Buying a new PC

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Mikener
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Buying a new PC

Post by Mikener »

I am new to PHP. I am planning on buying a PC that runs XP. Before I buy the PC I would like opinions on the following:

1. Is a 2.0 MHZ too slow to run PHP? If so, what speed would you recommend?

2. How much memory should I install?

3. How much disk space do I need?

4. Besides a scanner, is there anything else you would recommend that I buy.


Thanks
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phice
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Post by phice »

1) I'm betting that you mean GHz, and not MHz. And yes, 2.0 GHz is plenty CPU speed to run a server.

2) Atleast 256mb (I would recommend 512)

3) Atleast 40gb

4) That's all!
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m3rajk
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Post by m3rajk »

if you're just using it as a dev environment you can do like me. pull and old comp outta the closet, bump up the hd, the ram, and put a STABLE os on instead of something microsoft (sorry, but if the os has inherint memory leaks it's not stable. the memory leaks require that it be rebooted every so often. posix doesn't have memory leaks. windows has sh*tloads of memory leaks)

i took an old p1 (pre-mmx)/166 and changed outthe hd (2.5 gb to 20.0 gb) and am using that as a dev (LAMP) platform.

that's working fine. the comp is maxedout in it's memory... at 64 mb.

if you buy somehting new, the fsb is what you really have to care about. the faster the fsb the faster the communication between the processor and everything else. you shoulf get a min of 256 mb ram, but like phice said, if you're buying new: get 512 or more

if you're not getting a p4, go amd. the athlons are a chip that's competitive witht he p4s. the celerons are a joke compared to p4s.

fsb with amd right now is 266 mhz

if you're not sure what to do, or wanna wait a little anyway, the general populace 64 bit from amd should be hittin g the market by the end of the year, unlike the server ones that intel has, and unlike the g5, the chip itself is backward compatabile with 32 bit oses (meaning you'll see a speed improvement and no drawbacks). the g5 actually needs a program to be backward compatabile. if it's not in the bios then apple screwed up worse than i've heard. they wont have a 64 bit os until sometime next year. the delay ont he 64 bit chip from amd is due to something dealing with ati... they wanna release a 64 bit videocard at the same time. i've been told rumors the amd chip is already perfected but they are waiting on ati due to a monetary incentive. if that's true then intel's gonna get it's ass kicked.. because i know several companies have already started work on 64 bit oses due to the g5 release

don't wait for an intel 64 bit chip. theree's a rumor they put their commercial one on the shelf, and it was never an extenstion of the x86 architecture anyway. when they made the 32 bit they had two, the x86 extension took off, the other one flopped. so even if they didn't can it for one that's an x86 extension...
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m3mn0n
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Post by m3mn0n »

As much memory as possible. Depending on how much sites u host, 20-40 GB is more than enough. And cpu speed of 2.0 GHz is a boost if your site is a traffic heavy one, but 1.x and even >1.0 is ok.
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