Replace iMac with Windows-based Desktop

[jeffandgop]

Need to replace 9-year old iMac. Would like recommendations of Window-based alternatives...principally used for streaming, and not gaming.....

[Thainesss]

Pretty much any brand-name desktop with about 16 gig of ram (minimum) & solid state 1tb hard drive will perform those basic duties flawlessly. 

 

You should be more concerned with the monitor IMO. Tech has changed so much in the TV/Monitor department over the last 9 years that its essential to get something in 2019 thats top of the line 2019 tech. 

 

So at a minimum a 27" OLED monitor and a desktop that can run it with HDMI cables. 

[jeffandgop]

Just now, Thainesss said:

Pretty much any brand-name desktop with about 16 gig of ram (minimum) & solid state 1tb hard drive will perform those basic duties flawlessly. 

 

You should be more concerned with the monitor IMO. Tech has changed so much in the TV/Monitor department over the last 9 years that its essential to get something in 2019 thats top of the line 2019 tech. 

 

So at a minimum a 27" OLED monitor and a desktop that can run it with HDMI cables. 

I have a 27" monitor and use HDMI to stream from my iMac to my 50" TV...thanks....am looking for advice on specific manufacturer products recommended and I'll look at the specs from there.....

[Thainesss]

6 minutes ago, jeffandgop said:

I have a 27" monitor and use HDMI to stream from my iMac to my 50" TV...thanks....

 

LOL and my point flies straight over your head. Are they both OLED tech? 

 

7 minutes ago, jeffandgop said:

am looking for advice on specific manufacturer products recommended and I'll look at the specs from there.....

 

Just go on Lazada and look at desktops you already said you use it primarily for streaming (TV). 

 

Or get the Nivida Shield and be done with it. All youre doing now is using your Imac as a "Smart Tv" anyway. 

 

[KittenKong]

2 hours ago, jeffandgop said:

am looking for advice on specific manufacturer products recommended and I'll look at the specs from there

I dont think that you need to worry particularly about which brands you go for. The beauty of Windows compared to Apple is that with Windows you can mix and match endlessly, with a choice of hundreds of suppliers/manufacturers to pick from. Unlike Apple where the choice is simply Apple or nothing, and where all the prices are fixed by Apple. If you spend as much on a PC as you might on an Apple you will get something at least 50% better than the thing that Apple sells. Apple are hugely overpriced.

 

If you do want specific manufacturer advice then I would say Gigabyte motherboards and Intel processors as both will probably last a long time. Mine are 6+ years old, in constant use and doing just fine. Which brand of memory or hard drive you buy is less important, though no-name brands should generally be avoided and it pays to look at user reviews on sites like Amazon as that way you can avoid brands/models that fail often. Video card is up to you, and for what you want to do a separate video card would not even be needed though you could get one if you want. A decent power supply is always a good investment, as is a decent case.

For the actual spec I would say 8GB of RAM, a 240GB SSD for the system disk and a much larger spinning hard drive for your data. By all means increase that spec if you want to spend more. Processor speed will depend on your budget, so fix the budget first and work backwards from there. My processor was mid-range 6+ years ago and is still plenty fast enough.

 

Go to any mall where there are assemblers and you will find many options for putting systems together. You dont need to buy a particular brand like Acer or HP or whatever.

 

https://www.jib.co.th/web/pcsetspec/main

 

Oh, and never accept the offer of a Thai pirated copy of Windows. Buy a real recycled activation key on Ebay or wherever, and install Windows from media downloaded from the MS site ONLY.

Edited March 29, 2019 by KittenKong

[jeffandgop]

3 hours ago, Thainesss said:

 

LOL and my point flies straight over your head. Are they both OLED tech? 

 

 

Just go on Lazada and look at desktops you already said you use it primarily for streaming (TV). 

 

Or get the Nivida Shield and be done with it. All youre doing now is using your Imac as a "Smart Tv" anyway. 

 

It’s my question that I asked that went over your head. I didn’t ask for attributes or features that need to be considered, just what PCs people would recommend. I never said my usage was limited to streaming either and also did want people who might consider my question that I am not a gamer. Other than wanting PC recommendations as an alternative to an iMac that’s all I was looking for. Don’t think you’re so wise to know what is or is not understood by others. 

[jeffandgop]

1 hour ago, KittenKong said:

I dont think that you need to worry particularly about which brands you go for. The beauty of Windows compared to Apple is that with Windows you can mix and match endlessly, with a choice of hundreds of suppliers/manufacturers to pick from. Unlike Apple where the choice is simply Apple or nothing, and where all the prices are fixed by Apple. If you spend as much on a PC as you might on an Apple you will get something at least 50% better than the thing that Apple sells. Apple are hugely overpriced.

 

If you do want specific manufacturer advice then I would say Gigabyte motherboards and Intel processors as both will probably last a long time. Mine are 6+ years old, in constant use and doing just fine. Which brand of memory or hard drive you buy is less important, though no-name brands should generally be avoided and it pays to look at user reviews on sites like Amazon as that way you can avoid brands/models that fail often. Video card is up to you, and for what you want to do a separate video card would not even be needed though you could get one if you want. A decent power supply is always a good investment, as is a decent case.

For the actual spec I would say 8GB of RAM, a 240GB SSD for the system disk and a much larger spinning hard drive for your data. By all means increase that spec if you want to spend more. Processor speed will depend on your budget, so fix the budget first and work backwards from there. My processor was mid-range 6+ years ago and is still plenty fast enough.

 

Go to any mall where there are assemblers and you will find many options for putting systems together. You dont need to buy a particular brand like Acer or HP or whatever.

 

https://www.jib.co.th/web/pcsetspec/main

 

Oh, and never accept the offer of a Thai pirated copy of Windows. Buy a real recycled activation key on Ebay or wherever, and install Windows from media downloaded from the MS site ONLY.

Thanks for your information. 

[Jeffrey346]

6 hours ago, KittenKong said:

If you spend as much on a PC as you might on an Apple you will get something at least 50% better than the thing that Apple sells. Apple are hugely overpriced.

 

 

I would like to see a 9 year old Win PC that's still running. I have a 10 year old MAC with an upgraded HD that runs better than when it was new. No WIN machine can match my "over priced" MAC.

[bkkcanuck8]

For a windows machine, I would just pick the parts (quality) based on your requirements and DIY (or have someone like Invade IT {I am assuming they have that service} build it for you). 

 

I have 'replaced' my computers last year, I build a quite powerful and high end Windows computer (or linux depending on boot), and I bought a Mac Mini 2018 (high end processor choice).  Each has their function, but I still vastly prefer using my Mac Mini (with multiple LG monitors) -- over the other OS choice -- [I would say 95% of the time the Mac still]

 

I actually ordered a lot of the premium parts off of New Egg and built the other computer myself.  Although likely way to high end for your purposes it might give you ideas on parts required.

 

- Fractal Design - Meshify C (enclosure/case) [JIB]
- Corsair Ax860i 860w [80+ Platinum] (power supply) [JIB]
- Gigabyte Aorus Master Z390 (motherboard)  [Invade IT]
- Intel i7-9700K (cpu) [New Egg]
- Noctua NH-D15 (cpu cooler) [Invade IT]
- Corsair Vengeance LPX 64GB DDR4 3200 [4 x 16GB] (memory) [New Egg]
- Sapphire Pulse RX Vega 56 (videocard) [New Egg]
- 2 140mm Noctua case fans (additional to 120mm case fan) [Invade IT]
- 2 x Samsung 970 EVO 2TB [New Egg]

- 2 x Seagate Ironwolf Pro 12 TB Hard Drives [New Egg]

- 3 x LG 27UK650 Monitors (27" 4K) [Banana IT]

 

Edited March 29, 2019 by bkkcanuck8

[steve187]

get a dell and you will know the specs to look for as i dare not suggest anything component wise

[atyclb]

9 hours ago, KittenKong said:

I dont think that you need to worry particularly about which brands you go for. The beauty of Windows compared to Apple is that with Windows you can mix and match endlessly, with a choice of hundreds of suppliers/manufacturers to pick from. Unlike Apple where the choice is simply Apple or nothing, and where all the prices are fixed by Apple. If you spend as much on a PC as you might on an Apple you will get something at least 50% better than the thing that Apple sells. Apple are hugely overpriced.

 

If you do want specific manufacturer advice then I would say Gigabyte motherboards and Intel processors as both will probably last a long time. Mine are 6+ years old, in constant use and doing just fine. Which brand of memory or hard drive you buy is less important, though no-name brands should generally be avoided and it pays to look at user reviews on sites like Amazon as that way you can avoid brands/models that fail often. Video card is up to you, and for what you want to do a separate video card would not even be needed though you could get one if you want. A decent power supply is always a good investment, as is a decent case.

For the actual spec I would say 8GB of RAM, a 240GB SSD for the system disk and a much larger spinning hard drive for your data. By all means increase that spec if you want to spend more. Processor speed will depend on your budget, so fix the budget first and work backwards from there. My processor was mid-range 6+ years ago and is still plenty fast enough.

 

Go to any mall where there are assemblers and you will find many options for putting systems together. You dont need to buy a particular brand like Acer or HP or whatever.

 

https://www.jib.co.th/web/pcsetspec/main

 

Oh, and never accept the offer of a Thai pirated copy of Windows. Buy a real recycled activation key on Ebay or wherever, and install Windows from media downloaded from the MS site ONLY.

 

 

 

good points. in addition gigabyte motherboards are perhaps the most hackintosh friendly if one ever wishes to run osx on their pc hardware, common nowadays. i have built several hackintoshes including a 12 core xeon one.

 

oled screens look nice but are they worth the extra money when theres many great led screens that cost much less?

[AAArdvark]

11 hours ago, Thainesss said:

Pretty much any brand-name desktop with about 16 gig of ram (minimum) & solid state 1tb hard drive will perform those basic duties flawlessly. 

 

You should be more concerned with the monitor IMO. Tech has changed so much in the TV/Monitor department over the last 9 years that its essential to get something in 2019 thats top of the line 2019 tech. 

 

So at a minimum a 27" OLED monitor and a desktop that can run it with HDMI cables. 

For an average user, and then some, 16 GB RAM is way overkill.  I keep many applications and windows open and with 8 GB I never see even close to 60% usage.  If an SSD is used, and it should be, there is even less need for massive amounts of memory.  Page and Swap files on a HDD will really slow you down but not much at all for an SSD.

[JamJar]

2 hours ago, Jeffrey346 said:

I would like to see a 9 year old Win PC that's still running. I have a 10 year old MAC with an upgraded HD that runs better than when it was new. No WIN machine can match my "over priced" MAC.

 

My current PC was bought here in Thailand in February of 2007. That makes it twelve years old, as compared to your claimed ten.

I'm creating this post with it. Cost me 21,000 baht when the exchange rate was around 70 to the £.

 

I've upgraded the CPU at a cost of £6. Upgraded the RAM to 4GB for £6 and fitted a 120 GB Crucial BX300 SSD, costing £21.

 

So a total of £333(less than £28 per annum thus far). How much did your Mac cost? Purchase price and cost of upgrades?

 

Seems your statement has proved rather empty. 

[Orton Rd]

Why bother with Windoze at all if it's not for gaming, Linux in my recent experience, is far better all round than any Windows version.

[atyclb]

8 minutes ago, JamJar said:

 

My current PC was bought here in Thailand in February of 2007. That makes it twelve years old, as compared to your claimed ten.

I'm creating this post with it. Cost me 21,000 baht when the exchange rate was around 70 to the £.

 

I've upgraded the CPU at a cost of £6. Upgraded the RAM to 4GB for £6 and fitted a 120 GB Crucial BX300 SSD, costing £21.

 

So a total of £333(less than £28 per annum thus far). How much did your Mac cost? Purchase price and cost of upgrades?

 

Seems your statement has proved rather empty. 

 

 

4 gb ram, damn,... styling

[JamJar]

4 minutes ago, atyclb said:

 

 

4 gb ram, damn,... styling

 

It's a twelve year old device, Einstein...

[arithai12]

4 hours ago, Jeffrey346 said:

I would like to see a 9 year old Win PC that's still running. I have a 10 year old MAC with an upgraded HD that runs better than when it was new. No WIN machine can match my "over priced" MAC.

Wanna bet?

[bkkcanuck8]

32 minutes ago, arithai12 said:

Wanna bet?

I would say on average Macs last longer overall than Windows machines,  but then that could be a side effect of many manufacturers cheaping out on certain components -- especially when manufacturing the the motherboard etc.

[Thainesss]

1 hour ago, arithai12 said:

Wanna bet?

 

 

[KittenKong]

 

7 hours ago, Jeffrey346 said:

I would like to see a 9 year old Win PC that's still running. I have a 10 year old MAC with an upgraded HD that runs better than when it was new. No WIN machine can match my "over priced" MAC.

Thailand is full of very old machines that are still running perfectly well on Windows 7. All sorts of shops and businesses use them, including banks.

 

In the UK some medium size companies that I am connected with exclusively use reconditioned Dell PCs that are purchased for under 100USD including Windows. They are usually about 5-7 years old when purchased, and they come with a 12-month warranty. They fit a cheap SSD in-house and the machines are easily good for another 7 years or more.

 

Fitting an SSD to any machine that came with a mechanical drive will result in a significant improvement and will always make it better than new, so there is nothing special about your Mac in that respect.

 

Like other "designer" brands, Apple products are just an overpriced joke where most of the cost goes on packaging and marketing and profit. Nothing will ever change that, but those who want to squander their money that way are welcome to, of course.

[kekalot]

I agree with the above, putting an SSD on my 300$ Walmart laptop from 5 years ago made it 12x as fast to start as it used to be

 

so instead of pressing power button and waiting 6 minutes for the hard drive usage to go under 100% (and unusable laptop)..
 

now I can be logged into Windows 10 in under 25 seconds.

Edited March 29, 2019 by kekalot

[Thainesss]

7 hours ago, KittenKong said:

Like other "designer" brands, Apple products are just an overpriced joke where most of the cost goes on packaging and marketing and profit. Nothing will ever change that, but those who want to squander their money that way are welcome to, of course.

 

Apple products use a completely different operating system, streamlined apps, and hardware that compliments it. 

 

Comparing an Apple product to a cheap windows machine is like comparing a Toyota Corolla to a Mercedes. 

 

Businesses use windows and office suite because it’s cheap, not because it’s good or efficient. It’s a cheap way to run outlook/office. 

[ThaiBunny]

2 minutes ago, Thainesss said:

Businesses use windows and office suite because it’s cheap, not because it’s good or efficient. It’s a cheap way to run outlook/office. 

I disagree.  In a couple of businesses that I've been involved in Apple products were used by the graphics teams because they were perceived as best suited for that role.  The general office used Windows because its ecosystem supports a huge range of products, not just Office.  I fact we used Libre Office in one company, not Microsoft Office

[Thainesss]

9 minutes ago, ThaiBunny said:

The general office used Windows because its ecosystem supports a huge range of products, not just Office.

 

Apple also supports most products and even Microsoft office. Only reason the general office used Microsoft is because it’s cheap, not because is good or efficient. 

 

The argument the other poster is trying to make is that you can buy/build a better machine for cheaper and Apple is nothing more than a gimmick. That’s just not true. It’s a completely different OS, apps, and top of the line hardware. 

[KittenKong]

1 hour ago, Thainesss said:

Apple products use a completely different operating system, streamlined apps, and hardware that compliments it. 

 

Comparing an Apple product to a cheap windows machine is like comparing a Toyota Corolla to a Mercedes. 

Open up an Apple product and you will find plenty of entirely standard hardware inside, just as you would in a PC.

 

There is nothing special about Apple apart from the price and the fancy packaging and the lack of choice. But it is a tribute to Steve Jobs that so many silly people believe that they are in fact getting something better inside that shiny box. Apple is a triumph of marketing over content, and this is why they have such an enormous bank balance.

[Thainesss]

6 minutes ago, KittenKong said:

There is nothing special about Apple apart from the price and the fancy packaging and the lack of choice.

 

Youve got a clear dislike of apple products and it’s been my experience that the loudest protestors usually haven’t even had any apple products before. 

 

Toyota Corolla takes you from A to B. 

 

Mercedes takes you from A to B. 

 

Both are cars that have engines and wheels and drive, but they aren’t the same. 

 

As I’ve stated several times already, they have a different OS, proprietary hardware like the trackpad, proprietary apps for documents (that are far cheaper). 

 

They arent the same and you comparing an Apple product to a cheap windows machine is kind of ridiculous. 

[KittenKong]

28 minutes ago, Thainesss said:

As I’ve stated several times already, they have a different OS, proprietary hardware like the trackpad, proprietary apps for documents (that are far cheaper). 

And as I pointed out, most of the parts inside Apple products are entirely standard and are often identical to the parts one would find in a PC. If you think it's worth paying so much extra for a trackpad, fine.

 

The OS is different and it is rubbish. It is designed specifically to restrict user choice (the only way they can make it reliable) and to ensure a locked-in user base (this is how Apple earn most of their money). Many entirely free office-style apps are available for Windows, and of course MS Office is also available at a reasonable price for most users. Apple's software is a pathetic joke in comparison.

 

Spend the same amount of money on a PC as you would on an Apple and you will get something vastly superior. Or you could get something similar to the Apple for less money. Or you could get some much cheaper again that is nearly as good. Up to you. With Apple it is never "up to you" and you always pay over the odds for it. But I entirely understand that Apple fans never get this, and of course Apple is happy with that.

[kekalot]

why are you comparing MacOS/PC to a Corolla and Mercedes?

a proper analogy would be to compare a Mustang to a Smart fortwo (apple)

 

I have been working in IT for 23+ years now and I don't know a single knowledgeable person who would choose Apple over a Windows PC

in fact, I only know two guys who were hardcore Apple fans and both of them were clueless regarding computer usage apart from very basic stuff.

so one of those guys I don't talk to much to but the second still talks to me (known him for 21 years) and always had those stupid rants about why Apple was better than PC

so 2 years ago I sent him a new proper PC (in parts) without telling him a word about it and told him to assemble it and use it for a week or two

if he wanted it he could pay me monthly and if not I would send someone to take it back.

he absolutely kept it

 

I forced him to learn how to build a computer, a thing he had never done before and in that two years, his knowledge of computers/tech probably went up tenfold.

I have never heard him talk about his iMac since unless I asked about it (he is now using it as a Plex media server, lol)

also heard he had done a (very unnecessary) upgrade to his PC recently and also kitted it with 3 monitors

 

you should buy that new iMac that comes with a 5400 rpm hard drives (a technology that was superseded in 1992)

 

 

this guy knows what he is talking about as he has been working making a killing of repairing faulty apple devices for years.

 

so for you, dunning-kruger effect it is.

Edited March 30, 2019 by kekalot

[Thainesss]

Funny because if the hate shown by the above 2 posters was in any way indicitive of the truth, the company would be bankrupt. But that’s not the case. Apple is one of the most valuable companies in the world. 

 

 

[canuckamuck]

It's the illusion of high end, the OS, and the dictatorial Apple ecosystem that keeps people in the Apple bubble. They are fraid of getting equal or better quality and a much greater diversity of choice while paying half as much. 

It's like people who buy curved TV's and top model phones. Pay more for less.