Are my computers rubbish?

[AC123]

Well I guess they are.

I got some of these https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/FULL-DELL-HP-DUAL-CORE-... a year ago for use in an office.

I went down the cheap route. Got some extra staff starting next week and can probably upgrade what we've got. They seem slow when using our online system/accountancy package. Which bit of them needs improving/what should I get to speed things up?

Cheers

[aaron_2000]

AC123 said:

Well I guess they are.

I got some of these https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/FULL-DELL-HP-DUAL-CORE-... a year ago for use in an office.

I went down the cheap route. Got some extra staff starting next week and can probably upgrade what we've got. They seem slow when using our online system/accountancy package. Which bit of them needs improving/what should I get to speed things up?

Cheers

I've always preferred the ThinkCentre, or better yet a ThinkPad with a dock. Upgrade them to 8GB of RAM for a start. 4GB isn't enough for more than light use anymore IMO

[anonymous-user]

Cant tell with the advert as they don't say which processor .

As they only say "dual core" and nothing more then I'm inclined to guess they have Celeron processors in them with means, yes, they are crap :-(

[LordGrover]

As the 'investment' is on £50 each, I'd bin them and start again - not worth 'upgrading'/adding memory.

[budgie smuggler]

Swapping from spinning disk to SSD and upgrading to 8gb memory are the easy wins. For accounting software that will probably be fine.

[mike9009]

Hi

I would try a cheap SSD in there. The existing HDD is only 120GB, so like-for-like replacement will only be about £20. Might not be the full answer but as a cheap trial on one PC, it would be worth trying.

Mike

[Mr Pointy]

AC123 said:

I got some of these https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/FULL-DELL-HP-DUAL-CORE-... a year ago for use in an office.

I went down the cheap route. Got some extra staff starting next week and can probably upgrade what we've got. They seem slow when using our online system/accountancy package. Which bit of them needs improving/what should I get to speed things up?

Yes, those are dreadful & making your staff use them counts as cruel & unusual punishment.

Don't waste money upgrading them, spend it on better PCs. Look for an i5 processor, 8-16Gb RAM & maybe an SSD (250Gb should be ok). Then you'll have PCs that will cope with most work & your staff will be more efficient.

Full marks for buying used from ebay though as it's an excellent way to save money.

[Sheepshanks]

LordGrover said:

As the 'investment' is on £50 each, I'd bin them and start again - not worth 'upgrading'/adding memory.

Wow - £50 is just ridiculous. Wonder if the Windows licence is legal?

I spent £120 some years ago for a relative on just the tower unit with some level of dual core processor running Windows7, but he later let it upgrade to Windows10 and it became useless.

[budgie smuggler]

Mr Pointy said:

Yes, those are dreadful & making your staff use them counts as cruel & unusual punishment.

Don't waste money upgrading them, spend it on better PCs. Look for an i5 processor, 8-16Gb RAM & maybe an SSD (250Gb should be ok). Then you'll have PCs that will cope with most work & your staff will be more efficient.

Full marks for buying used from ebay though as it's an excellent way to save money.

I'm with Mike, at £25 for a 240gb SSD surely it's a no brainer to simply test it before binning them?

16gb of RAM IMO is massive overkill for normal desktop usage. I'm running a full development system and two VMs in 8GB and it's not swapping.

[bitchstewie]

Not aimed specifically at the OP but I do wonder if employers consider whether paying £50 for a computer and then paying their staff hundreds or thousands of pounds to work slowly because they're using a £50 computer is "money well spent".

[peterperkins]

Sheepshanks said:

Wow - £50 is just ridiculous. Wonder if the Windows licence is legal?

I spent £120 some years ago for a relative on just the tower unit with some level of dual core processor running Windows7, but he later let it upgrade to Windows10 and it became useless.

That's worth it for the pre-installed Windows 10 and drivers. etc

Just clone it to a 500GB SSD and add more RAM and it's probably pretty good.

[anonymous-user]

budgie smuggler said:

Mr Pointy said:

Yes, those are dreadful & making your staff use them counts as cruel & unusual punishment.

Don't waste money upgrading them, spend it on better PCs. Look for an i5 processor, 8-16Gb RAM & maybe an SSD (250Gb should be ok). Then you'll have PCs that will cope with most work & your staff will be more efficient.

Full marks for buying used from ebay though as it's an excellent way to save money.

I'm with Mike, at £25 for a 240gb SSD surely it's a no brainer to simply test it before binning them?

16gb of RAM IMO is massive overkill for normal desktop usage. I'm running a full development system and two VMs in 8GB and it's not swapping.

If they have Celerons then SSDs will only make boot up faster, marginally (and I'm an SSD evangelist). Celerons are so painfully crap I've refused to help people with computer problems with Celerons as the waiting for anything to happen was intollerable :-)

[deckster]

Upgrading to an SSD, putting in more RAM etc. is totally worth it for your personal machine.

It's an absolute waste of time and money when you have a whole load of business machines that just need to work.. Bin the lot of them and buy something that's up to the job next time.

[The_Jackal]

2 words
Polish
Turd

How well do you want your staff to do their jobs?
Just think how much your phone costs. And all you spend is 50 quid on something they use all day.

[Yacht Broker]

Earlier this week I picked up a refurb HP Prodesk 400 G3 SFF with Core i5 6th gen processor, 8gb memory and 256Gb (Samsung) SSD for £200 via eBay. Put a £30 graphics card in to run dual monitors and all set. Got a few of these now and they are great office workhorses for not much cash

[annodomini2]

Penny wise, pound stupid. I.e. you're so focused on the pennies you fail to see the pounds flying out the door.

Buy something reasonable for the job they are doing and buy the upgraded warranty.

Look beyond the bottom line of the machine cost.

E.g. Productivity and downtime.

Newer machines tend to be faster and more reliable.

I work in Engineering and the accountants were always trying to down cost our machines or make us keep them longer.

I ran the numbers with a typical 20% performance improvement on a 2year upgrade cycle, on a machine costing around a £1000, in our business they would pay for themselves in around a month.

The other factor I didn't cover is power efficiency, newer machines tend to be more power efficient so you save on electric too.

Now I'm not saying go and buy them £1000 machines, run the numbers, what jobs do they do that are computer intensive? Where are you going to gain (as a business) from the upgrade?

But given the age of the machines even a new budget machine will offer a performance boost.

Work out what you need and your budget and go from there.

[Zad]

This is like giving your staff a 1973 Escort van for a company car. They must be really motivated!

[AJB88]

SSD them all and throw in at least 8GB ram and will run a lot better.

[The_Jackal]

Zad said:

This is like giving your staff a 1973 Escort van for a company car. They must be really motivated!

This.
Have you actually spoke to your staff and asked them about their experiences using these really slow computers?
Even bringing something up on the web will be slower.

[vaud]

Read carefully the replies on the thread.

You are probably cutting costs in the wrong area.

No need to spend 1000's but a trip to Dell outlet or some newer refurb machines would probably be a good investment for your business for productivity and happier staff. Newer machines are also often more power efficient.