How to Buy a Desktop PC | Roundup | PCMag.com

When buying a Desktop PC, you still need to make some choices when it comes to CPUs, memory, hard drive capacity and graphics technology. The good news is your money has never gone further.

Does your PC take so long to start up you have time to go get a cup of coffee-and drink it? Tried installing the latest game only to find out your graphics card is six generations too old to play it? Or maybe you just want to take advantage of the speed and reliability of operating systems like Microsoft Windows 7 and Snow Leopard. If any of these are true, then it is time for you to buy a new desktop PC. And we can help you do it.

Prices for desktop PCs start as low as $250 and range all the way up to $5,000, but most of us would be more than happy with an $800 box. You still need to make some choices when it comes to CPUs, memory, hard drive capacity and graphics technology, but the good news is your money has never gone further. And a PC you buy today could very well last you for four to six years.

The Nettop Option

If all you want to do is surf the Web, run Office apps, and do very light computing duties, you should consider a nettop. Nettops belong to a desktop category that comes in below the $400-500 value desktop categories, both in price and capabilities. Nettops run on the same basic components that netbooks do: low-powered single- or dual-core processor like the Intel Atom, AMD Neo, or some of the low-powered AMD Athlon X2 processors; non-upgradable integrated graphics; 512MB to 2GB of RAM; smaller hard drive; no optical drive; and Windows XP, Windows 7Starter/Home Basic, or Linux operating system.

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