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CPU usage.

Dieselman said:
Also when was the last time you carried out hard drive maintenance?

Clean out all unused fies, then perform scandisk, then defragment.

At least that way you know the HDD is ok and working at it's best.
Click to expand...

I clean the hard drive regularly.
I ran a disk defrag yesterday and it said I didn't need to defrag.
I have someone coming out this afternoon to have a look.
He is talking about upgrading the system, as it's not a huge one ATM.
It's a 2.80 ghz, 80gb, 256 mb.
I'll see what he says and how much it will cost, then decide if it's worth it, or just buy another system.
Thanks to all for your input and help so far though.
Greatly appreciated.:rock:
 
I'd solve any issues prior to upgrading anything.

The RAM is hindering that spec, that's all, assunming you a few GBs of free disk space.

Stick a Gig of RAM in there and it should perform ok.
 
Afraid not.
The engineer came out and condemned it.
He said it would not be an economical repair.
The hard drive is on the way out and he was surprised that it is still working.:crazy:
So, went onto the DELL site, entered a promotional code he gave me and ordered a new one on buy now, pay whenever.

He helped me with the spec I need for what I use it for.:rock:
 
No doubt a new PC will resolve the problem, however I have to now bite my tongue........
 
GrahamC230K said:
No doubt a new PC will resolve the problem, however I have to now bite my tongue........
Click to expand...

How much would a new hard drive and an upgrade be then?

I got this for £350:

PROCESSOR AMD® Athlon™ 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 5000+
OPERATING SYSTEM Genuine Windows Vista™ Home Premium - English
HARDWARE SUPPORT Collect & Return, 1 Year Service only
MONITOR Dell™ 19" Value Flat Panel (SE197FP) - UK/Irish
MEMORY 2048MB 533MHz Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM [2x1024]
HARD DRIVE 250GB (7200rpm) Serial ATA Hard Drive with 8MB DataBurst™ cache
GRAPHICS CARD Integrated nVidia® GeForce® 6150 LE graphics
OPTICAL DRIVE 16 X DVD +/- RW Drive
KEYBOARD Dell™ Entry Quietkey USB Keyboard - UK/Irish (QWERTY)
MOUSE Dell 2 Button USB Scroll Optical Mouse - Black
Accessories
SOUND SOFTWARE Integrated 7.1 Channel High Definition Audio
SPEAKERS No Speakers
FLOPPY/MEDIA DRIVES 13-in-1 Media Card Reader
MODEMS No Modem
SECURITY SOFTWARE McAfee® Security Centre™ 8.0 - 15 Month Protection - English
MICROSOFT SOFTWARE Microsoft® Works 8.0 - English
Also included with your system
Gedis Bundle Reference List D06C16 Dimension C521
Shipping Documents C521 English Documentation with UK Power Cord
Order Information Dimension Order - UK
Standard Warranty Collect & Return, 1 Year Service only
Dell Internet Order Dell Internet Order.
Promotions Hidden Option Class Memory - Upgrade to 2048MB
Promotions Hidden Option Class Free Upgrade - 160GB SATA - 250GB SATA
SYSTEM MEDIA Dimension Resource DVD for Vista (Diagnostics & Drivers)
 
GrahamC230K said:
I bought a 250GB disk for about £35 last week.
Click to expand...


:eek: :eek:

Maybe I should have sent it in the post to you then;)

The one I am getting though is plus VAT, but I get that back anyway.

Bearing in mind the age of this one, I thought new was the best way to go.
 
Last edited:
But take heart, I'm sure you'll appreciate the 2gb RAM, decent processor and reasonable graphics, and the Dell monitors are pretty good IMO.
 
good choice , would be too easy to pour cash into an old pc and be back at square 1 soon.

Now , batter a new hard drive into that machine and reinstall windows and hang onto it till christmas and flog it :)
 
The new one will be so fast you'll laugh out loud.

Amazing what you can get for the money now - I've still got an old Gateway P3 800MHz desktop that hasn't been turned on for several years and that cost £1500. I just can't bear to throw away something that cost so much.
 
Rory said:
The new one will be so fast you'll laugh out loud.

Amazing what you can get for the money now - I've still got an old Gateway P3 800MHz desktop that hasn't been turned on for several years and that cost £1500. I just can't bear to throw away something that cost so much.
Click to expand...

problem is its only worth about 50quid 2 day, thats depreciation for you
 
jpskiller said:
problem is its only worth about 50quid 2 day, thats depreciation for you
Click to expand...
I doubt it's even worth that.

I sold its predecessor, a Gateway P5-90, which cost well over £2K, through our local free-sheet for a nominal amount. I got call after call from people who'd never had a computer and wanted me to set them up on the Internet etc. The guy that eventually bought it didn't say anything until he was leaving and then said he was hoping it would be OK for running voice-recognition software!! :eek:
 
GRAV888 said:
How much would a new hard drive and an upgrade be then?

I got this for £350:

PROCESSOR AMD® Athlon™ 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 5000+
OPERATING SYSTEM Genuine Windows Vista™ Home Premium - English
HARDWARE SUPPORT Collect & Return, 1 Year Service only
MONITOR Dell™ 19" Value Flat Panel (SE197FP) - UK/Irish
MEMORY 2048MB 533MHz Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM [2x1024]
HARD DRIVE 250GB (7200rpm) Serial ATA Hard Drive with 8MB DataBurst™ cache
GRAPHICS CARD Integrated nVidia® GeForce® 6150 LE graphics
OPTICAL DRIVE 16 X DVD +/- RW Drive
KEYBOARD Dell™ Entry Quietkey USB Keyboard - UK/Irish (QWERTY)
MOUSE Dell 2 Button USB Scroll Optical Mouse - Black
Accessories
SOUND SOFTWARE Integrated 7.1 Channel High Definition Audio
SPEAKERS No Speakers
FLOPPY/MEDIA DRIVES 13-in-1 Media Card Reader
MODEMS No Modem
SECURITY SOFTWARE McAfee® Security Centre™ 8.0 - 15 Month Protection - English
MICROSOFT SOFTWARE Microsoft® Works 8.0 - English
Also included with your system
Gedis Bundle Reference List D06C16 Dimension C521
Shipping Documents C521 English Documentation with UK Power Cord
Order Information Dimension Order - UK
Standard Warranty Collect & Return, 1 Year Service only
Dell Internet Order Dell Internet Order.
Promotions Hidden Option Class Memory - Upgrade to 2048MB
Promotions Hidden Option Class Free Upgrade - 160GB SATA - 250GB SATA
SYSTEM MEDIA Dimension Resource DVD for Vista (Diagnostics & Drivers)
Click to expand...

As long as you don't plan on playing games on it (due to the lack of proper graphics capability) it doesn't look like too bad a spec. I'd advise you to ditch the McAfee though.
 
If you don't run games and only want Office, internet, etc, pretty much any old PC will suffice.

I have an old IBM X21 laptop that has a P2 600 processor and 384mb of (non DDR) RAM. It runs Win 2000 and is absolutely fine.
 
Download this and let it do the business. Free 30 day trial.

http://www.iolo.com/sm/7/

Despite being a cheapskate I bought it in the end. Made a big difference, some very useful tools in there present in eeeeejit friendly form
 
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