What is your main computer?

[GreyGeek]

I'm seeing fewer and fewer desktops, which are getting older and older. It got me wondering what the breakdown was.

[Snowhog]

Re: What is your main computer?

I haven't owned a desktop PC in over ten years - maybe longer. This is my second laptop, my first being a Sony VAIO 14". While I don't casually travel with my laptop, I do take it with me 'on occasion', and when I travel to see my father in California. I like that if I want to I 'can take it with me' which one can't (easily) do with a desktop.

[wizard10000]

Re: What is your main computer?

I dunno - I use the desktop PC when I need big horsepower, like for rendering video. My netbook gets the most use, though.

[Adrian]

Re: What is your main computer?

I built my desktop, I couldn't have build a laptop, also have a netbook but that's not my main computer.

[kyonides]

Re: What is your main computer?

Since I don't travel too much I use my desktop PC the most.

[Detonate]

Re: What is your main computer?

I use a home built desktop as my main computer mainly because I need to be able to mount hard drives from infected windows machines to clean them up and repair them. I have adapters to mount IDE drives to my sata machine directly and by USB. USB is very slow when trying to do a chkdsk or a virus scan. Being able to actually mount the drive directly solves this problem. I only use my laptop when traveling. Maybe when USB 3 becomes the norm, I may get a newer laptop and use it more.

[sithlord48]

Re: What is your main computer?

my main computer that i use is a Desktop that i built about a 1 1/2 years ago. its got

an Asus M4A79 Deluxe Motherboard
Phenom IIx4 940 Be @ 3.0 ghz (i have no need to over clock it atm)
ATI HD 4830 512 Mb pci-e card
4GB ddr2 @ 1067mhz
500 GB hd (80 / 2 swap , rest /home)

[MoonRise]

Re: What is your main computer?

You see my sig! The DT is about 3/4 years now and the laptop replaced my 6 year old laptop about 5/6 months ago.

[rfakhrai]

Re: What is your main computer?

My main computer is a desktop I built almost 6 years ago.

3.2GHz P4 still running strong, 1G ram, 2-IDE HDDs, Nvidia FX5200. I'm on a college student's budget and I see no reason to upgrade to the latest and greatest. Hey, that's why we're running linux right? Low overhead.

My father works for Intel and he gets a free chip every year. If I can get some money saved up, I'll be eyeing an i7 rig

[wizard10000]

Re: What is your main computer?

Bragging, but I'm currently rendering all six Star Wars movies to DVD format at the same time.

I heart my i7

[Qqmike]

Re: What is your main computer?

I built my two desktop PCs. I do not use a laptop or smart phone.

I use the old PC 7x24 (which has Kubuntu 8.04.3 installed, dual boot old GRUB w/XP).
I seldom turn on the new PC (which has Kubuntu 9.10 installed w/GRUB2).
(I boot into XP once every 2-3 months only to do all the horrendous security/software updates.)

It is my intent to continue building and using desktops only, but the future will tell. I wonder to what extent are the answers to usage-type strongly a function of one's age?

Old PC, built 11/2005: My main machine
Intel 915GAVL 915G LGA775 motherboard
CPU Intel P4 530J 3 GHz 800 MHz FSB 1 MB L2 Cache
Crucial 1 GB memory kit
Two HDDs: Seagate 160 GB S-ATA NCQ 7200 8MB Cache
Sony DVD Writer

New PC, built 4/2009: Never use it; it's my "back-up PC" in case my Old Trusty fails.
Intel BOXDG33FBC LGA 775 Intel G33 ATX motherboard
CPU Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 Wolfdale 3.0GHz 6MB L2 Cache LGA 775 65W Dual-Core
Crucial 4GB memory kit 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel
One HDD: Seagate 320 GB SATA
SAMSUNG DVD Writer

[dibl]

Re: What is your main computer?

My trusty home-built tower with Intel's hottest chip from 2006, overclocked to 3.4GHz, and a monster Samsung SyncMaster CRT, turns 4 years old this month, and my thoughts are now turning to Intel i7s.

(Yes, wizard, that is very, very cool!)

I also have a Toshiba NB205 netbook, and just last weekend I installed a 40GB SSD in it and had some fun learning about "partition alignment" and the various versions of Linux "fdisk" that one encounters, and their little anomalies when it comes to writing cylinder-head-sector partition tables. :P Now it flies with Debian Sid on it, and it is a great travelling accessory, but I can still type 3X faster on my Microsoft Comfort Curve keyboard on the desk. My hands just don't love tiny keyboards. With database data entry and writing being my main productivity tasks, I don't see how tiny devices with tiny screens and tiny keyboards will ever replace a manly desktop computer.

[arochester]

Re: What is your main computer?

I recently got a “new” computer! A Dell Vostro A100. I got it on ebay as a barebones for £26. I bought 2Gb of memory (the max) for £20.00. I used a 120 Gb laptop hard drive that I had lying around. Got brackets for £3.

It's just an Atom. My first SATA. It can run 64-bit, but it is just single core. (Not sure that I undersand that...)

Bought a keyboard at a local charity shop for £2. Mouse someone gave me. Bought webcam for the huge price of £9.99. I have always used charity shop digital cameras for this, until now. A flat-screen monitor for £10 from a charity shop. OK it has a thin red line down the screen but it's usable.

I've got 3 Dell C400 laptops. Pentium 3s. Two work, one to fix. The best on cost £32.

I have a mountain of old bits and pieces. Need a clear out...

[woodsmoke]

Re: What is your main computer?

Hi
I have two desktops that run regularly one for work and the other a game machine. Both are homebuilt. I go for Asus boards NVIDIA 6000 series cards, although the latest work machine is an AMD dual core 64.

Two lappys one an old Toshiba that is exclusively Linux the other a Sony Vaio that is a dual boot with Vista and about ten boot loaders that don't go anywhere! lol

I used to build from junque a lot of computers to donate with a Linux, but laptops are so cheap that I don't do that so much any more, and with the netbook, it will probably be less and less.

But, the one really important thing for me about a desktop is that I need the old MS ergonomic keyboard, which won't probably happen on a lappy any time soon! lol

woodsmoke

[GreyGeek]

Re: What is your main computer?

I bought that old MS ergonomic keyboard when it first came it out. I found that it really impeded my productivity because I was switching between it (on my PC) and a regular keyboard used at work. My fingers were getting confused because of the change in hand positions. It's gathering dust now.