Re: Microsoft to force new Outlook on Windows 10 PCs

On Wed, 1/15/2025 3:52 PM, -hh wrote:

On 1/15/25 2:32 PM, Joel wrote:

-hh <recscuba_google@huntzinger.com> wrote:

On 1/15/25 10:46 AM, Joel wrote:

Chris <ithinkiam@gmail.com> wrote:
>

Linux is the only option worth pursuing.  macOS is weird and
expensive, Windows is bloatware beyond belief.

>
macOS is free. Just needs a $600 mac to run it on.

>
Windows Home preinstalled on volume-produced gear is virtually free,
self-installed Linux completely free, but yes that "$600" you cite
isn't cheap for the device it buys.  That OS upgrades are free is just
to incentivize buying/using an Apple device.

>
Where said "isn't cheap" $600 is ~half what Joel's already spent...
>
...or for when the Lady protests too much, after deducting off his
alleged $200 mistake of a second Windows OS license, roughly 50% less
($600 vs ($1150 - $200 = $950).
>
But don't let actual math get in one's way of a good narrative!  /s

>
>
You keep including my monitor or video card or something, those were
choice add-ons that I could've trivially avoided with another HD
monitor.
>

 
Monitor?  Nope.
 
Video Card?  Yup:  because you said that even though you'd researched your gear, you quickly realized that you screwed up as the i5's included one was inadequate for your desires.  But even if we subtract off the $100 you spent here, its still $600 vs your $850 spent
 
But do feel free to provide a detailed cost list.
 
Because even the $100 you spent on the video card is subtracted off too, your $850 spent is still higher than $600, but now its only by +30%.
 
 
-hh

But you have control of your expenses.

It all depends on your objectives and budget.

An upgrade could be $500 or it could be $2000.

If you build your own computers, you can reuse
PSU, computer case (my daily driver case is 25 years old),
keyboard, mouse, and so on. My daily driver case, I think
that's about the fourth motherboard.

An upgrade can be mobo, CPU, RAM.
Maybe $200 for mobo, $100 for some RAM, $150 for CPU.
It wouldn't be much of an upgrade, but it would depend
on what you were driving previously.

The trick to hitting points like this, is to look
at trailing-edge parts. When the kids are buying DDR5
systems, you buy a DDR4 system. As long as the market
has some legs, a few reduced-cost motherboards will be
issued in a second wave (intended to "mop up" the
old processors), offering a small savings. The RAM can
be cheaper to quite a lot cheaper, than the current generation
RAM (DDR5).

The CPUs start off strong on price, but if you wait
long enough, the price of the lower end ones comes down.
The apex processor, the price does not usually drop
enough to make that an option for a budget consumer.

As long as the CPU has an iGPU, that "reduces the video card
tax on building a system". I have a 5600G and a 5700G, and
those have an iGPU. Can I play Crysis at 30FPS. No.
I can only play solitaire on those. They have movie decoders,
so movie playback does not load the machine at all.

To get the top CPU clock speed, you usually end up buying a
lot of cores you might not have wanted or needed. They don't
usually make 2 core CPUS that run at 6GHz. If they did, we
would buy those... because they would be very useful and
offer a "kick" the normal spread of CPUs does not offer.

You can use the Windows OS with the infinite grace period
if you want, or you can get one of those $20 licenses off
the Internet instead. Some people in the newsgroup here, have
partaken of the bargain items. No particular drama to mention.
Sometimes one of those keys does not work, but the merchant
doesn't usually make a fuss and another key will be sent.

*******

The enthusiast sites have more info, if you need it.

https://www.tomshardware.com/best-picks/best-pc-builds-gaming

   Paul