So I was listening to the 99.7 FM the last few mornings and instead of the Michael and Gwen show, they've been pumping in some other guy. While this show is on breaks, he's been advertising a US based computer manufacturer (Vision Computers) with the big selling point being a 15 second wait time for tech support, and gushing about this computer's specs. The system specs are ridiculous (the bad kind) for the price. Unless you are getting a netbook or want ultra tiny do not get anything with an Atom processor.
Atom 2306 New Radio Special
- 17" LCD 1280 x 1024
- Atom 410 / 1.6 GHz
- 1GB DDR2 800MHz Ram
- 160GB SATA Hard Drive
- 16x40 DVD-ROM Drive
- Windows 7 Starter Edition
So how much will this cost you? A mere $499.00 !!!! I'm willing to bet that the 15 second wait time for tech support is because they hardly have any distribution because of crummy spec'd systems.
If you really want an Atom processor, get a Sony W netbook. You can get them with a 250GB disk inside, and if you are willing to pop a few screws and pop out the keyboard, you can upgrade it to 2GB RAM. I have two different Sony W netbooks (a white W111XX and a brown W121AX) and they each have been upgraded to 2GB RAM and both run Windows 7 Ultimate 32 bit). You will need an external DVD or Blu-Ray, but that can be gotten starting less than $50. The screen resolution is also 1377x768 which is a 16x9 aspect ratio, instead of the 4x3 (square) screen spec'd above. You can plug in external keyboard, mouse, and monitor if you really want.
Sony VAIO VPC-W121AX
- 1.66GHz Intel N280 Atom Processor
- 1GB DDR2 533MHz Memory
- 250GB Serial ATA 5400RPM Hard Drive
- IEEE 802.11b , IEEE 802.11g , Bluetooth
- Memory Stick , SD Memory Card , Memory Stick Duo
- 10.1 (1366 x 768) LED-backlit LCD Display
- Mobile Intel 945GSE Express
- Windows 7 Starter
- Up to 7 Hours of Battery Life
What will this cost you, somewhere between $320-$400 - and you can take it with you! You could easily get a keyboard, mouse, and monitor for less than $150 total, and you would have portability of a netbook, more RAM, and a bigger disk. All for about the around the same cost.
If you just want a small and affordable desktop system, head over to Best Buy or Wal-Mart. You can get a desktop like this one for less than $500 and you have way more disk, RAM, and CPU.
- AMD Athlon II X2 or Intel core2duo
- 18" - 20" widescreen LCD
- 3GB-4GB RAM
- 500GB-640GB Hard Drive
- Windows 7 Home Premium
- Double-layer DVD±RW drive