It’s that time and you know it. You have cleaned your hard drive for the umpteenth time, debated about backing up those long neglected files and reformatting it. You have even looked at the sale on those nice shiny new PCs at Best Buy or HHGregg but your pockets are short.
We all know how notoriously unreliable PCs can become after many years of use and abuse, some of us don’t clean as often as we should or backup as often as we should and unless some of us have hundreds upon hundreds of dollars laying around, sometimes buying a brand spanking new computer is out of the question.
With a little bit of know how, some of these tips that I offer can help you get the same results without spending $500 or more dollars to get a new PC and also going thru the headache of breaking it in.
Now, what I have to say about doing these upgrades is for people who are experienced with doing upgrades and not for the faint of heart.
Also, this is good for geeks with good connections…you will see what I mean in a moment.
This past weekend, I finally decided to make the jump to move from Windows XP to Windows 7 since I had an opportunity to test Win 7 on another machine and see that it’s pretty stable and will not make me go insane. I also wanted to hook it up to my 47″ TV and take advantage of streaming Hulu, Fancast, Netflix, Youtube, and so on to my HDTV.
(and please note that my next PC purchase will be a desktop Mac so Windows is getting a stay of execution in my house until then!)
Now to be fair, my desktop is a 3 year old Acer T180 that even after I orginally bought it, I maxed the memory out at 4GB and had a pretty hefty video card (nVidia GeForce 7950 GT OC) on board. But the original hard drive, a 1/4 GB Maxtor was failing so I already had stuff backed up on my external drive. So, before you begin doing any upgrades consider the age of your computer. One thing to consider is, if your processor is not at least a duo-core (Think: any PC older than 4 to 5 years)you may not want to do all of the upgrades listed below.
This step (as with many others throughout) is purely optional but this is where your ‘old is new’ step should probably begin. If your hard drive is showing some wear and tear, buy a new one. My honest recommendation is to get a low capacity drive, because me personally, I don’t install/store anything on my main drive anymore. I have learned my lesson that once your main drive fails and takes eveything with it…HAVE A BACK UP! Therefore, I install/store everything on my external drive and let my main drive run the OS. So, to me, buying a 1TB drive is almost a waste if I don’t plan on using it so a small drive for me was the answer. If you are considering using the old drive, or can’t swing for an external, a full reformat as opposed to just upgrading your OS is in order as it can clear out some of the ‘gunk’ that is slowing down your PC so again, back up your old files and also keep a list of software that you want to reinstall handy.
There are a few alternatives for those that don’t have external storage (and in this day and age, why don’t you?). For one, you can partition your hard drive and should something happen to the section that stores the main OS like a virus or a Trojan and you are storing stuff on your secondary partition, you may be able to recover it, however if that drive gets physically damaged, call it a day and kiss it goodbye. Then there is cloud storage and your miles may vary with that technique.
Back to the matter at hand. For under $100 dollars you can get anything from a 320GB hard drive to a 1TB drive (Tigerdirect.com and newegg.com also has some great deals too) and have tons of storage and just be aware that you may have to spend a little extra for SATA cables if your PC only supports that drive.
Now the one thing that is critical before you even consider slapping on Windows 7 is how much memory does your computer have? Check the minimum requirements and then see if your motherboard can handle it. If not, Windows 7 is out…but still doesn’t rule out you installing XP, and XP still isn’t a bad OS and with SP3 out it’s at it’s most stable version…just be forewarned that XP support by Microsoft has dwindled so if you still have to run XP, it’s close to time for you to get a new PC. if your computer can handle the minimum to run Windows 7, go ABOVE the minimum or make plans to do so in the near future.
Make sure that your video card can handle running your new OS but more on this later.
Now, install the hard drive and install the OS. What? You don’t have any OS disks laying around? You lose geek cred for saying that! Stop reading now! Most computer geeks I know have at least 2 copies of OSes laying around just for this situation but if not…get your butt down to the nearest store and spend your money for one! If you plan on making the move to Windows 7, it can cost anywhere from $89 to $200 to do so and keep in mind that if you are just upgrading from XP make sure you back up EVERYTHING as Win7 completely erases XP before it installs and whatever you forgot about, you will lose. If you plan on installing XP and don’t have an OS disk, you can look around online or check at the next PC show that’s in your area but you will not find XP or Vista at retail anymore.
Ok, next, you just had the funnest (yes, bad Ingrish) 2 hours of your life going through that install and updating, Windows 7 took well is running fine so, now what? I wanted to hook my PC up to my HDTV. But did I have the right materials to do so? Well, yes I did! Remember that GeForce card I told you about earlier? It has HDMI capability due to the dual DVI out connectors on the back and also of course me being a geek, I had extra HDMI cables and DVI adapters laying around from another experiment I tried a few months ago (hooking my Macbook to the TV…hehehe) For those of you geeks that don’t have these cables laying around, you can get them retail starting around $40 to $200 bucks depending on brand and length (oh, did I mention that it’s probably a wise idea to move your desktop PC close to your TV?) and online of course can be found for cheap. And it always helps that before you make this purchase that your HDTV accepts HDMI inputs. Some of you are looking at me like,”… but Aitch, of course mine does!!!” NOT ALWAYS! Some of the older model big boxy HDTVs (one or 2 of you reading this still have one!) that were available before the current day flat TV only had a DVI connection. Heck, I know a few people who still only have VGA inputs on the back of their outdated TVs! Main point of this is check your TV before you get the cables!
Now, as a bit of a sidenote, I am a gamer, so the brilliant idea of me hooking my PC to my HDTV also included me getting some gaming in. This step is PURELY optional and really depends on how satisfied you are with the performance of your PC’s video card and HDTV hookup but with mine, I wasn’t 100% happy and was looking forward running my games at (or as close to) full tilt on the large screen.
I stumbled across this chart (
http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/) that allows you to do a comparison of video cards that are currently on the market and using this chart, I noted a steal that Best Buy had in their store, the nVidia GeForce 9800 GT going for $125. (Again, if you want to go online, it’s cheaper but if you want instant gratification, go to the store!) So after trying a few games Sunday with the old video card and then yesterday with this new one, it was a HUGE difference, some of my old games like Neverwinter Nights 2 and The Witcher look as good if not better than my PS3 and Xbox 360 games! Even Dragon Age showed a remarkable improvement over the 360 version…too bad I can’t find my savegames! (why are you looking at me funny because I have both gaming systems…you’re a geek, don’t you have them too? So judgemental!) Next up to try out will be Company of Heroes!
Another quick note: A lot of the video cards at Best Buy are really crap cards and that chart REALLY came in handy and although the GeForce 9800 GT card is a nearly 2 year old card, it’s the best card you can get in the sub $150 range…don’t even think about getting the Geforce 9500, 8800 or the Gefore 210…you are asking for hurt! Also it won’t hurt to check out the power supply running your PC as most of the newer video cards require that you have AT LEAST 500 watts of power running your machine.
Keep in mind that this step of adding a new video card is purely optional! If you aren’t into heavy gaming, you don’t need to! Also don’t forget to get audio cables!! That is almost not an option!
Last item up for discussion is how to enjoy your ‘old is new’ PC from the comfort of your couch or recliner or stack of crates that you sit upon.
This is the easiest upgrade of them all. Just buy a wireless keyboard and mouse set wich can cost between $40 to $89 bucks and make sure that it has a range of at least 20′ from the PC.
Once you hook that up, you are off to the races!
Just to review, let’s list the items that you may want to purchase:
Memory - $40 and up
Hard Drive – $45 dollars and up
External Drive – $65 and up
Operating System – $89 and up
Video Card – $79 and up
DVI to HDMI Cables – $30 and up
Wireless keyboard – $39 and up
So, on the really cheap, if you got everything, you can upgrade your computer for less than $400 dollars just remember, you always get what you pay for! Just remember that results are not the same for everyone and not everyone needs to get everything listed. Check and see what you have onboard before you upgrade and determine if the cost of upgrading is worth it. Check around your house and see if you may already have these items and even ask some of your geeky friends for stuff they may not be using. (BTW I am selling my old GeForce card that I took out fo r $50 bucks if you want it!) My estimate is if you are looking at spending over $500 dollars just to do upgrades on an older board, that money can probably be better spent buying a new motherboard and building it or just buying a new one.
Just be aware of the risks of doing any upgrades and when you don’t know, bring in a 2nd person to help!
I know, it doesn't make any sense.
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