Should I trade my machine?
December 12, 2007 1:54 PM   Subscribe

My computer is making an ominous whirring noise, but seems to work okay (albeit a bit slow). It's also older (from 2002). I don't really want a new one. One of the tech support guys at school has offered to swap my hobbling Dell Dimension 4550 for his HP Pavilion Desktop with 512mg of ram and an extra 30g hard drive.

Will I be able to do basic stuff like word processing, some Photoshop, Itunes, and internet surfing the same way on this other machine? Is this a relatively fair trade?
posted by answergrape to Computers & Internet (11 answers total)
 
Looking at the links, I'd say you'd be better off buying some RAM for your existing machine. 2.66 Ghz isn't really that slow, I'm guessing your RAM (rather, lack thereof) is slowing you down by quite a bit. If you're really strapped for cash, then the HP might work better for a lot of things (RAM is better than CPU speed until you get over 1 gig of it.)
posted by TeatimeGrommit at 2:04 PM on December 12, 2007


Best answer: Your current system has a much faster processor, thus it's most likely newer with slightly better motherboard specs, but otherwise it's a reasonably fair trade.

If I were you I wouldn't go for the trade. That whirring is either a bad fan or a bad hard drive. Pop the cover and see where the noise is coming from. If it's a fan, that's a $5 part and no more than 20min of labor. If it's the hard drive that's an $100 part and a few hours to reinstall everything. Find a geek who's cool and who'd fix you up in exchange for a case of beer rather than in exchange for your faster computer.
posted by waxboy at 2:07 PM on December 12, 2007


If the ominous whirring noise corresponds with disk use: back up your data right now, and buy a new hard drive.

If it corresponds with processor use/CPU heat: clean the fans. Consider replacing them.

Without even looking at the specs, I'd be hesitant to make this trade, because I figure the tech support guy knows more about computers than you do, and I figure he thinks he's getting the better end of the deal.
posted by box at 2:08 PM on December 12, 2007


++waxboy

If you can catch the drive (if that's the ulitmate problem -- good chance) you can do a drive copy and won't have to reinstall anything. Use Norton Ghost or Paragon's Drive Copy. Better yet, find some computer geek who has one of those and let them do it.
posted by trinity8-director at 2:10 PM on December 12, 2007


Should read: If you can catch the drive...before it fails...

Who needs preview?
posted by trinity8-director at 2:11 PM on December 12, 2007


My strange Dell whirring noise was a fan, not the hard drive. No idea what yours looks like, but give mdevore's answer in a similar question I asked a try before you switch.
posted by mdonley at 2:19 PM on December 12, 2007


Best answer: 2nd box.

could be processor fan, power supply fan, or it could be a case fan (if your computer is equipped with one).

it should be pretty simple to open the case and disconnect the case/processor fan, to see if the noise stops. if it's the power supply, you are probably better off just replacing the power supply, unless you are comfortable with soldering.

if you do open the cover to take a look, a can of compressed air is good to have, so that you can blast the dust bunnies out. there are undoubtedly many living in your computer if you haven't opened the case in the 5+ years since you got it.
posted by ArgentCorvid at 3:04 PM on December 12, 2007


Response by poster: You have collectively confirmed my reasons for trepidation. I'm going to revisit the issue after finals, but I'm definitely going to try to have my own fixed.

Maybe I'll even crack open that case; I'm pretty sure I've never done it in five years. Maybe just a blast of compressed air would help. If not... I can think more clearly on more sleep and with fewer final exams to grade.

Thanks to everybody for their great suggestions!
posted by answergrape at 3:16 PM on December 12, 2007


For what it's worth, I've got a fan in the back of a new work computer that sounds like death but (other than being annoying) does no harm.

Also, reloading your old machine from scratch (with more memory, naturally) is going to give you a speed jump, because you've got years of garbage on there. Have you ever even defragged the drive?

Echoing fix/upgrade, don't trade.
posted by davejay at 3:33 PM on December 12, 2007


Another possibility is that there is nothing at all wrong with your hardware. If a program/process is continuously using the cpu then the fan may be reving up to keep it cool. That would be consistent with your "albeit a little slow" comment." My Dell Optiplex can sound like a jet engine if the cpu is continuously used.

Open your task manager (control/alt/del) and look at the cpu usage at the bottom. If it is "stuck" on at more than a few percentage points then that may be the problem. Kill the process to see if that makes a difference. Note: in some machines the fan will tend to stay on high even after the cpu usage is reduced until the next reboot. So you would have to figure out how to prevent the process from starting in the first place.
posted by Kevin S at 4:04 PM on December 12, 2007


you may want to do a spyware check as well; if you have nasties living on your machine and sending spam when you aren't looking, that could make your machine more than a little slow.
posted by jenkinsEar at 9:29 PM on December 12, 2007


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