Question for the group about an opportunity I have to buy a year old computer from a co-worker of my wife.
Last December the following computer was bought and now they have decided that they do not use it and are looking to sell it. Here are the specs that I have on it:

Alienware X51 BTO
Windows 7 Home Premium
Dell Ultra Sharp 21.5" monitor
Intel Core i7 3.4 Ghz (8MB Cache) with Hyper Threading and Turbo Boost
1 GB GDDR5 NVIDIA GeForce GT 640
2 TB Serial ATA 3 Hard Drive
Steam Factory Installed
Single Drive 8x CD/DVD Burner w/ double layer write capability

Looks like they paid around $1,300 for this and they are looking to sell. No word yet on their asking price.

Just looking for opinions on this particular computer and set up; feel free to offer opinion on asking price as well.

Thanks!

 

Damn, thats a real nice setup! You wouldn't happen to know how many gigs of ram it has, does it? Im guessing probably somewhere around 8. Very nice MB on it, with probably only the i7 extreme surpassing it. More space then you'll ever need, thats for sure. If you really want that thing to haul ***, swap out the HDD for an SSD. 2 would be better though...

Space wise, no worries at all. 2 Terabytes is a ridiculous amount... 1024 GB= 1 TB.

I've got a friend of mine who taught me a good bit about this stuff. I'll ask him and see what he thinks its worth.

 

Thanks for the reply and info.
I accidentally left off this info:

8GB (2 x 4GB) Dual Channel DDR3 up to 160 Mhz

 

It's used - I wouldn't pay more than $500 for it. Even though it's an Alienware, it's not really a gaming machine, that's a relatively cheap video card.

 

Figured it would be close to that.

That can always be change fairly easily. Newegg will have something that'll give it a nice upgrade...

 

My oldest son would love to have a desktop that would be able to play PC games like Rome Total War II (when he is not playing Minecraft).
Would this computer, based on the limited info I have provided, be able to play those type of games?

 

Not too bad of a computer but since it's an Alienware your coworker already overpaid, it's basically a really expensive dell in a nicer case.

What are you planning on using it for? If it's for gaming that nvidia 640 is going to leave a whole lot to be desired. If it's workstation or media center it should do alright except maybe some hd video playback.

The downsides to it are the graphics card will limit most gaming, the processor is the last gen which are still good but power hungry and run hotter than the current gen i-series ones, the case is mATX which means if you want to add in more stuff later say a bigger graphics card or another hard drive you might not be able too.

But being used I wouldn't pay more than 600-850 or so for it. Deepening how much you like your coworker...

Im assuming that monitor is 1920x1080 resolution (full hd), which is more demanding on a graphics card. So it'll be able to play them but not on max settings, and you may not get the most desirable fps during graphics intensive parts.

 

The computer would mostly be used to play PC games like Rome Total War 2 and similar PC games (but at this time not World of Warcraft or Diablo). Assuming that this computer would be able to play those games.
This would be a computer for my 12 year old son, so he will also be playing Minecraft and surfing the net.

I was thinking the same thing about the price - how much does my wife like this co-worker (or not). She also has all of the original boxes and packaging which adds nothing to the computer but just might make it possible for me to "re-gift" this to my 12 year old as a Christmas gift!

Any idea as to if I would be able to upgrade the Nvidia 640 and if so, how much an upgraded one would be?

The monitor is listed as being the Dell Ultra Sharp U2212HMC 21.5" Monitor.

 

You can upgrade it, it's about a 80 dollar card right now so pretty much anything on the market from the 600 series up is an upgrade. What I can't tell you is what will fit, I'm not sure how much free space you'll have in that case for a bigger card and what size the power supply is to see if it'll support the card.

But from what I could find out the 640's are about 5.7x4.8" and the 650 gtx ti is 6x4.8", so if you have the extra room that card would be a huge improvement and is about 150 dollars or so.

 

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...view,3107.html

Before upgrading the video card, you need to do 2 things - measure how much room you have in the case (length is what's critical) and see how many watts the power supply is.

 

I would guess that computer would be more than enough to play RTWII and Minecraft. It would surf the net nicely also.

 

Minecraft can get really demanding if you try to run near optimal settings where it renders a lot more at area at once and run with fog off. And if he runs it full screen at that monitors native resolution, it's gonna hit hard on that card.

 

I was just looking at laptops last night and seen an Alienware for over 4 grand. The price stood out in the line up I was looking at lol. Just mentioning that since it seems you do pay quite a bit for the name.

The 1,300 as the "new" price a year ago for that desktop seems sort of cheep doesn't it?

Any problems with it at all? Does the seller seem trustworthy? I'd try to get some real time data. Maybe some bench marks, - up to date benchmarks if you could.

80 bucks sounds cheap for a good card.

If it's a friend of your wifes; as a friend, ask for a Demo first and try it for a few days or perhaps ask for a demonstration. It's your money, but these kind of deals can sometimes cost yuh. Asking for confirmation that everything works fine shouldn't NEVER be a problem, - especially from one you or yours calls friend.

Good Luck.

 

Thanks for all of the information. It is a good friend and co-worker of my wife and her kid does not use the computer at all anymore and so they are looking to get rid of it (and try to make back some amount of $$ that they spent on it a year ago).
I am sure that they would have no problem letting us see and/or use it to see if it is what we want/need.
I checked the details that they sent to us and it indicates: "240W External Power Supply" - I assume that answers the question above about how many watts the power supply is (although I don't know if 240W is good, bad or indifferent).
Bigger question would indeed be if there is enough room to put in an upgraded video card.

 

240W is pretty weak IMO. I'm not sure you could upgrade the graphics card without upgrading the supply to something more comfortable.

Do you mean internal ? Why would you have an external?