Getting a new computer

[CanuckSigns]

I consider myself fairly computer savvy, I can operate one very well, but when it comes to building one, I'm pretty lost. I tried building myself a HTPC about 5 years ago and it works, but I took me 5-10 hours of researching components, ordering and assembling. Then there was a few more hours of research to figure out why certain components weren't playing nicely with each other.

That was for a personal machine and I did it in my spare time (before I had kids, now I don't remember what spare time is!) So the time spent wasn't an issue. But for my business, in the 10-15 hours I spent in total, I can be making much more than the sign burst computer costs by producing jobs rather than researching everything I need in a computer, makes more sense to order something that will work out of the box and go back to making signs.

 

[Texas_Signmaker]

I think people are going to two extremes here.... Building your own computer VS buying Signburst... there is the more practical step in the middle.. just buy one at Best Buy or order it from Dell... just make sure the specs are good. Really anything today is going to be better then that 531 you have.

 

[149motorsports]

What does someone think of this one for what I need it for? Ive heard I have to get windows 10 off of it and put windows 8 or 7 on the computer for it to operate.
https://bestblackfriday.com/deal/149614

 

[WildWestDesigns]

What does someone think of this one for what I need it for? Ive heard I have to get windows 10 off of it and put windows 8 or 7 on the computer for it to operate.
https://bestblackfriday.com/deal/149614

No, you don't have to take Windows 10 off and put 8 or 7 on it. You could VM the other OS on there and keep Win 10. Personally, if going to get a new computer and it's going to be on the internet, I would personally would choose to have the latest OS on it (even though I'm not a huge fan of Win 10 at all).

Bare in mind as well, newer hardware (which shouldn't be a problem in this case as box store computers tend to lag behind the latest and greatest in hardware on their pre-built stuff) may not have drivers for Win 7 and/or Win 8. May not be the case, but that's a risk when trying to put a legacy OS on a computer that came with the latest and "greatest". Make sure that the components in that computer have drivers for the legacy OS that you are wanting to put on it.

Now, the one thing that I really don't like is that it's Win 10 Home. There isn't any way to even differ updates on that version of the OS at all. Your the beta tester of the new Windows releases as MS deems them ready to release. That would be a big reason to put something else on the computer.

 

[Texas_Signmaker]

What does someone think of this one for what I need it for? Ive heard I have to get windows 10 off of it and put windows 8 or 7 on the computer for it to operate.
https://bestblackfriday.com/deal/149614

If that fits the budget then go for it....anything is better then your old one. That processor doesn't look all that bad. Plenty of RAM and HDD space. Has onboard graphics which could be a drawback but for $400 you'd see a big increase in speed for what you do.

 

[149motorsports]

Yes it will be connected to the internet. My old dell inspiron 531 has flexi sign cloud version 10. I have the internet up on it playing music, while flexi is open and im cutting vinyl..never an issue. So I figured a new computer could only be better!

Im no computer wiz, so I appreciate everyone's input. Sorta a big purchase for the little guy here

 

[GAC05]

What is "well built"?

You guys are a bunch of nerds
It's a matter of personal preference but I consider this unit "Well Built"

As far as computer hardware use what works best for you. Apple makes nice hardware at a premium price - PC's work good too.

wayne k
guam usa

 

[visual800]

What does someone think of this one for what I need it for? Ive heard I have to get windows 10 off of it and put windows 8 or 7 on the computer for it to operate.
https://bestblackfriday.com/deal/149614

As I stated im still on I5 and that one is a good deal. The one thing I dont like about HP is all that useless junk that comes preloaded on the systems, I would format that whole harddrive and fresh load window 7 on it and then any computer hardware updates it needed and cut microsoft updates off along with their useless firewall. I use Avira Antivirus and malwarebytes with ccleaner to keep mine clean

you can get a copy of OEM windows 7 off ebay very resonable

 

[Texas_Signmaker]

As I stated im still on I5 and that one is a good deal. The one thing I dont like about HP is all that useless junk that comes preloaded on the systems, I would format that whole harddrive and fresh load window 7 on it and then any computer hardware updates it needed and cut microsoft updates off along with their useless firewall. I use Avira Antivirus and malwarebytes with ccleaner to keep mine clean

you can get a copy of OEM windows 7 off ebay very resonable

I can pretty much guarantee you this will NOT work. Almost any computer you buy today will NOT run Windows 7. You might be able to load the O.S. (after fooling around with the BIOS) but once it's time for the infamous driver work, you'll be screwed.

Back dating a new computer to and older OS is not advisable.

 

[WildWestDesigns]

Back dating a new computer to and older OS is not advisable.

This right here ^^^. Even if the computer had drivers for Win 7 (some store bought computers are using older components, so there is a slim hope there, but unless you are wanting to manually check that out, I wouldn't bother), at some point other things that Win 7 supports may become outdated.

Since this is going on the internet, looking up webpages may become an issue as standards change. Certainly using the built in browser, but at some point "your" 3rd party browsers aren't going to support Win 7 either. Official EOL is 2020 for Win 7 (and MS is trying to make sure they don't have an XP debacle (I hated XP, even when it was new, but I digress)), that's not long before I would expect software vendors not to support Win 7 as well. Portable software may not be an issue post Win 7 EOL, but how many here (all my production software now is portable software) actually use portable software as their main software?

If you are going to update, why already put yourself behind the curve? Bare in mind, I'm saying this as not a huge fan of Win 10 either.

If you need the legacy OS, get a stouter computer (resource wise especially) and VM the legacy OS. It would be contained(to a point), don't have to worry about drivers and when your on the internet, won't have to worry about being on there with an essentially legacy OS. I firmly believe in not having a production rig connected to the internet. Some people think that they may not be infected, but may be surprised that they have something and be aware that some malware isn't targeted desktops so much IoT devices (including routers) and using the desktop as a typhoid mary in some instances.

One thing that I would do though OP is if you stick with Win 10, don't do Home, do Pro at bare minimum. At least you can put off updates for a time (without having to resort to 3rd party scripts/programs which bring about their own security issues) and won't have to get them as their released (have a very recent tale of woe for those that got the most recent update right off the bat).

 

[149motorsports]

I talked to SAI and they said to try it on windows 10, it may crash in a few months, but ill just have to restart it. If not, upgrade for $800 to version 12 and it would work fine.

 

[WildWestDesigns]

I talked to SAI and they said to try it on windows 10, it may crash in a few months, but ill just have to restart it. If not, upgrade for $800 to version 12 and it would work fine.

One other thing to try is to run it in compatibility mode and assign a legacy OS to that. It may or may not help, but it wouldn't hurt to try.

 

[kcollinsdesign]

If all you are doing is cutting vinyl, then the computer you have is more than enough. Just use it until it breaks.

For all other computer uses, get a reasonably spec'd modern computer. Probably a laptop so you can carry it back and forth to work.

I have a closet full of used Macs and PCs. I buy a new Mac for general computing every three years or so. For certain businesses, the employees prefer PCs. I have them made up at a local shop. The old ones just stack up, sometimes getting pressed into service as machine specific drivers (I drive my plotter with a 20 year old Mac). I don't give them away anymore because the operating systems and hardware are not optimized for todays needs. You are not doing anybody a favor if you give somebody an old PC that's not updated for the modern internet. And you will end up being their tech guru, and trying to fix things that were the reason you bought a new computer for yourself.

 

[visual800]

I can pretty much guarantee you this will NOT work. Almost any computer you buy today will NOT run Windows 7. You might be able to load the O.S. (after fooling around with the BIOS) but once it's time for the infamous driver work, you'll be screwed.

Back dating a new computer to and older OS is not advisable.

I did not think of that nor did I think that would have been an issue

 

[WildWestDesigns]

I don't give them away anymore because the operating systems and hardware are not optimized for todays needs. You are not doing anybody a favor if you give somebody an old PC that's not updated for the modern internet.

Typically on my older ones, just throw on a very Windows looking version of XFCE and call it a day. At least from computers from the early XP and current versions ('01 to more modern). Your older Macs, that depends on what processor it's running. There are some newer Linux OSs designed for the PowerPC days as well, some aren't.

And you will end up being their tech guru, and trying to fix things that were the reason you bought a new computer for yourself.

I just say, you get what you pay for.

I did not think of that nor did I think that would have been an issue

Oh, drivers are very much a concern. The reason why Window comes out on top on what people use more often is that more drivers are written for it. A lot of the headaches with updates during this great Win 10 era are due to the Win 10 updater "picking" wrong drivers.

Drivers for hardware are what make or break an OS.

Now, buying used from ebay, probably not going to be as much of a concern for a couple more years.

 

[brycesteiner]

Upgrading to a new system won't matter much - if at all. I just talked to SAI about upgrading our RIP software from Flexi 11 Cloud. I had noticed that our Flexi RIP was not utilizing more than one processor for RIPping nor was it 64 bit. Well it turns out after talking with SAI that even their latest version does not RIP with more than one processor nor is it 64 bit.

Here is what I see as our modern dilemma with software: It's written for processors 20 years old for compatibility rather than optimum performance. My quad core i7, 32GB RAM from 2010 is still not being utilized. Why would it be beneficial to upgrade to a new machine, new software? It won't be. In fact, it may have more issues with drivers and new OS. It's probably why the new iPad Pro can process 4k video 3x faster than 90% of computers and it only has 4 or 6GB or RAM and a small amount of energy - It's optimized new code.

Backwards compatibility sucks when 1. It only works halfway, 2. Optimization never happens (just looks at the Adobe software). It's easy for these company to charge subscriptions because it means you are locked into their file type rather truly offering you improved software.

Rant done

 

[kcollinsdesign]

Before you buy a copy of "Unix for Dummies" and start downloading tarballs, just remember that most of what we do (sign graphics) requires relatively little processing power. We're not trying to run Crysis in SSAA. A standard issue computer will do fine.

 

[WildWestDesigns]

Backwards compatibility sucks when 1. It only works halfway, 2. Optimization never happens (just looks at the Adobe software). It's easy for these company to charge subscriptions because it means you are locked into their file type rather truly offering you improved software.

There are pros and cons with software that has legacy code in it. And this goes for OSs as well. This is why Windows (at least for prosumers (which is what most of us on here are)) will never be optimized, because you'll have people that will bitch about their older program not working on their newer OS or in this case of Adobe programs, you'll have people bitch that their 20 yr old Ai files won't open in their CC programs (which is what some complain about with DRAW and not opening older files).

It's also not easy to pull out 30 yr old code from a program. Newer programs like Affinity Designer don't have that issue.

Then, of course, programming in a closed environment, optimization can actually happen quite glacially in terms of speed. There are trade offs to that. I have one commercial program that MSRPs far greater then most other perpetual licenses and it's still 32 bit. Great in other ways though.

Apple and Linux (in a smaller way) are better in part of not having quite a bit of bloat, compared to Windows with legacy code (and if a user needs it, it's easy enough to get it back in there with Linux as it's open source, problem is having the knowledge to get it back in there).

Downside is the transitional "painful" period.

Production environments, that most of us are in, tend to favor a more legacy approach, then a "bleeding edge" one. Unless one is able to be bleeding edge with everything: hardware, software and equipment.

Make no mistake, I do agree for the most part with brycesteiner, I just think that there are trade offs that aren't readily apparent to everyone.

 

[DerbyCitySignGuy]

I consider myself fairly computer savvy, I can operate one very well, but when it comes to building one, I'm pretty lost. I tried building myself a HTPC about 5 years ago and it works, but I took me 5-10 hours of researching components, ordering and assembling. Then there was a few more hours of research to figure out why certain components weren't playing nicely with each other.

That was for a personal machine and I did it in my spare time (before I had kids, now I don't remember what spare time is!) So the time spent wasn't an issue. But for my business, in the 10-15 hours I spent in total, I can be making much more than the sign burst computer costs by producing jobs rather than researching everything I need in a computer, makes more sense to order something that will work out of the box and go back to making signs.

There's a website called PC Part Picker that takes care of most compatibility issues for you. It's a pretty great resource. Nowadays everything is plug and play, so there's no more manual pin setting and jumper connections. Even if you don't know what you're doing or are inexperienced, you're only look at a couple hours (not including software installation).

Also, kids ruin everything, I feel you there! Haha!

 

[brycesteiner]

Before you buy a copy of "Unix for Dummies" and start downloading tarballs, just remember that most of what we do (sign graphics) requires relatively little processing power. We're not trying to run Crysis in SSAA. A standard issue computer will do fine.

I'm not sure what little processing power you are talking about. Our RIP at times will process a file in only a minute and other times for hours on a single job. I'm pretty sure that the computers today, with most applications (some do well like Affinity and Apple), do not take advantage of the technology that has been built in to Windows or MacOS for the last 10-15 years. Waiting 5 minutes for the progress to move from 9% to 10% is not fun when you know it's just because of poor programming and the subscription model of software just enables the companies to keep it the same.