A powerful desktop computer with a big hard drive and large monitor thrown in for good measure.

For a full desktop computer this system from Dell doesn’t look too bad. There have been complaints about the pricing of Dell desktop computers being a little high compared to the offerings from the other big boys in the home computer market. But his model fights back with a whole lot for under $700.

Here’s a bunch of numbers:

• 2.6GHz Intel Pentium Dual Core E5300 CPU
• 6GB memory
• 640GB hard drive
• DVD writer
• 6 USB ports
• 22-inch monitor, 1920 x 1080 resolution
• Windows 7

Lets just start off by saying that this is not the fastest or newest processor out there, however it is more than enough for most intensive programs. Graphics programs will have no problem, although heavy games that need powerful graphics cards will have a hard time.

One interesting thing is a review on CNET that pointed to this computer being low on the value scale and not matching up to its near competition.

With the price lower than their review and the 22-inch model thrown in for good measure it at least measures up to similar models in terms of pricing and has a more reasonable amount of memory at 6GB. The speed increase from 4GB upwards is not worth the money most of the time.

Hidden behind the shiny black front cover is a DVD writer and a media unit for plugging in the myriad of memory cards gathered from various home electronics.

One of the biggest upsides to the whole deal is the great monitor. Quite often 22-inch monitors still don’t support 1920 x 1080, which I think should be the absolute minimum specification for this sort of machine. So it’s not just a cheap add-in to pick up sales of the main machine, it really is a worthwhile addition to the set.

Note that the system does include mouse and keyboard, although not pictured above.

Like

• Big, high-resolution monitor
• Ample memory
• Big hard drive
• Decent speed

Not so much

• No Wifi (included on some rival machines)

Refurbished computers are a great way to get a whole lot of older technology for a discount price. The computer itself has been done up to catch up with the times a little and make it a little more marketable. No cutting edge technology here, but the price is pretty good.

This refurbished desktop computer comes in at around $225. The system includes:

• 17″ monitor
• 2.8GHz Pentium 4 processor
• 1GB memory
• 40GB hard drive
• Fast Ethernet
• 8 x USB
• CD drive
• Windows XP

The Pentium 4 chips are around 7 years old. They use more power than modern processors but won’t get too hot unless overclocked. My work computer is a 2.4GHz Pentium 4 and at home I still have a 2.0GHz for my main computer. And they are fine, memory upgrades, which this computer includes as standard, are the only change I’ve made in the past few years.

The hard drive is on the small side. But then again all the data on my own computer wouldn’t fill that up. For surfing the web, simple games and doing some documents it’s more than enough. You’ll run out of space fairly quickly if you are saving DVDs to your hard drive though. Fortunately you won’t be able to save any DVDs to the hard drive because the standard drive is a CD drive only.

The 17″ monitor will do. The resolution will display any web pages at full width, but not leave too much room for anything else on the screen.

The 1GB of memory is enough. With Windows XP, even a whole bunch of applications won’t fill that up very quick. The system will not handle a huge amount of multi-tasking, so keep programs running in the background to a minimum.

Fast Ethernet for network connectivity is good, eight USB ports allow easy extension and Windows XP works just fine most of the time, just remember to upgrade to service pack 3. Includes mouse, keyboard and speakers.

Pros:

• Cheap
• Decent power
• All extras included

Cons:

• Old
• No DVD burner

Firstly, this computer does not come with keyboard, monitor or mouse. It only comes with the system. Even so, for a tad under $400 it’s a pretty good offer.

As a primary home computer this Compaq can pack a bit of punch, with enough memory and processor speed to run anything but the most graphics intensive programs it can take most of what is thrown at it. Throw in the good looks and styling of the case and you’re looking at a pretty decent machine. Here’s a quick rundown of the main features.

• 2.3GHz AMD Sempron LE1300 processor
• 2GB memory
• 250GB hard drive
• DVD burner with Lightscribe
• NVIDIA GeForce 6150SE integrated graphics processor

The heart of the system is an AMD Sempron processor, which is branded as the cheaper end of the AMD lineup. The Athlon has traditionally been ahead of the Sempron in the pecking order. But AMD tend to throw quite a lot of good technology into their lower end products and this single-core processor can perform far better than its price tag suggests. Just the CPU on its own costs around $40 but performs well enough to surf the Internet, burn CDs and create some spreadsheets and documents.

2GB of memory is enough for even the heaviest of daily use. The memory or RAM is where programs are stored while they are running; it is much faster than the hard drive and means that programs can work quicker and store more information while they are running. The web browser Firefox for example can use up to 180MB of memory with only one of two tabs open, but as soon as you get to 15-20 tabs then all of those extra sites are now stored in memory and can shoot the memory usage of Firefox to over 300MB. Combine this with instant messengers and other programs and you get a lot of memory being used. But 2GB can comfortably handle all of those.

250GB hard drive is enough for around 40 DVD movies and should be plenty, especially if you store all your movies and photos online.

The Nvidia GeForce 6150SE is not a high performer for graphics. Although occasionally sold on “gaming computers” it really only does the basics. Modern games can be played if you turn off all the fancy shading and textures and other such stuff, but for getting the intended effect you’ll need a dedicated graphics card. Luckily it has a PCIe x16 graphics card slot for just this purpose, pity that it will probably be the processor slowing the graphics down for there onwards.

There is the standard slew of other extras including USB slots, audio input and outputs, Gigabit Ethernet and the pretty good looks of the case.