If your computer is over 5 years old I encourage you to upgrade to a new PC.  There have been a lot of improvements to the personal computer in the last several years, both in price and performance.  In the past you could figure on spending $1,200.00 to $1,500.00 on a new desktop computer and usually more if it was a laptop.  Now, you can spend as little as $500.00 to $700.00 and get magnitudes of performance over your older computer. 

For an example several years ago I spent $1,200.00 dollars on a brand name computer that had a 1.8Ghz processor (1 gigahertz (GHz) equals 1,000,000,000 calculations per second), 2GB RAM (1 gigabytes = 1,000,000,000 bytes /characters), and a 40GB hard drive (note, if you don’t know what RAM and GB are please check out our article “ What are these Strange Computer Terms?”).  This year I bought an HP Pavillion for $450.00, I got a great deal.  The computer has a 2.6Ghz processor, 6GB of RAM, and a 650GB hard drive.  And that was at the beginning of the year.  Since then Intel, the big micro processor maker has come out with a whole new line of processors.  If you want the latest and greatest go for it, but remember you will be paying a premium for the newest technology.

Why did I buy a new computer? 

I basically ran out of hard drive space.  I was constantly deleting old files from my 60GB hard drive so I could try out new program.  I kept looking at all the new machines with 500GB drives plus.  And even though I had a large external hard drive, my laptop was just getting too old and slow.  When I went looking for the new computer I wasn’t exactly sure what I wanted, another laptop, a desktop.  I liked WindowsXP and I didn’t want to trade it in for all the troubles people were having with their Vista machines.  I read good reviews about Window 7 and was happy to settle on a HP Pavillion with an AMD Athlon, quad core, 64bit processor, with 6GB of memory, a 650GB hard drive and Windows 7.  I paid $450.00 for the computer, mouse and keyboard.  I matched it up with my Acer flat screen display and have been happy ever since.