FIx Old PC or Buy New One

Hi..have a six year old micron millinea desktop with 768 ram, 40mb hard drive, that is working great except that my DVD will not read any DVDs (installed after I purchased the PC). I don't have the confidence to install a new DVD drive myself so I would have call the Geek Squad (bad back so would be difficult to take it into the store) and they charge $149 to install new drive plus the cost of the drive. After research on the internet for a new system, I'm wondering if now is the time to buy a new system like a Dell with 4gb ram, etc. for around $1500 (the one I like after searching for a comparable configuration). As for cost, the answer is a no brainer - but would the performance increase in a new system be worth the investment - and is it a good time to upgrade. I do graphics and my system is slow even with an upgraded graphics card installed last year. My knowledge of dual core and other PC "innards" is minimal (near zero) at best so any recommendations or suggestions would be really appreciated. Thanks ....Michelle

 

Hello Michelle,

"worth the investment" only you can answer

I would upgrade, especially given that you "do graphics" where the performance increase will be the most noticable.

I bought a laptop at the beginning of this year (with Vista in mind) for about the same money and very pleased with the performance and a Desktop would out perform my Laptop.

One consideration/decision you have to make besides Hardware is the OS. Dell still offers XP on some of their models. If you get XP, software compatability wouldn't be a worry. I would get XP, Vista can always be upgraded to in the future if there is a compelling reason - your hardware will certainly be ready for Vista. I don't think a compelling reason to run Vista exists now. I got around that by dual booting XP/Vista

 

Yes Dell does offer XP. I think you have to go to the business desktops for that.
I personally would not spend 1500 on a pc when you can get something comperable for half that.