marcia wrote:
Dear All,
I have been assigned the job to look for and purchase a new desktop for my stepson. He likes my Suse 8.2 pro dual boot with windows. He wants something similar to my setup. I have an athlon 1600+ xp with 60 gig harddrive(soon to increase to 200 GB) 512 megs memory, etc. He is not a do it yourselfer(yet) for working on computer problems really so I looked at Dell first.
Dell has a special for $499. In reality to get it to be an acceptable deal it comes closer to $750. He wants a printer and scanner as well and I wondered if the all in one Dell model will work with Linux. This is the advertised TV special that has been on lately. His father(my husband) wants to purchase this soon but does not want to go over the $700 range. It is a challenge so far to get everything right so that it is a good computer for his son's needs at that price.
Any suggestions? My stepson is open to athlon or pentiums and probably needs some kind of support that is decent as well as good warranties all in the $700 range . It would be better if Linux is already installed with the windows since he has never done that sort of thing and I live many miles away from him. I would otherwise install linux for him.
Any suggestions and ideas will be gratefully received.
Thanks very much.
Marcia
I assume you'd almost _have _ to get it from a custom PC shop - and pay extra - to get it loaded to dual boot. I know Dell has been offering Linux installation since 2000, but I don't think that's a dual boot deal. Sorry, I haven't been in the market for a new PC since 2000. At that time, you could request Red Hat instead of Windows - you would only get the one installed. Have you tried PriceWatch.com (might be streetprice.com)? (Be careful, some of those are not real reputable.) You can get new/used systems - usually pretty cheap. Might be other sites similar. But do try the custom shops. Some of them are pretty good. That's about the best I can do. Don