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Originally Posted by TheVinylRipper /img/forum/go_quote.gif
As I said, the case was quite old so yes, I started with a slug.
I am speaking of upgrading a years old box today, not starting with a new one and then upgrading in the future.
I'm not sure how you can really significantly improve the performance of a box without upgrading the mobo, in my experience just upgrading the processor doesn't really do all that much since so many of the limitations on processing bandwidth have to do with things other than the processor.
I really don't know much at all about Macs other than those who use them seem to like them. As far as I'm concerned if someone likes a given machine then more power to them.
Discussions about various machines and OS'es so often seem to degenerate into flamewars that rival the Crusades for sheer intensity. I'm glad to see that isn't happening here.
I wouldn't touch Vista with a ten foot pole, BTW. I still have box sitting on the floor here in my computer room that runs Win98 and can still do useful work if you stick to websurfing, word processing and that sort of thing.
My wife ran a business entirely on the same 386/25 box running Win3.1 for almost ten years with nary a hiccup. The machine never went down once.
But then, after the business apps were loaded, the box was left alone to do its job and nothing more was added. Where I and lot of other people get in trouble is constantly adding new apps which often don't get along with their neighbors.
I'm pretty well resigned to doing a reinstall about every nine months or so, but it's entirely my own fault because I love to fiddle with the thing.
I *have* learned to burn an image of a fresh basic install with all my most used apps and keep that as a backup.
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I'm also glad that the old wars are not surfacing here.
If you have time to upgrade a several years old box, often you are just keeping the case and drives. The M/B needs changing for the new CPU, which then doesent accept the old Ram, and then the Video card has an old slot etc.
I'm also a fan of old computers, I have here an old iMac DV G3 400Mhz
I bought it used a few years ago. It dates from Oct 99. It has been upgraded to an internal 120Gb Hd and 1 Gig of RAM.
It runs the latest Mac OS X.4.10. When the 120Gb drive filled up, I just pluged in a Firewire external 250Gb, cloned the internal drive and boot from that. I use a FireWire Pioneer 8X8 DVDR on it which is also bootable.
Upgrading the OS has been a no brainer. It started with OS 8.6 then 9 then 9.5 then 10.3 then 10.4. Each time I just put in the install disc clicked upgrade and it just "worked like magic". I have never reinstalled this system, in fact it is on 24/7. The only reboots are for software installs. So this machine often has several months of up-time.
This is the real advantage of the same company making the software and the hardware. Drivers, schmizers, Apple sold the box so they know which drivers to put on the upgrade disc.
This is not a fast machine but is useful almost 8 years after it was sold. I use it as a download machine and music server, print server, web browsing etc.
I think this is why Macs hold their value. Try and upgrade the HD and Ram on a Win 98 machine and run Vista!
This out of the box experience is worth it for me. I could spend a few hours upgrading an old PC, but I'd be better off just working a few hours, at what I'm good at, and buying a Mac. After all the people at Apple are better at building PC's than I am.
There is a lot of hype about marketing PC's and a side by side comparison of "Bullet" features only gives half the picture. The "Bullet" feature that I go for is the "It just works" which is a hallmark of Apple. The support is also a class leader, and for me this is a big positive.
We seem to have similar outlook on using computers, I'm just glad that we have the choice of using Win, Mac, Linux or whatever. At the end of the day it's just "horses for courses".
There are places for both platforms, but the Mac is not really a DIY solution. If you want to upgrade it, you are usually better off just selling it, they are easy to sell, and buying a new one with all the advantages of Applecare ect.
Peace.
