Computer Crossroads

tech explorer

tech explorer

New Member
Almost everyone sooner or later has those big decisions to make about computers. Typical questions are, "What kind should I get?", "How much should I budget?", "What if I want a gaming computer?", "Should I keep my current computer while trying to fix it?", "Should I upgrade it in part or upgrade all of it?", etc. (the same would apply to smartphones to a certain extent).

What are or were your computer crossroads? Did you, in retrospect, make good
decisions? Do you have any current plans in connection with your computer crossroads?
 
Crossroads

I had to decide to stop selling computers i was building, esp. on Craigslist, because I was selling them considerably below cost and losing a lot of money. Now I just fiddle around with them, trying to learn more about them each day. I have three of them in operation---ones I have built. I keep upgrading. The cases stay the same.
 
Most of the client work today is going to laptop's and smart-phones of the like. Does anyone disagree that there are less and less desktop repairs needed?
 
tech explorer said:
If this is true, does this mean desktops are more reliable than ever?
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No it means that less and less people are using desktops.

And I disagree with Ambushed's statement. My Dad works as a self employed IT engineer, and I help him service machines sometimes. We get more desktops than laptops needing servicing, but I guess businesses still use a lot of desktops.
 
spirit said:
...We get more desktops than laptops needing servicing...
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Lucky you.I mostly get laptops and lose a lot of time to completely open them lol.Desktops are a lot easier to open and change let's say a graphic card rather than on a laptop.Usually I need to change processors on laptops and I am SO DAMN "lucky" that I need to open them COMPLETELY to change it and then close EVERYTHING all over again lol.What a waste of time lol.And the worst thing is that the money you get is the same lol unless if you charge on how MUCH TIME you spent fixing it.
 
S.T.A.R.S. said:
Lucky you.I mostly get laptops and lose a lot of time to completely open them lol.Desktops are a lot easier to open and change let's say a graphic card rather than on a laptop.Usually I need to change processors on laptops and I am SO DAMN "lucky" that I need to open them COMPLETELY to change it and then close EVERYTHING all over again lol.What a waste of time lol.And the worst thing is that the money you get is the same lol unless if you charge on how MUCH TIME you spent fixing it.
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You remind me of my carpet cleaning days. A certain type of rug was tightly woven and took longer to clean so my company charged extra to clean Berbers.
 
S.T.A.R.S. said:
Lucky you.I mostly get laptops and lose a lot of time to completely open them lol.Desktops are a lot easier to open and change let's say a graphic card rather than on a laptop.Usually I need to change processors on laptops and I am SO DAMN "lucky" that I need to open them COMPLETELY to change it and then close EVERYTHING all over again lol.What a waste of time lol.And the worst thing is that the money you get is the same lol unless if you charge on how MUCH TIME you spent fixing it.
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How many times can you say lol in this short of a post? Well, stars says you can do it 4 times!!!
 
tech explorer said:
If this is true, does this mean desktops are more reliable than ever?
Click to expand...

What goes through your mind to get this conclusion...

If the number of an item being used goes down of course demand for repairs will go down too. It is like having classic cars, even a mass produced car from 50 years ago will be hard to find part for and someone that straight knows what is needed to fix it.

S.T.A.R.S. said:
Lucky you.I mostly get laptops and lose a lot of time to completely open them lol.Desktops are a lot easier to open and change let's say a graphic card rather than on a laptop.Usually I need to change processors on laptops and I am SO DAMN "lucky" that I need to open them COMPLETELY to change it and then close EVERYTHING all over again lol.What a waste of time lol.And the worst thing is that the money you get is the same lol unless if you charge on how MUCH TIME you spent fixing it.
Click to expand...

lol that's COOL STORY lol, thanks for THAT insight lol :rolleyes:


I think I can speak for everyone in this for and make a /thread post right now:


1. Is my computer still fit for purpose? No? Upgrade
2. I have come into some disposable income. Can it be spent to upgrade my computer, even if it does not necessarily need it? Yes? Upgrade.
3. Has a component just died? Yes? Replace and/or upgrade

The majority here already have more than one computer, so they have a backup if their main system dies so will just wait, either for the replacement to arrive, new part to arrive and/or to save money to repair/replace.
 
I like to repair my computer and people's so I'll try to repair it if the cost isn't too much. Recently spent 100€ to repair a laptop I found in thrash (you might have seen some threads about it) and it is working fine now.

There are two types of people, ones that will throw their computers away because they have no knowledge on how to solve the problems and ones that will repair it before buying a new computer (laptop or desktop). Unfortunately (well not for me actually LOL) the first kind are your average joes, therefore more people will throw away their computers instead of trying to repair what sometimes is a small problem...

What's with all the bullying of Stars? Grow up people. Especially coming from a Global Mod... And this isn't the first time this happened.
 
Nah don't worry man.I don't really pay attention wether people like the way I write or not. :D
As long as the "LOL" word is not against the rules,I will use it.:D

So all you "LOL HATERS" if you don't like my LOL words then don't read my posts LOL!

:D:D:D
 
spirit said:
No it means that less and less people are using desktops.

And I disagree with Ambushed's statement. My Dad works as a self employed IT engineer, and I help him service machines sometimes. We get more desktops than laptops needing servicing, but I guess businesses still use a lot of desktops.
Click to expand...

Depends on the context. I work at a University Helpdesk and we get more laptops, by far.
 
spirit said:
No it means that less and less people are using desktops.

And I disagree with Ambushed's statement. My Dad works as a self employed IT engineer, and I help him service machines sometimes. We get more desktops than laptops needing servicing, but I guess businesses still use a lot of desktops.
Click to expand...

Laptops tend to have a shorter lifecycle than desktops; my previous company generally kept laptops for 2-3 years, but desktops could be there for 4-5 years and in some cases far, far longer as specialist machines.
 
I tend to keep my builds until they needed to be upgraded/replaced. For example, I built an AMD X2 3800 system with 2 gigs of memory in 2008-09 and recently I started running out of memory while browsing the net. Haven't figured out that problem so last Nov I built a budget system, Celeron G540 with 4 gigs of memory and upgraded from Vista x86 to Win 7 x64. It went well.

I got the bug for building another system so I bought parts month by month while using the Celeron, better parts by the way and they add up.

Now I'm running an i3-2105 system as you can see in my sig. I had plans to upgrade the CPU but seeing how well it runs I didn't need to. :)
 
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