Should I buy the HP Pavilion A250Y BTO ?

[rvman8]

Does anyone have any advice? What are the pitfalls I might encounter?

It seems to have:
512M PC2700 DDR RAM - 4 slots, 2 used
3 PCI Slots
80G Hard Drive (5400)
16X DVD Drive
48X CDRW Drive
On-board intel@Extreme 2 Video
On-board Integrated 5.1 Sound (whatever that is)
2 USB
Keyboard - scroller mouse
Windows XP HOME Edition
Corel Word Perfect

NO PRINTER
NO FLOPPY DISK DRIVE
NO MONITOR
NO SPEAKERS

And - what does 'BTO' stand for?

 

[Amethyst]

Does anyone have any advice? What are the pitfalls I might encounter?

It seems to have:
512M PC2700 DDR RAM - 4 slots, 2 used
3 PCI Slots
80G Hard Drive (5400)
16X DVD Drive
48X CDRW Drive
On-board intel@Extreme 2 Video
On-board Integrated 5.1 Sound (whatever that is)
2 USB
Keyboard - scroller mouse
Windows XP HOME Edition
Corel Word Perfect

NO PRINTER
NO FLOPPY DISK DRIVE
NO MONITOR
NO SPEAKERS

And - what does 'BTO' stand for?

usually 'Buy to Own' unless I'm mistaken...

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correspondence to the group so that all may benefit. Thank you.

 

[S.Heenan]

Does anyone have any advice? What are the pitfalls I might encounter?

It seems to have:
512M PC2700 DDR RAM - 4 slots, 2 used
3 PCI Slots
80G Hard Drive (5400)
16X DVD Drive
48X CDRW Drive
On-board intel@Extreme 2 Video
On-board Integrated 5.1 Sound (whatever that is)
2 USB
Keyboard - scroller mouse
Windows XP HOME Edition
Corel Word Perfect

NO PRINTER
NO FLOPPY DISK DRIVE
NO MONITOR
NO SPEAKERS

And - what does 'BTO' stand for?

Rather than buy this HP, you might want to find a small local shop to build
one from base parts for you. The hardware used in the HP is not very good
compared to choosing your own. For instance: the 80GB hard drive of 5400RPM.
Not a huge thing, but most drives sold in systems are 7200 RPM. Video card:
a $45US Asus or similar video card will outperform built-in video.Where did
you get those specs from ? Pricing ?

 

[Adrian]

And the processor it uses is what? I think BTO is Buy To Own, rather than
lease, or hire. The only parts I don't like from that system are the
slowish HDD, the onboard video which wouldn't be much good for games (unless
you don't play games) and the fact there is no floppy disk. Most of the
time you can get away without a floppy, but once in about six months I've
needed it for a motherboard flash update.

~ Adrian ~

 

[rvman8]

Rather than buy this HP, you might want to find a small local shop to build
one from base parts for you. The hardware used in the HP is not very good
compared to choosing your own. For instance: the 80GB hard drive of 5400RPM.
Not a huge thing, but most drives sold in systems are 7200 RPM. Video card:
a $45US Asus or similar video card will outperform built-in video.Where did
you get those specs from ? Pricing ?

Yes - from HP's site.

 

[rvman8]

And the processor it uses is what? I think BTO is Buy To Own, rather than
lease, or hire. The only parts I don't like from that system are the
slowish HDD, the onboard video which wouldn't be much good for games (unless
you don't play games) and the fact there is no floppy disk. Most of the
time you can get away without a floppy, but once in about six months I've
needed it for a motherboard flash update.

~ Adrian ~

 

[rvman8]

:

Also it lacks serial and parallel output ports. A floppy drive is
still essential, even if it doesn't get used too much. You should
avoid XP like the plague; if you must have some form of Windoze
get an earlier version without the horrible EULA and checking with
Bill. Mount some form of Linux as your main OS.

 

[S.Heenan]

Does anyone have any advice? What are the pitfalls I might encounter?

It seems to have:
512M PC2700 DDR RAM - 4 slots, 2 used
3 PCI Slots
80G Hard Drive (5400)
16X DVD Drive
48X CDRW Drive
On-board intel@Extreme 2 Video
On-board Integrated 5.1 Sound (whatever that is)
2 USB
Keyboard - scroller mouse
Windows XP HOME Edition
Corel Word Perfect

NO PRINTER
NO FLOPPY DISK DRIVE
NO MONITOR
NO SPEAKERS

That's about $750USD at the HP site. A similar setup like the following :

ANTEC SOLUTION SERIES MODEL SLK3700AMB w/ANTEC SMART POWER 350W P4/AMD POWER
SUPPLY $65

Floppy drive $7

Gigabyte GA-7N400-L1, nForce2 Ultra400 chipset for Socket A w/Sound & LAN
$90

AMD ATHLON XP 2500+ "Barton" 333 FSB PROCESSOR CPU- RETAIL $90

WD WESTERN DIGITAL "SPECIAL EDITION" 80GB 7200RPM EIDE HARD DRIVE MODEL #
WD800JB - OEM $80

NEC/MITSUBISHI MultiSync FE770+ 17" (WHITE) FLAT SCREEN MONITOR - RETAIL
$153

Lite On 52x24x52 Black CDRW Model LTR-52246 OEM $40

Lite On 52x Cd Rom - Model LTN-526 -RETAIL $19

CRUCIAL MICRON 512MB 64x64 PC 2700 DDR RAM - OEM
184-Pin, CL=2.5-Unbuffered Non Parity 2.5V, CT6464Z335 Requires DDR $73

MSI AGP Video card Geforce Fx 5200 Model X5200-T64 Retail $71

Windows XP Home $93

Logitech BLACK SBD69 Corded Optical Wheel Mouse PS/2 $12

Keyboard $13


Total: $806USD

A few bucks more, but much better components, upgradeable, and a monitor to
boot.

 

[rvman8]

On Fri, 27 Jun 2003 17:55:47 GMT, "S.Heenan"

THANKS!

 

[JK]

Why not? That system you outlined sounds good, except that I would
choose 2 256 meg sticks of PC2700 ddr ram(or possibly 2 512 meg sticks?)
to use with the nForce2 motherboard. The nForce2 motherboards
perform much better when a matched pair of ram sticks are used.
I would also choose a DVD drive rather than a CDrom drive for just
a few dollars more. If the user wants to use dial up internet service,
they would also have to buy a modem.

 

[S.Heenan]

Why not? That system you outlined sounds good, except that I would
choose 2 256 meg sticks of PC2700 ddr ram(or possibly 2 512 meg sticks?)
to use with the nForce2 motherboard. The nForce2 motherboards
perform much better when a matched pair of ram sticks are used.
I would also choose a DVD drive rather than a CDrom drive for just
a few dollars more. If the user wants to use dial up internet service,
they would also have to buy a modem.

Thanks for pointing out the lack of a DVD-ROM. I was meaning to put that
rather than a CD-ROM. Ditto about 2x256MB on an NForce2 board.