Budget classroom PC...?

[BJG]

...yeah, sorry, perennial boring question. I'm used to buying fairly high-end PCs, but our IT budget is severely curtailed so I'm looking for something basic and inexpensive to replace old failing dual-core machines, preferably all-in-one...i5 or even i3...any suggestions...? (Heard someone mention cashback...haven't done that before, sounds interesting.) Edited January 10, 2018 by BJG

[sparkeh]

Have a word with @ICTDirect_Dave

[yac2016]

Do you have a budget per unit you would not want to go over?

[newpersn]

...yeah, sorry, perennial boring question. I'm used to buying fairly high-end PCs, but our IT budget is severely curtailed so I'm looking for something basic and inexpensive to replace old failing dual-core machines, preferably all-in-one...i5 or even i3...any suggestions...? (Heard someone mention cashback...haven't done that before, sounds interesting.)

 

Mostly i3's (even some 7th Gen Pentiums).

 

All IT rooms are SSD's

 

Speak to Stone, Very-PC and even ICT Direct for some great refurbs.

[Roberto]

...yeah, sorry, perennial boring question. I'm used to buying fairly high-end PCs, but our IT budget is severely curtailed so I'm looking for something basic and inexpensive to replace old failing dual-core machines, preferably all-in-one...i5 or even i3...any suggestions...? (Heard someone mention cashback...haven't done that before, sounds interesting.)

 

What do you normally buy that you'd consider something based around an i5 to be basic?

 

We've actually had good results in classrooms with "recent Pentium"-based PCs with SSDs in them from Stone. They seem to build faster, perform just fine in our tests and overall seem to be very well balanced machines for most classroom tasks... though I probably wouldn't put any in our specialist music,design or autocad labs, though they do load and run both the autocad s/w and the adobe suite and cope with at least some workload much better than you'd expect.

[BJG]

...thanks...I've just been looking through this refurb thread, and since that's clearly regarded as acceptable, it sounds like a good plan...

[yac2016]

Just so you know you can new Lenovo SFF's for under £300 with 3 year warranty, i3 7th gens with SSD and HP G2 Minis 6th Gen i3's.

[Katy]

We used to get i5 equivalent from Dell (ages ago before they were called i3/i5/i7), then that scaled back to i5 Zoostorm, then further scaled back to i3 Zoostorm. Our last batch we got from Very PC and they suggested that we drop down from i3-7100 to Pentium G4600 as the performance is basically the same (same core count etc too) - in benchmarks I looked at there was a 1% difference in them. Dropping down to the Pentium also meant we got cheaper Windows licences, so we've basically cut our desktop cost in half since the Dell days.

 

The G4600s with 4GB RAM and SSD are perfectly fast enough for driving the IWBs or general student use.

[DJ-1701]

...Dropping down to the Pentium also meant we got cheaper Windows licences, so we've basically cut our desktop cost in half since the Dell days...

 

Interesting... how does that work? Refurbished licenses or something?

[Katy]

Interesting... how does that work? Refurbished licenses or something?

I've no idea, I didn't question it as the order form and invoice stated Windows licences included which was good enough for me. I think it was something about lower spec PCs... @VeryPC_Colin_M might know (how do you tag people in this??)

 

Edit: For the first time ever it has actually tagged/hyperlinked, making my previous comment look stupid

[DJ-1701]

I've no idea, I didn't question it as the order form and invoice stated Windows licences included which was good enough for me. I think it was something about lower spec PCs... @VeryPC_Colin_M might know (how do you tag people in this??)

 

You just did!

 

Edit: For the first time ever it has actually tagged/hyperlinked, making my previous comment look stupid

 

Not at all, we have all had fun with mentions at some point in time.

Edited January 10, 2018 by DJ-1701

[jmak]

Interesting... how does that work? Refurbished licenses or something?

There used to be a Microsoft scheme called Technology Access Programme, which superceded their Shape the Future scheme.

@Katy made a good call with Very PC - I couldn't remember the details, but after a Google the first mention was on one of their blogs:

 

https://www.very-pc.co.uk/blog/tap-device-specs-upped-by-microsoft

 

No idea if it's still going, but I would say that for general classroom/office use, the quad core Pentiums give plenty of performance - we've got some that are over three years old now with 4GB RAM and some SSDs and they run fine.

 

I also just bought a refurb Dell 5440 laptop with an i5, a new SSD and battery from ICT Direct for around £300 and it absolutely flies.

[Notperfect]

We've gone with refurbs and I've been impressed with the spec we can get for the money. The machines from ICT-direct were spotless and excellent value, I'd give them a call.

[Bev]

I'm intrigued by this post, as I was just looking for suggestions on replacing our ICT Suite PC's which are coming up to 7 years old, they are Stone i3 with 4GB. From the sounds of this thread, they should still be ok but they are struggling and my gut reaction was that at 7 years old it was time to replace them.

Can you get someone in to refurbish existing PCs? How straightforward is it to replace the Hard Drives with SSD drives?

[PotNoodleTech]

Bev replacing the HDD with SSD will transform those stone PCs from useless to awesome! You will need to build/rebuild/reinstall the PC once you fit in a blank SSD drive.

 

FOR the OP - we only buy refurb dell OptiPlex and latitude now - no sense in spending double or more for the sake of newness. most of us wouldn't bother buying a brand spanking new car as it's a waste of money - why do we do it with PCs??!!

[3s-gtech]

I know I bang on about it, but honestly I believe that there's no greater upgrade for an old PC switching from HDD to SSD. It's one of the easiest and most cost effective upgrades there is. We went 100% (other than Macs in warranty) SSD in 2014 - as well as restoring life to our oldest kit (we're still running some HP DC7700s, with early Core 2 Duo CPUs) it has greatly reduced support calls because I found HDDs fail all the damn time.

 

My most notable comparison was when I upgraded our late 2009 iMacs to SSD (C2D 2GHz, 4GB RAM). They were markedly and consistently faster than our new (at the time) Broadwell i5 powered Mac Minis which had horrible, miserable 5400rpm HDDs in them.

[HTCPCP]

Thankfully not in that position any more - however, it was the Very-PC machines that we used to buy - and Colin always was good with prices too.

 

However, do not be tempted by the Viglen devices - poor build, shoddy components, terrible support.

 

If the machines are still working but slow - strip down, clean out and swap the hard drive for a SSD, and you can get a couple of years extra life from them for not a huge outlay. Takes a bit of work your end, but I always find tinkering inside a machine to be quite enjoyable!

[Priscilla110]

Cheap yet strong. I'm looking for something around this same range

[Blue_Cookeh]

We opted for NUCs from VeryPC mounted to the back of Iiyama monitors from Insight. A full workstation was around the £300 mark for reasonable specs.

[ICTDirect_Dave]

Hi Hi!

 

Sorry It's taken a while to say hello.

 

I've been away with the family and today is my first morning back in the office!

 

We've got some smashing refurbished machines, and I've just seen that we have around 400 Core i5 (3rd/4th gen) due to come into stock by the middle of Feb.

 

Drop me a line if you'd like to talk?