much lower than the previous poster's. Something I would recommend is making sure you get 8GB RAM. I'm not sure how many low-end laptops are still sold with 4GB but at the lower end of the spectrum you will get problems if you're trying to run e.g. a browser with multiple tabs and iTunes or something at the same time. Past that, ask yourself what you want. If you're more serious about gaming, looking to something with dedicated graphics may be worthwhile (but likely will cost >£300), but if you're fine playing games which aren't post-2014(ish) blockbusters, you won't need it. Your CPU speed is unlikely to be a bottleneck that often but if you have budget left over after the HDD space (should be able to get 1TB pretty cheap nowadays) and the RAM, I'd really strongly consider going i5 rather than i3 just because the latter really is a pain in the arse if you change your habits later and end up doing anything computationally intensive. Things like touchscreens are pointless and you won't use them. Same goes for an UHD display.


For games you're either looking at laptop for work and a console if you already have a screen you can use, or something at least similarly priced

Posted from TSR Mobile
Original post by TheDefiniteArticle
Yeah, your standards for a 'good laptop' I suspect are much lower than the previous poster's. Something I would recommend is making sure you get 8GB RAM. I'm not sure how many low-end laptops are still sold with 4GB but at the lower end of the spectrum you will get problems if you're trying to run e.g. a browser with multiple tabs and iTunes or something at the same time. Past that, ask yourself what you want. If you're more serious about gaming, looking to something with dedicated graphics may be worthwhile (but likely will cost >£300), but if you're fine playing games which aren't post-2014(ish) blockbusters, you won't need it. Your CPU speed is unlikely to be a bottleneck that often but if you have budget left over after the HDD space (should be able to get 1TB pretty cheap nowadays) and the RAM, I'd really strongly consider going i5 rather than i3 just because the latter really is a pain in the arse if you change your habits later and end up doing anything computationally intensive. Things like touchscreens are pointless and you won't use them. Same goes for an UHD display.


Sub £300 every single machine comes with a maximum of 4GB ram. CPU speed can regularly be a bottleneck, you won't be getting even an i3 at that bracket, as its predominantly populated by Pentium / Celeron chips. Watching Youtube on Chrome will fully saturate the CPU on one of those.
Original post by iainvg
Sub £300 every single machine comes with a maximum of 4GB ram. CPU speed can regularly be a bottleneck, you won't be getting even an i3 at that bracket, as its predominantly populated by Pentium / Celeron chips. Watching Youtube on Chrome will fully saturate the CPU on one of those.


Have low-end laptops got much more expensive lately or something? I got an i3 + 4GB RAM + 1TB HDD for £175 a couple of years ago, would think an equivalent would be cheaper now if anything (and if they do only come with 4GB RAM, it's easy enough to pick up another stick for about £15).
Original post by TheDefiniteArticle
Have low-end laptops got much more expensive lately or something? I got an i3 + 4GB RAM + 1TB HDD for £175 a couple of years ago, would think an equivalent would be cheaper now if anything (and if they do only come with 4GB RAM, it's easy enough to pick up another stick for about £15).


Yes, considerably so. Inflation + the weakening of the pound against other currencies as of late has seen as much as a 30% increase in price on electrical goods. Most laptops sub £300 now have RAM soldered to the mainboard, which means no chance of upgrading it in the future.
Original post by iainvg
Sub £300 every single machine comes with a maximum of 4GB ram. CPU speed can regularly be a bottleneck, you won't be getting even an i3 at that bracket, as its predominantly populated by Pentium / Celeron chips. Watching Youtube on Chrome will fully saturate the CPU on one of those.

Well, that's not quite right because I've been looking at laptops around the £300 mark and been looking at i5s.
Original post by alexs2602
Well, that's not quite right because I've been looking at laptops around the £300 mark and been looking at i5s.


As at work we get them considerably cheaper due to bulk contracts (equating to 45% lower than retail prices), and we can't get i5's below £350 i'm calling BS. Only way it would be possible is on refurb's or 2nd hand.
Original post by iainvg
As at work we get them considerably cheaper due to bulk contracts (equating to 45% lower than retail prices), and we can't get i5's below £350 i'm calling BS. Only way it would be possible is on refurb's or 2nd hand.


£330 -
http://www.laptopsdirect.co.uk/lenovo-b50-50-intel-core-i5-5200u-4gb-128gb-ssd-dvdrw-15.6-inch-windows-10-80s2000buk/version.asp

A couple of weeks ago I saw a HP 250 G4 at £300.


http://www.thetechforum.co.uk/index.php?topic=3860.0

No one in their right minds should be giving Lenovo any money until they sort that out. The claims a few months ago of them having ceased doing that are bogus, we've already had one brand new machine (a model which has only been on the market for 2 months) appear in the office from them with the crapware installed this week alone.

Original post by alexs2602
A couple of weeks ago I saw a HP 250 G4 at £300.


£340 is as cheap as it gets, and even then it's only capable of 1 DDR3L DIMM, memory expandability is limited at best. - https://www.amazon.co.uk/HP-N1A92EA-ABU-Generation-Resolution/dp/B018LRGXGS?SubscriptionId=AKIAID2HUF7VPZYSVYFQ&tag=pcad03-21&linkCode=xm2&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=B018LRGXGS&ascsubtag=-1

Take into account that this part of the discussion is based on a budget of less than £250, and you've effectively added another 30%+ onto the price.
Original post by iainvg
http://www.thetechforum.co.uk/index.php?topic=3860.0

No one in their right minds should be giving Lenovo any money until they sort that out. The claims a few months ago of them having ceased doing that are bogus, we've already had one brand new machine (a model which has only been on the market for 2 months) appear in the office from them with the crapware installed this week alone.



£340 is as cheap as it gets, and even then it's only capable of 1 DDR3L DIMM, memory expandability is limited at best. - https://www.amazon.co.uk/HP-N1A92EA-ABU-Generation-Resolution/dp/B018LRGXGS?SubscriptionId=AKIAID2HUF7VPZYSVYFQ&tag=pcad03-21&linkCode=xm2&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=B018LRGXGS&ascsubtag=-1

Take into account that this part of the discussion is based on a budget of less than £250, and you've effectively added another 30%+ onto the price.


While it doesn't make it being done right, it's not like its hard to get rid of all the crap that almost always cokes with laptops that nobody actually wants.

Posted from TSR Mobile
Original post by Jammy Duel
While it doesn't make it being done right, it's not like its hard to get rid of all the crap that almost always cokes with laptops that nobody actually wants.

Posted from TSR Mobile


Unfortunately that theory doesn't work, one of the bits of malware that Lenovo preinstalls is tied to the BIOS. Unless a general user is competent enough to rewrite that (highly, highly unlikely), you cannot get rid of it. That is why I suggest to avoid Lenovo like the plague. Said piece of malware sends personal information back to Lenovo surreptitiously.
Reply 917
Hi,

I'm looking into buying a new desktop PC.

I will mainly be using the PC for playing games so a decent graphics card is a top priority.

My budget is around £500 (ideally I wouldn't want to go over this and if it's less that's even better!).

Can anyone recommend the best parts for this budget? Will I be able to run most current games?

My desk theme colours are black/red/white so I'd prefer it if the case stuck with these colours i.e. no blue LEDs etc.

My current desktop PC specs are below (recently it died, I suspect it's the PSU and I've ordered a replacement but since I built the PC 5 years ago it's probably due an upgrade by now):

i5 3450 CPU Intel
Radeon Sapphire GPU HD 7800 Series
2 x 4GB RAM
Corsair 600W PSU
Gigabyte Motherboard (forgot the model name, pretty old though)
1TB Hard Drive

This build runs most games like CS:GO + League of Legends (I know these don't take much). It also ran ARK, albeit on the lowest settings.

I actually have an Antec 302 case which I could technically keep and use but if the PC works with the new PSU I've ordered then ideally I'd like to sell the desktop to recoup some cash. I'm not sure whether I could strip the PC and sell the parts individually but that sounds like a lot of hastle i.e. posting out a motherboard doesn't seem like a good idea to me lol.

Are there any decent deals going for a desktop PC that is pre-built? Even though I built my current PC, it took forever and stressed me out no end (I'm surprised it actually worked after the way I handled it).

I would appreciate any help and guidance that anyone has to offer.

Thanks for reading :smile:
Original post by Deanio
Hi,

I'm looking into buying a new desktop PC.

I will mainly be using the PC for playing games so a decent graphics card is a top priority.

My budget is around £500 (ideally I wouldn't want to go over this and if it's less that's even better!).

Can anyone recommend the best parts for this budget? Will I be able to run most current games?

My desk theme colours are black/red/white so I'd prefer it if the case stuck with these colours i.e. no blue LEDs etc.

My current desktop PC specs are below (recently it died, I suspect it's the PSU and I've ordered a replacement but since I built the PC 5 years ago it's probably due an upgrade by now):

i5 3450 CPU Intel
Radeon Sapphire GPU HD 7800 Series
2 x 4GB RAM
Corsair 600W PSU
Gigabyte Motherboard (forgot the model name, pretty old though)
1TB Hard Drive

This build runs most games like CS:GO + League of Legends (I know these don't take much). It also ran ARK, albeit on the lowest settings.

I actually have an Antec 302 case which I could technically keep and use but if the PC works with the new PSU I've ordered then ideally I'd like to sell the desktop to recoup some cash. I'm not sure whether I could strip the PC and sell the parts individually but that sounds like a lot of hastle i.e. posting out a motherboard doesn't seem like a good idea to me lol.

Are there any decent deals going for a desktop PC that is pre-built? Even though I built my current PC, it took forever and stressed me out no end (I'm surprised it actually worked after the way I handled it).

I would appreciate any help and guidance that anyone has to offer.

Thanks for reading :smile:


Do you even really need anything other than a more powerful graphics card? I have an overclocked i5 and 8GB RAM and don't need to go below the max graphics settings for new games yet.

Your budget would buy a whole computer's worth of mostly pre-owned parts that would do that too, so from what I see you just need a PSU and graphics card, I guess a faster processor you can overclock would be nice, depends what'll fit in your motherboard.

Graphics card doesn't even need to be new. Mine is a pre-owned GTX 780 for example, that was about £150 but very underpriced. My 750W top-tier PSU I got new for £80 or something. CPU is a 2500K which I also got pre-owned for £90 or so. And this was a couple of years ago, so cheaper now.
(edited 7 years ago)
Reply 919
Original post by ozzyoscy
Do you even really need anything other than a more powerful graphics card? I have an overclocked i5 and 8GB RAM and don't need to go below the max graphics settings for new games yet.

Your budget would buy a whole computer's worth of mostly pre-owned parts that would do that too, so from what I see you just need a PSU and graphics card, I guess a faster processor you can overclock would be nice, depends what'll fit in your motherboard.

Graphics card doesn't even need to be new. Mine is a pre-owned GTX 780 for example, that was about £150 but very underpriced. My 750W top-tier PSU I got new for £80 or something. CPU is a 2500K which I also got pre-owned for £90 or so. And this was a couple of years ago, so cheaper now.


The new PSU arrived and I found that the PSU wasn't the problem. I took it to a PC repair shop and they tested it out, they diagnosed the problem down to being either the graphics card or the motherboard (with it most likely being the graphics card).

I'm going to risk it and buy a new graphics card as I planned on doing this anyway. Hopefully this will fix the issue (praying that the motherboard works).

Can either of you please recommend the best GPU that will fit my motherboard? It's quite an old board since I bought it 5 years ago so I'm not sure if these newer graphics cards will be compatible.

I'm willing to spend around £200 on a new graphics card, the £400 1070 looks amazing but I'd rather not put that much into a graphics card. I assume a £200 one will run most games on low/medium settings anyway.

Also the GPU must be on Amazon as I plan to order with prime so it arrives tomorrow...

Cheers for the advice, you are both right in saying that building a whole new PC probably isn't worth it - unless of course I find out tomorrow that the motherboard is dead!

This is one that I'm looking at, just not sure if it will be compatible with my motherboard / other PC components. If the graphics card says DDR5 and my RAM isn't DDR5, will they still function together? :s-smilie: Gigabyte Nvidia GTX 1060 WF2 6GB GDDR5 PCI-E It's £240 which is slightly over the budget but if this one works with my components I'll go for it.

Can my 600w corsair power supply run this with everything else? It say's the GPU alone needs 400w :/

UPDATE: Found my motherboard from logging into ebuyer:

1 x Sapphire HD 7850 OC Edition 2GB Dual DVI HDMI DisplayPort PCI-E Graphics Card 390921 Warehouse Shipped Invoice Track £124.99 £124.99
1 x Samsung SH-224BB SATA DVD Write Optical Drive | OEM 397468 Warehouse Shipped Invoice Track £11.65 £11.65
1 x Gigabyte GA-Z77-D3H Socket 1155 VGA DVI HDMI 8 Channel Audio ATX Motherboard 351598 Warehouse Shipped Invoice Track £64.66 £64.66
1 x Antec All Black 302 Three Hundred Two Case 391870 Warehouse Shipped Invoice Track £39.15 £39.15
1 x Intel Core i5 3450 3.1GHz Socket 1155 6MB Cache Retail Boxed Processor 349022 Warehouse Shipped Invoice Track £118.90 £118.90
1 x Tenda Wireless-N300 PCI Adapter 155641 Warehouse Shipped Invoice Track £6.65 £6.65

As you can see I only paid £64 for it 5 years ago, so it must be very basic :biggrin: Hoping it fits the 1060 in though!
(edited 7 years ago)

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