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Buying a PC

You've finally decided to buy a PC. Now, if you're still quite new at this, you'll be surprised at how many options are available to you. Just take a look at all those magazines, newspapers and websites covering PCs and information technology in general. Seems like every month there's a new product that will make your PC faster, better, easier: mew processors, graphics cards, hard drives and so on. What to buy, what to choose? Well, let this article be your guide and let's take it one step at a time.

Like everything else in life, buying a PC is not as simple as it seems. That's why so many newspaper, magazines and websites publish those 'buyer's guide' articles. But unless you're a geek or a tech nut, those articles might as well be written in alien-speak for all you care. Every now and then, people asked me what kind of PC they should buy. My answer is always the same: What do you want to do with your PC? That should be the first question you ask to yourself. I think all of us agree, that there's no point in having the most expensive and fastest PC on earth if doesn't' fit our needs. But then again, buying the cheapest one you can find isn't a good solution either. What we all want is a PC that will fit the bill (and hopefully doesn't break your wallet in the process), one that won't slow to a crawl when your working on that all-important assignment / paper or playing with your friends.

Where do we start?

OK, come and take a second look through those ads you found. You'll notice that some of them offer a whole package - a complete PC - while others let you add options and accessories. Some stores even offer custom built ones. So basically, when buying a PC, you could either buy:

* a whole package (with or without options/accessories)
* a custom or built to order package
* and for those who are more technology inclined than the rest of us, buying the parts and doing it by yourself.

If you're already quite familiar with a PC and its internal components, you'll probably more inclined to choose the third option. So this guide is not really necessary for you (but keep on reading anyway, you might learn something new). Let's talk about the first two options. For those of you who (really) don't know what the difference between a nut, a bolt and a screw is (no pun intended), the first option is probably your best (and only) choice. Take a look at the choices, pick one that suits your need and still inside your budget. If you're buying (and using) a PC for the first time, choose a company or store that offers 24 / 7 support (it would be better if it was on site support) or at least some basic training on how to use a PC. Oh yes, while they are unwrapping your new PC, there's no harm in checking out the manual that came with it. I know, reading those one inch thick manual can be a major drag, but (surprise) most of the stuff you'll ever need about your PC is there, and the info is actually quite useful. Of course, having a tech-inclined friend on hand is also a plus, but not everyone has a neighborhood friendly tech.

The second option is suitable for those of you who are already quite familiar with a PC. Basically, this means you already know what to do with a mouse and keyboard, you can handle your way around Windows, or you can even tell someone the difference between a memory (RAM) and a hard drive. Buying a custom built-to-order PC means that you could tailor it to fit your needs. Maybe get a bigger hard drive for those MP3s and videos or more RAM and faster processor. Some of you may not need the 24 / 7 support and basic training, but if you can have it for free, why not? It's nice to know you can always count on someone (even if it's only through the phone) to tell you what to do when you something went wrong. When push comes to shove, you could always ask them to come by and look at what's wrong with your PC.

What to buy

Well, while we've narrowed down what kind of option you have on how to buy a PC, we really haven't covered what kind of PC you want to buy yet. Don't worry, we'll get around to that. But first let's take a look at the parts of a PC. If we know the parts and what they do, we could decide which part will better fit our needs

Just by looking at a PC, you'll probably notice that it is actually made up of several parts. Usually, there's a monitor where you'll see what the PC is doing (or what you told it to do), a mouse and keyboard that you use to tell the PC what you want it to do and a central processing unit (CPU). For the technologically-challenged, it's usually that big box with the wires and holes in it.

The monitor is the one with the screen, just like your TV. The keyboard looks just like a typewriter and you use much in the same way. The mouse, usually with two buttons on it is used to control the pointer. By moving the mouse, you move the pointer around the screen. If you want to select something, you click or press the left mouse button. By far, the most important part of any PC is the CPU, where the real action is. Inside it, you'll find the processor, memory (RAM), hard drive, graphics card, motherboard, CD / DVD-ROM and so on. These components are what make a PC do what they do best. But we'll get into that later. Let's talk about the others first.

Monitors

Your PC monitor is actually quite similar to your TV set. It displays images sent from the CPU and displays them to you. So, banging on your monitor isn't going to fix that crash you just had on your brand new PC (or so will banging on your CPU - it will probably do more harm than good). PC monitors come in several sizes, usually ranging from 15' to 21' monitors. Now, here's where you have to be careful, a 21' monitor doesn't mean you'll be getting a 21' screen. Why? Because that number is not for the screen, rather for the whole monitor. The screen is actually smaller than that, because you have a 'border' between the outer sides of the monitor and screen. Take at least 2' of that number and you'll get what's usually called 'viewable area' - the screen. Just remember that the screen is the more important one, since this is the part of the monitor that displays the images.

Another monitor measurement is dot pitch. This number indicates the physical density of your screen. This might a quite difficult concept for some of you, but the following example is probably the easiest to understand. Try looking closely at your TV or PC monitor. I mean, really close to the screen. You'll notice that the screen is actually made up of lots of tiny dots or alternating lines with a combination of colors (red, green and blue). Dot pitch literally means how big the dots / lines used within a given area of the screen (usually per square inch). A lower number means the dots are smaller so there are more dots on your monitor's screen. You'll get a sharper image on monitors with a low dot pitch number - these will be quite useful to you if you're going to use the PC to edit pictures and images.
PC monitors also uses what we call 'resolution'. Don't confuse this with the screen. Basically, resolution is a measure of how much pixels your monitor can display, indifferent to screen size. A typical 17' monitor (15' viewable screen) can support several resolutions. A higher resolutions means there are more pixels displayed on the screen and you'll get a larger workspace or desktop. Typically, resolution range from 640 x 480 pixels to 1600 x 1200 pixels. Now, I can understand if some of you still think this is confusing. Maybe this example would help. What you have to remember is that a displayed image (such as the icons in your Windows workspace / desktop) will stay in its original resolution, despite the resolution your monitor supports. So, a 320 x 240 pixels image will take up 1/4 of your physical screen on a screen resolution of 640 x 480 pixels and roughly 1/25 on a screen resolution of 1600 x 1200 pixels. The icons and text on your PC is designed for a fixed resolution, so using a too high resolution will make the icons and text difficult to read and see. For most people, a 17' monitor using a resolution of 1024 x 768 pixels is good enough. If you need more screen space, you could up the resolution at the cost of legibility. Generally, it's better to use a bigger monitor if you're planning to use a much higher resolution (19' monitors for 1280 x 1024 pixels, 21' monitors for 1600 x 1200 pixels).

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