Tips for PC buyers in the fall of 1995

    It is curious to look into the past and compare how computers have changed. For example, here is an article on October 30, 1995 ( scan ), the author of which gives users advice on components. He notes that in just a couple of years, prices have fallen dramatically - and now is the time to buy: “Back in 1993, we saw advertisements for 9600 baud modems for only $ 500, and Dell offered a top-end model with a 486 processor 66 MHz, 8 MB of memory and 320 MB of hard drive for $ 4400. Single-speed CD-ROM drives sold for $ 600. Today, if you want to buy such equipment, then it will cost 10-25% less than two years ago! ”, The author of the article rejoices. There have been changes in the typical configuration of the average PC.

    Memory (RAM). Most manufacturers seem to have adopted the 8 megabyte standard, compared with 4 megabytes in 1994. Do not buy less than eight. The performance difference between a computer with eight megabytes of memory and four can be radical.

    Hard drives : This year, 1 gigabyte drives have become common, compared with 400-500 megabytes last year. The difference in price is only about $ 200, but this money pays for itself.

    Monitors . In 1995, we came to the conclusion that 15-inch monitors became the standard compared to the 14-inch monitors of the past, but one inch is not such a big difference. If you want a truly large monitor, then take the 17-inch, which is $ 400 more expensive.

    Video. Now there are 24-bit video cards with special graphics accelerators, and although they look great in performance tests, in fact, the presence of a graphics accelerator is not critical, as the performance of processors and memory is growing. The 24-bit function affects the color depth - this means that a computer can display more than 256 colors (8-bit color). A 24-bit video card can display up to 17 million colors - this is great if you can somewhere find an image with so many colors, but very few programs support this. So you do not need to upgrade to 24-bit color from a standard 256-color display: many inexpensive video cards support 32,000 or 64,000 color modes, which is already a significant improvement.

    Sound cards. In 1995, we see more and more cards with support for wavetable synthesis, which provides a more realistic transmission of musical instruments. But then again, not many software require this: the plasma-broster sound in DOOM is not a musical instrument. If you don’t work professionally with music, for now you can ignore the wavetable sound.

    Modems . The 14.4k models gradually leave the stage, giving way to 28.8k. I prefer to take 28.8k for $ 100 more, although 14.4k is enough for email.

    CD-ROM. In 1994, two-speed drives were mainstream, and four-speed drives were only planned in the future. Well, the future has come. I’d like to say that you don’t need extra speed here, but I think that software developers assume that people have already switched to 4x, so upgrade if finances allow.

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