First timer. Is This Good?

M

milellie111

New Member
Hi guys, this is my first post here. I wanted to know if this is a good machine for the price, or if i could build one for cheaper:
HP Pavilion Elite E9250t

Intel Core i5-750
6GB DDR3-1066MHz SDRAM
640GB 7200 rpm SATA 3Gb/s hard drive
512MB ATI Radeon 4850 (DVI, HDMI, VGA)
Lightscribe 16x max DVD +/- R/RW Super Multi Drive/Blu Ray Rom Reader
Premium Wireless-N LAN Card
15 in 1 memory card reader
Integrated 7.1 channel sound
HP Multimedia Keyboard and optical mouse
Microsoft Works 9.0
Norton Internet Security 2010- 15 months
HP 21.5 inch Full HD Widescreen Monitor



All of this comes to $1016 with a government discount i get.

What are your thoughts?
 
Yes, pretty good deal considering a monitor is included, but it always scares me when they put 6Gigs of RAM in a Dual Channel motherboard.

The i5 runs on socket 1156, which is Dual Channel DDR3 (4 memory slots)

Would they go the extra mile and put 2x2Gig sticks and 2x1Gig sticks to make 6Gigs?

Scares me. I would think they would just put 3x2Gig sticks in, which would make the memory run in Single Channel.
 
Bodaggit23 said:
Yes, pretty good deal considering a monitor is included, but it always scares me when they put 6Gigs of RAM in a Dual Channel motherboard.

The i5 runs on socket 1156, which is Dual Channel DDR3 (4 memory slots)

Would they go the extra mile and put 2x2Gig sticks and 2x1Gig sticks to make 6Gigs?

Scares me. I would think they would just put 3x2Gig sticks in, which would make the memory run in Single Channel.
Click to expand...

How much more slow/less efficient is it if the memory is running in single channel?
 
milellie111 said:
How much more slow/less efficient is it if the memory is running in single channel?
Click to expand...

Very much. It could cause system instability and OS crashes.

You'd be much better off removing the third stick and just running 4Gigs.

I'm assuming the setup, as I don't know for sure. Just something to look out for.
 
Bodaggit23 said:
Very much. It could cause system instability and OS crashes.

You'd be much better off removing the third stick and just running 4Gigs.

I'm assuming the setup, as I don't know for sure. Just something to look out for.
Click to expand...

Yes, i checked and they put in 3 Dimms to make 6 Gigs. So, i should actually decline the 6 Gigs of Ram (which is a free upgrade) and stick to the 4? It would actually be faster that way?
 
milellie111 said:
Yes, i checked and they put in 3 Dimms to make 6 Gigs. So, i should actually decline the 6 Gigs of Ram (which is a free upgrade) and stick to the 4? It would actually be faster that way?
Click to expand...

If it's free, then take it, but I would remove the third stick, most definitely.
 
That's a definate must. take the extra RAM but remove the third stick as bodaggit said. You could keep it as a spare or sell it. pure profit :)
 
Running memory in single-channel won't cause any form of instability or crashes, that's actually the "normal" way of running memory, and dual/triple-channel actually gives more problems (though I should mention these are almost nonexistent as well, memory issues often are caused by the sticks themselves or other hardware fault rather than the "channelness"). All it doesis half the bandwidth, but since memory bandwidth rarely is the bottleneck anyways, this is often irrelevant. In real-world usage, unless you run some really bandwidth-intensive programs, you most likely aren't going to notice the difference. The fps difference in games is less than 5 in practically all scenarios, often even only 2 or so, if that.

Also, as far as memory goes, amount > speed in nearly all cases.
 
hackapelite said:
Running memory in single-channel won't cause any form of instability or crashes, that's actually the "normal" way of running memory, and dual/triple-channel actually gives more problems (though I should mention these are almost nonexistent as well, memory issues often are caused by the sticks themselves or other hardware fault rather than the "channelness"). All it doesis half the bandwidth, but since memory bandwidth rarely is the bottleneck anyways, this is often irrelevant. In real-world usage, unless you run some really bandwidth-intensive programs, you most likely aren't going to notice the difference. The fps difference in games is less than 5 in practically all scenarios, often even only 2 or so, if that.

Also, as far as memory goes, amount > speed in nearly all cases.
Click to expand...

But you only really need 4GB RAM anyways, right now.
 
Good deal. You don't need to take the RAM out. Just leave it as it is. Don't touch any hardware if unnecessary, it could void the warranty if you did.
 
daisymtc said:
Good deal. You don't need to take the RAM out. Just leave it as it is. Don't touch any hardware if unnecessary, it could void the warranty if you did.
Click to expand...

Removing a stick of RAM so the hardware performs as it's supposed to will void the warranty?

I would think hobbling the memory speed by adding the wrong number of modules would void the warranty first.
 
Bodaggit23 said:
Removing a stick of RAM so the hardware performs as it's supposed to will void the warranty?

I would think hobbling the memory speed by adding the wrong number of modules would void the warranty first.
Click to expand...

It used to be the case in the old days. I remember when I owning those pre-build machine, there is a sticker on the case, and if you break it to open the case, it void the warranty. Not sure if it still the case as I haven't been using these pre-build machine for ages.
 
daisymtc said:
It used to be the case in the old days.
I remember when I owning those pre-build machine, there is a sticker
on the case, and if you break it to open the case, it void the warranty.
Not sure if it still the case as I haven't been using these pre-build machine for ages.
Click to expand...

So, buying a prebuilt computer means you can never open the case to add
more memory or hard drive space? How about to blow the dust out? That's
just plain silly.

I would rather run 4Gigs of RAM in Dual Channel than 6Gigs of RAM in Single Channel, period.

To me:
6x1=6
4x2=8
 
Bodaggit23 said:
So, buying a prebuilt computer means you can never open the case to add
more memory or hard drive space? How about to blow the dust out? That's
just plain silly.

I would rather run 4Gigs of RAM in Dual Channel than 6Gigs of RAM in Single Channel, period.

To me:
6x1=6
4x2=8
Click to expand...



Is this true?
 
Bodaggit23 said:
Removing a stick of RAM so the hardware performs as it's supposed to will void the warranty?

I would think hobbling the memory speed by adding the wrong number of modules would void the warranty first.
Click to expand...
Opening the case might void the warranty, regardless of why you did it. Some companies, though, accept adding hardware / cleaning the components as a valid reason.

Also, I have no idea where you get this idea that it's "supposed" to run in dual-channel. Just because it has the capability, doesn't mean it's "supposed" to be run that way. Yes, it would make more sense to use the feature, but not doing so definitely won't "void the warranty" or cause any problems.

And as I explained, "hobbling the memory speed" is almost irrelevant in all real-world applications.

Bodaggit23 said:
I would rather run 4Gigs of RAM in Dual Channel than 6Gigs of RAM in Single Channel, period.

To me:
6x1=6
4x2=8
Click to expand...
You appear to have the impression that speed/bandwidth makes up for capacity... that's not the case. 4GB of RAM in dual-channel will NOT equal 8GB of RAM in single-channel. Capacity and speed are two entirely different things.

Is this true?
Click to expand...
The last part, no.
 
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