Moving; trying to decide which computer to keep

H

HEDoubleRAMStix

New Member
I am moving residences this summer and was wondering which older Dell computer I should keep? Both are old Core 2 Quads that would be basically an HTPC for watching movies on.

I have:
Dell Optiplex 780 Mini tower (BTX design)
Core 2 Quad Q9550 2.83 GHz
6GB DDR3
AMD Radeon HD 6570 2GB

Dell Studio 540 Mini Tower
Core 2 Quad Q9650 3.0 GHz
10GB DDR2
500W aftermarket PSU
Nvidia Geforce GTX 950

I have an i7 4790K machine I built myself a year ago, but I use it strictly for gaming. Plus its noisy (7 case fans plus GTX 970).
 
i would say keep the studio 540 much better video card, more ram, a little faster cpu.
 
The reason you would have 7 case fans, in my opinion, are to run them all at 30-50% speed, thus still keeping the machine quiet.
You can spend a lot of money making a noiseless PC, but you don't have to spend a lot, if anything, to make a quiet PC. Just configure your fans.
 
I ended up keeping the 780. I switched the Q9650 that was in the Studio and put it in the Optiplex. Also the Geforce GTX 950 is overkill for a Core 2 based system (and more power hungry than a GTX 745).

I really like the Optiplex designs for 2006 to 2009 (The GX520 to 780). They feel indestructible like a tank. Plus, the DDR3 SDRAM is upgradable all the way to 16GB.

I'm going to keep the GTX 950 in storage until I build an AMD Zen computer around the holidays.

HEDoubleRAMStix said:
I am moving residences this summer and was wondering which older Dell computer I should keep? Both are old Core 2 Quads that would be basically an HTPC for watching movies on.

I have:
Dell Optiplex 780 Mini tower (BTX design)
Core 2 Quad Q9550 2.83 GHz
6GB DDR3
AMD Radeon HD 6570 2GB

Dell Studio 540 Mini Tower
Core 2 Quad Q9650 3.0 GHz
10GB DDR2
500W aftermarket PSU
Nvidia Geforce GTX 950

I have an i7 4790K machine I built myself a year ago, but I use it strictly for gaming. Plus its noisy (7 case fans plus GTX 970).
Click to expand...
 
HEDoubleRAMStix said:
I'm going to keep the GTX 950 in storage until I build an AMD Zen computer around the holidays.
Click to expand...
That doesn't really make any sense to me, but whatever you think man.

I'd put the slower card in storage, at idle there really isn't a difference in power consumption. If you're really that worried about 30 watts (and about 5x more performance) then unscrew one of your lightbulbs while playing to compensate.
 
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