From: "Adam Flinton" 


"Geo."  wrote in message news:3df92891{at}w3.nls.net...
> "Adam Flinton"  wrote in message
> news:3df85cb0$1{at}w3.nls.net...
>
> > Yup but (a) how many are replacements not new buys?
>
> If I'm buying a new computer isn't that a new buy? I mean by your
reasoning
> nobody buys new cars but new drivers?
>

Replacements are replacements.
WRT new drivers...mostly yes. The car market is a mature one. People can
acquire more than one obviously but if they replace car A with a new car
it's a replacement.

>
> > & (b) the nice thing wrt
> > to a std PC bought now (e.g. a 2ghz cpu + 256-1024 mb RAM + 80+ gb of
hdd
> > space) is that it can be used for multiple tasks so one can do all that.
>
> Right, except we don't watch video on the server, the kids watch one thing
> in their room, my wife and I watch another thing in the living room, the
> other kid is in his room listening to music... It's one more computer than
> TVs.
>

Nah you just need "Dumb edutainment terminals" 

> > I think digital film will boost hdd sales but once most people have 512+
> mb
> > of RAm that will do em for quite some time (as will a 2Ghz+ CPU).
>
> No way. It takes 3 hours to reduce 2 hours of video to divx5 avi file.
> (45minutes of video is roughly 300mb in divx5 format at a resolution that
is
> crystal clear in full screen mode on a computer) then when you play it you
> suck up more cpu so it's one machine to handle server services, and one to
> play each thing being watched and one more if you are recording off the
TV.
> Oh and you better have 100Mb network because 11mb wireless is barely
enough
> for 1 stream and email.
>

How often do you do that? It takes a video 1.5 hours to video a 1.5 hours
long film. While it's doing that you can't play any tapes on it.....fine so
have 2 or have the ability for it to take 4 hours to convert to dvix5 while
still being able to get on with other things.

> > Upgrade -yes buy new? E.g. what is the cost of a Mobo + chip + fitting?
>
> Upgrade as in buy new yes. If you have a 2 year old computer you need new
> motherboard (for the bios to handle large drives), new cpu, new memory,
new
> power supply, new fans, hell the only thing you don't need is a case and
> keyboard..
>

I've never upgraded the PSU. The only time I've bought new boxes like that
is when AT went to ATX. I tend to (in no particular order) add mem....then
change CPU then add a new & larger hdd & then maybe a new keyboard
or mouse....& then maybe a new monitor etc.

The box I'm writing this on used to be a P266 Pentium 2 with 64 mb ram
& (I think) an 8GB disk. Now it's a PIII 667 + 512MB ram & 80 GB
disk. Same box, same PSU same monitor.

Adam

--- BBBS/NT v4.01 Flag-4