Computer for University: Which one is better?

So its about time for me to star my back to school shopping. I will be going to university in a near by city (Ottawa) which is a few hours away from my home (Toronto) and one of the items on my list is a computer. I will be living in residence on campus for the first year, I've applied for single dorm room. But I'm a little iffy on taking my stuff there. Well it's not that I am iffy on taking the stuff with me its actually that I have a trust issue. My computer costs over 2 grand and my monitor when I bought it cost almost the same. Honestly I would rather leave my computer at home with my sibling and have them drive it to the ground opposed to me brining it with me and leave for "x" amount of time and come back and its missing.

I've been doing some web browsing on computer systems in the price range I want to spend. Which is $400 with tax included, I have a spare monitor. I know of this small computer shop called ETC Computer and they have reasonable prices. However Future Shop and Best Buy (same company) have back to school sales. The computers are dirt cheap so I was thinking why spend "x" amount of dollars on a incomplete system when I can get a complete system for practically the same amount of money.

So I have narrowed it down to these few systems and I was hoping to get some input on which computer would be the best for my buck.



Emachines Intel Pentium 4 641 3.20GHz Media Center Computer

http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/pro...0086452&catid=

Mfr. Part Number: T5088

Processor Type Intel Pentium 4 641 With Hyper-Thread

Processor Speed 3.20GHz

RAM 512MB DDR2 (Exp. To 2GB)

Hard Drive 160GB SATA (7200RPM)

Optical Drives DVD +/- RW 16X Multi-Format Dual Layer

Graphics Card Intel GMA 950 With 224MB Shared Memory

Available Expansion Bays 1 x 3.5", 1 x 5.25"

Available Expansion Slots 1 x PCI-E x16, 1 x PCI-E x1, 1 x PCI

Cache 2MB L2

Disk Drive No

Fax/Modem 56K ITU V.92

Network Card 10/100Mbps Ethernet LAN (RJ-45 Port)

Other Control Devices Keyboard, 2-Button Wheel Mouse

Preloaded Operating System Windows Vista Home Basic

Sound Card 6-Channel (5.1) High Definition Audio

Speakers Amplified Stereo Speakers, USB Powered

System Bus 800MHz

Warranty 1 Year Parts & Labour

Price $330.00



Value - Intel Pentium 4 LGA775, AGP, DDR Computer from ETC Computer

Intel P4 Processor 641 3.2GHz FSB800 2MB Prescott LGA775 800 MHz bus

512MB DDR400 PC3200 Memory (Major Brand)

ASRock 775i65G Mother Board

Western Digital 160GB 7200RPM 8MB Cache Serial ATA II

LG 18X H54N DVD RW +- Dual Layer Rewriter (beige)

Onboard Video

Onboard Audio

Onboard Network Card

Standard ATX Case 226 (Beige)

450 Watt Power Supply

Windows Vista Home Basic

1 Year Parts & 3 Years Labor Warranty

Price: $440.00

http://www.etccomputer.ca/eShop/defa...&systemid=1244

They are very similar.. top one cause it's cheaper.

Exactly, they are both very similar. Only difference is one's an eMachine so brand name and the other isn't brand name. If I were to delete the operating system on the second one then it would be like 15 dollars cheaper then the first one, but come one 15 bucks and you get Vista installed I think is worth it.

The top one has Vista too.



Anyways IMO Vista is only useful for DX10 and Aero (Come on though.. Solaris has a much cooler GUI).. I don't think you'll be doing any gaming on this so I vote #1, slightly better brandname () and cheaper; What can go wrong?

I don't think anything can go wrong. Like I have a warranty with it, drivers are available off the manufacture website so I can get them. If it is found to be defective I return and get a new one. I won't be playing any games that require a high performance processor or video card. Maybe the occasional online game. Plus with the first one I can even use sd cards and all that crap because it comes with the reader drives and front usb. I don't think I would put Vista Ultimate on it thought, I don't see it running it smoothly. What I could do is make one of those system restore disks.

I know it sounds like it but i wasn't being sarcastic. I was too lazy to reword and left it like that.



Top ones a good choice

Don't worry about it man, I knew what you were getting at

I will choose the first one, but you may need to add some RAM (Only 512MB!?)

And I suggest you could consider Acer Aspire AST180-UD381A as well

first one, emac

I am sorry, I may be a little off with my reasoning, but here is a way to look at it...



I looked at the system you recently bought and it does seem really nice. However, I find it would be sad to have paid 2k for a rig you would barely use in 3 years because after that it would be just an average one instead of a top of the line machine like it is now.



Basicly, I understand your fear for your computer, but using it only 4 months every year is a too little in my eyes, because when you would really want to use it... it would be like if someone stole your great computer. Not sure if I make any sense whatsoever, but well just a little thing to think of.