Whilst I sit here recovering in hospital, (covid), I have time on my hands to think about bits and pieces, I'll also have recovery time when I get home.
Our desk top is quite a few years old now and we've talked about a new one.
Question is, do we replace with a desktop or go with a large laptop.
Reason for asking is that we have a proper study for it so would like to retain the room/facility.
We have smart phones etc that get used for most things but sometimes a desk top is easier for certain tasks.
Don't do gaming or anything like that, so just after a decent spec PC/laptop with a decent size screen.
Also would like to replace our ancient printer as well.
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Hi Steve,
Hope you are recovering well. I have recently bought a couple of HP Elitedesk G800s, just out of curiosity. They are the gen1
version and are tiny, about the size of a paperback and are brilliant. There are later generation ones which perform even better, they take up no space, Might be worth a look as conventional desktop machines are full of unused space.
Finally off the oxygen today, so heading in the right direction hopefully, but I know it's a long recovery when I get home.
I know all things electronic etc are getting smaller and better, and for mobile devices that's fine, iphone and Samsung tablet sort that for me.
Sometimes it's nice to sit in front of a decent size screen, ( age thing maybe ), and do some work etc
Mostly gets used for our ebay work and document writing etc hence why we'd like a modern printer as well, and, as I mentioned, we have a purpose built study anyway.
Sent from my SM-T590 using TZ-UK mobile appOriginally Posted by notnowkato
Hi, the correct description should be HP Elitedesk 800 G3 or 4 or 5. Here is the sort of thing https://support.hp.com/gb-en/document/c06045012 . How long have you been in hospital, that must have been very worrying ?
Glad to hear that your on the mend!
If you only want if for office, eBay and web surfing then the previous suggestion or something like a intel nuc would also do.
That said so would a 13” mid range laptop which you could easily add a external screen to and cover desktop at home and any travel duty’s
I haven't heard much about Windows 11 but it sounds like a good idea to make sure any new Windows machine is (or will be) compatible.
Been in hospital for 10 days so far, tried to recover at home after testing positive and feeling shite, finally after a week I knew it was serious, so my partner drove me to the covid ward.
Ended up quite Ill and was on cpap mask, basically pumps air into your lungs to make them work, ( that’s frightening).
Then gradually reduce the amount, lots of steroids etc etc
I had both jabs and have been very very careful, so it shows it can hit you at any point.
Would you believe there’s so many people in here that haven’t had their jabs, ( and they’re not all youngsters ).
I will certainly look at life differently from now on.
The wife and I have migrated from Windows to Apple and its the best thing we have ever done computer wise. Laptops and Iphones all interconnected providing a seamless transfer of information. Also once the penny drops, it's a piece of cake to use.
Hope you're recovering well.
We recently ditched our old desktop for a refurbed Thinkpad (T460).
It does everything we need.
It's pretty much indestructible (great for kids to use).
It's easily upgradable from a storage and RAM standpoint.
It was dirt cheap.
That's what I would recommend unless you have some seriously meaty programmes to run on it.
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Bad news on the illness but great news on the recovery. Hope all continues in the right direction.
In terms of a pc I can't recommend pc specialists highly enough. Super knowledgeable and will help you whichever you decide. Personally I like a desktop for serious stuff, phone for everything else.
Hope you're doing well mate.
Some good suggestions on here, personally if I had the space (which I do), I would always go for desktop.
There are more chances of it being more future proof and lasting longer, as well as being easier to open up and change/upgrade bits as required.
Probably will go desktop, as we have the room and also have other devices to use away from the desktop.
Are there any particular makes to avoid, or even lean towards, printer wise,what would be a decent standard make, mainly black and white printing but odd colour page sometimes required
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I just went back to a desktop computer after 15 years of laptops. The new m1 iMac is hands down the best computer I’ve owned, and no cable clutter. Also looks like a piece of art.
Hey Steve, so sorry to hear of your Covid situation after getting both vaccine innoculations. That's scary! I hope your recovery continues rapidly and completely.
I've primarily used a desktop ever since the IBM PC was introduced 40 years ago. Seems to me that a better and more reliable computer can be framed within a large box, rather than squeezed into a tiny, tight space. A desktop doesn't need to be lightweight, so the "best" components can be utilized and be well-ventilated. Full disclosure: I travel with my little Samsung ChromeBook and Samsung Galaxy Note 20 Ultra 5G.
Desktop- more power for your money, more easily upgraded or customised, more ergonomic.
Laptop- portable, but limited by battery life.
Another vote for PC Specialist.
Sorry to hear you had a nasty call with the virus, hope it’s going well now.
+1 here for an I-Mac. Had one for a few years now and I’m never going back to anything using Windows. The Retina display is pin sharp and the startup is lightning fast. I found it easy to use and it looks great as well.
Started out with nothing. Still have most of it left.
I'll second the M1 recommendation (though mine is a MacBook Air). Phenomenally quick. Only frustration for me is the inability to get Excel at the moment ("Numbers" is c**p)
Numbers has always been total poo. Always will be. I use Google sheets instead.
Luckily I don’t need Excel privately - picked a PC over a Mac as my work computer solely because of how crap the Mac version is. Despite how utter crap PC laptops are.
But why can’t you run Excel?
Years ago I sold Macs b2b and nearly everyone who needed Excel in a professional capacity ran the windows version in a virtual machine via Parallels and bought a copy of Windows separately. It'll never not be junk.
Interesting (perhaps only for me) a while ago I used to have to manipulate a reasonably large excel spreadsheet for work and when I worked on it from home on my Mac it was significantly slower and would crash with with little warning.
I should have looked at parallels or a vm really.
Apologies to the OP for derailing the thread with my Excel issue, but if I may ask what the best solution is to work with Excel on my Mac M1? Unfamiliar with Parallels and Sheets. Thanks
Excuse my ignorance but never had or used mac computers before, always stuck to good old windows stuff etc
What are they like to get on with, work around etc
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Based on my 4 weeks of experience after a lifetime of MS Windows, it’s extremely well built, amazingly fast processing, great screen, and massive battery life.
Using the track pad with two and three finger shortcuts is brilliant, and finding my way around is getting easier - it isn’t as different as I had feared.
I use a Windows PC all day with work and have no problem flitting between the two - though miss the trackpad shortcuts. Apologies if some of this is irrelevant for your preferred PC over laptop.
If an Apple phone user, then there are further benefits through linking them.
Although relatively expensive, Apple are renowned for their build quality and residual value.
I do like that iMac, and although we live in an old cottage type house with exposed stone walls in the study, I think that would contrast rather nicely sat on the desk.
Now to decide screen size and spec, and colour of course.
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Good to hear that they're not the monsters to get on with that you sometimes hear, and yes, having been used to iphones/iPads I suppose that could be a bonusSent from my SM-T590 using TZ-UK mobile app
Not to teach you to suck eggs but it’s not massively different when I moved over around 8 years ago everything I wanted to do but couldn’t work out was only a Google away, I can’t recall not being able to work anything out.
I’d assume the Mac version of excel unless you’ve tried it and have issues, are you a ‘power’ excell user or just general use?
I'll take any advice/help that's forthcoming.
At present we save docs/pics etc on the computer and every now and then download onto an external hard drive in case of crashes/viruses etc, ( probably old school but it works for us ).
Moving forward, probably iMac, would this be easy enough to connect and view if neededSent from my SM-T590 using TZ-UK mobile app
Yep super easy, if you have a existing office 365 with the apps you can just download the Mac versions.
If not then most find the free Mac apps pages (word), numbers (excel) & keynote (PowerPoint) suffice and will open the existing documents.
Regarding backups get a additional external drive or even a cheep nas and use the built in backup app time machine it will keep hourly snapshots of you docs/photos etc without you doing anything once setup and just take manual copy’s on your existing drive for belt and braces
How do/did, people find the keyboard switch, obviously I've been used to the bigger standard version, sausage fingers don't help either.
Is the mac a standard size keyboard or can you get bigger versions?
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I hope you store that external hard drive in a physically separate location. Otherwise there are a whole host of possible events (theft/fire/flood/etc) which could mean that you could irretrievably lose all of your documents and pictures.
All of my data (including photographs, music and documents) is backed up onto three separate external drives, at least one of which is always in a separate location. You can pick up a 5Tb drive for well under £100 these days, so there's no excuse for not doing it.
(Cloud backup is another option, but I'm personally not a fan. Apart from the - significant - privacy implications, you are effective trusting your data to be stored on somebody else's computer. There have been enough high-profile failures for that to concern me.)
Was also very sorry to hear about your Covid experiences. It's worrying that despite being double-jabbed and being careful it still hospitalised you. A salutary lesson for the rest of us. Hope that your recovery is speedy and complete.
Believe it or not its kept in a safe, proper old vintage safe that I restored a few years ago, so hopefully secure enough.
Now just thinking of screen size, 24/27"?
Yes, it is worrying that even double jabbed it will still get you, but they are doing wonderful things now to reduce the severity of its effects once you're in hospital.
Talking to the nurses/doctors here you can tell it's totally different to the first wave.
Still frightening though.Sent from my SM-T590 using TZ-UK mobile app
At the moment only the 24” is the new m1 cpu, the 27” is an older intel chip and I couldn’t recommend buying one now.
If you need a larger screen you’ll need to either wait or buy a Mac mini or MacBook Air and external display in the size you want.
Also the internal memory and ssd can’t be upgraded so consider if you want to upgrade at purchase, 16gb / 512gb is not unreasonable depending on the amount of data you have today.
I’d suggest the mid range 8-core CPU, 8-core GPU model as the lower spec doesn’t have a Ethernet port and less usb connectivity.
You can upgrade to a full size Apple keyboard with a number pad for £30 and I found the transfer painless.
Thank you for that info/advice.Sent from my SM-T590 using TZ-UK mobile app
If OP has Windows PC I'd stick with Windows TBH. Have Mac Mini but never got on with it and wasn't worth learning something different. Tried Parallels etc but not guaranteed 100% compatible with Windows software, especially USB devices etc.
Have iPhone and no problem using that alongside Windows. Mail/Calendar on iPhone integrates well with Outlook on PC, can view and edit (though not easy on any phone) Word/Excel documents too.
Always had a desktop but this year bought a 13" DELL XPS laptop, not cheap but top spec and should have done years ago. Have an external GPU I can use along with large monitor if required.
Couldn't agree more. For what you need to do a Mac would be massive overkill, more money than you need to spend and unfamiliar.
Sometimes Mac owners are akin to Scientology members!
The Mac version (Numbers) is pants. I use Excel all day at work and only use it at home for a couple of tasks (domestic finances and for a charity I’m treasurer of). Not a power user. I don’t want to sign up for anything that requires a subscription and cloud storage.
Unless it’s a fire-proof safe then I’m afraid the contents wouldn’t survive a house fire.
Cloud photo storage can be bought for a couple of pounds per month. We already have Amazon Prime so I threw our thousands of images and videos onto that. It automatically syncs daily with my phone so any snaps I take are on the cloud same day.
I love the daily notifications I get that show me images from this date in years gone by
I suppose it depends what you want it for. I mainly use it for web surfing, social media, occasional writing of letters and essays, photo storage, website editing, e-mails and probably not much else. Does what I need and pretty simple to use really.
What I don't do is keep having to find ways to fix stuff thats not working and playing computers. I just use it and it works. Starts up really quick as well. And the 4k retina screen is just the dogs.
I can see why people are scared of them, some things are very different to Windows, but if I can use one I'm sure most people could. Thing is you have to forget Windows and not say 'oh thats not like Windows' all the time, just accept they're different. Having said that it's still just clicking on stuff and typing!
The first two sentences there remind me of some watches I own.....and a car........and other 'stuff'!
And I put my hand up for the Scientology bit
Started out with nothing. Still have most of it left.
What you've just described is the experience I've had with my desktop pc for the past 6 years. This notion that you can't have a stress free experience with a Windows PC is just not true.
Hey if it works for you that's great. Just my experience with Windows over the years that's all.
Started out with nothing. Still have most of it left.
Well I wish you good luck then…
I’ve had more issues with windows updates than macOS updates so would disagree
I know the imac route is probably way over the top for my/our needs, but as has been said, do we ever only buy to suit our needs.
I've got watches in the safe that hardly ever see the light of day but were purchased because I like them and rarity value, I just tend to stick to a daily wearer and maybe on a special occasion take one from the safe.
After what I've just been through recently, and still recovering from, my attitude is, if I want it and can afford it, I'm going to have it, and enjoy it, believe me it opens your eyes being in a covid ward and being asked if your next of kin details are correct, just before putting you in one of those cpap masks.
I'll carry on looking at imacs and still appreciate feedback/advice on these, but I'm still open to other suggestions.
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If it's interesting there are more Mac's being released this year, maybe even a 27 inch iMac. I wouldn't buy before the September event personally.
You have the right idea. My mum's saying for this is "you'll be a long time dead".
I have the iMac Retina 4K 21.5-inch, with the 3.1 GHz Quad-Core Intel Core i5. Nearly bought the 27-inch but decided the 21.5 inch was plenty big enough for my needs. The 27 inchers must be great for looking at photos etc though!
Started out with nothing. Still have most of it left.
Hope you feel better soon Steve.
I would just buy it-you won't regret it and will be up and running in a few days. We've used Macs at home for years, and the kids all have macbook airs for studies. I personally just find them so much slicker than anything windows based.
If you like photos ( I do) then try and get the largest you can afford would be my advice.
Sorry to hear you have been unwell-must be really frightening but hopefully onwards and upwards now.
Oh no, just when I thought the 24" would suffice.
I thought the 24" imac only came out this year in it's current spec/form.
People have said about overkill/cost etc but looking around at windows PC's you can quite easily pay similar money, if not more, for what looks like a similar spec set up.
Anyone had any good/bad experience with printers and apple computers, or basically do they just do what they're supposed to.Sent from my SM-T590 using TZ-UK mobile app
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