Reuse, Reboot: Used computers a bargain for basic needs

By David Steinkraus
Journal Times

Friday, December 5, 2008 10:43 AM CST

They wink at you from televisions, beckon from magazine ads — new, shiny computers that will satisfy your heart’s every desire.

But do you really need them? What if you could fulfill every desire and spend less?

Talk to area dealers in used computers, and you’ll find that an older machine can do what you want and save you a bundle.

From behind the desk at Harbor PC, 3208 Washington Ave., in Racine, owner Kevin Conrad took a Sony Vaio laptop, small and blue, weighing a few pounds and with a 12-inch screen. It’s three to four years old, and he was preparing it for resale.

“Laptops are hot this year. I actually sell them as fast as I can get them in,” he said.

People like them because laptops can be moved, either within a home or to a coffee shop for checking e-mail and browsing the Internet. And that Sony laptop with its Pentium 4 processor and the ability to read DVDs and burn CDs will do well for most basic needs and will cost about $250, he said.

Laptops can be fragile, however, and not everyone needs mobility, said Michael Pitsch, executive director of Tech Corps Wisconsin which recently moved into new space at 2051 Lathrop Ave. (the old Aldi’s store behind Family Video).

Basics

For first-time buyers, Pitsch said, he recommends a $100 computer. There’s a keyboard, mouse, monitor, and of course the computer’s hardware in a small tower enclosure. Many first-time buyers don’t want to invest a great deal of money, he said, and it takes them about a year to become proficient in using a computer.

“But if they use a $100 computer for a year, it costs them 8 bucks a month to have it,” he said. What can you get for 8 bucks a month?”

For most people’s needs — Internet exploration, word processing, and e-mail — a basic, older computer will be just fine. It will even play some games, said Jimmy McCormick, a computer technician at Microcomp Services Inc. in Union Grove.

“All the simple stuff works,” he said. “But when you get more into the stuff that’s being advertised on TV, those aren’t going to run.”

Moving up in price a couple of hundred dollars buys you a faster processor — the computer’s brain—maybe more working memory (RAM) to store information for the processor to work on, maybe a disc drive that will allow you to create CDs or DVDs, maybe a larger hard disk so you can store more documents, photos, or videos.

You may be wondering precisely what you’re paying for in a new machine aside from the ability to run the latest video games.

“You’re getting the ability to run a few windows of Explorer, and Word, and another program or whatever, e-mail or accounting-type program simultaneously,” Pitsch said.

Beyond basics

“The most important thing is what the customer is looking to do with it versus what the capacity of the computer is,” Pitsch said.

So a family with a teenager who has an audio player such as an iPod and perhaps a digital camera should consider one of the $200 or $300 machines that have the processor power to handle more demanding tasks and perhaps a disc drive to make CDs.

Lower-end computers are even capable of running some photo- or video-editing software. However, McCormick said, most of the people he talks to are home users and are primarily interested in storing photos and videos, not doing extensive editing.

In Harbor PC are three Apple iMacs, $75 each, which are perfectly capable of running Adobe Photoshop, the top-end photo editing software, Conrad said.

The all-in-one design of those machines does limit the user’s ability to expand their capabilities, he said.

But in 15 years he’s never seen a virus-infected Apple, and Apples tend to last a bit longer. Older machines will run the newer version of Apple’s operating system, which is not true of Windows, he said.

And speaking of operating systems, one advantage to some people may be the fact that older Windows machines run Windows XP, the previous version of Microsoft’s operating system. Many people are comfortable with it, and some people have found the newer Windows Vista to be unstable.

“Doing the repairs that I do, I see problems with Vista,” Conrad said. “When Windows Vista is broken, it’s broken.”

That is not to say Microsoft won’t eventually fix Vista. Conrad believes that will happen, but not for a while, which is what happened with XP. New computers won’t run XP, he said.

There are small bits of software that control disk drives and other components, and for new computers there are no XP versions of these.

The basic machines at Tech Corps have Windows 2000 installed, Pitsch said, and more expensive models have XP. At Microcomp in Union Grove, McCormick said that some machines he’s seen are running Windows 98, which also still works for basic tasks. Again, those work well for basic use.

Another point which these independent computer dealers talk about is the reliability of their machines.

Most are corporate surplus, computers leased by a company and then auctioned off when the lease expires after two or three years.

Very cheap, brand new, consumer-level computers may last a year before they malfunction, Conrad said. But corporate-surplus machines which cost $250 now were worth $1,500 three years ago and were made to run for years without being shut down.

Upgrades

There may be an even less-expensive computer solution for you, and that is an upgrade. The most cost-effective change you can make is to increase the working memory, the RAM. In some cases, Conrad said, a $25 investment will double the memory and nearly double performance. You can have a larger hard drive installed to store more files, or about $60 will get you a disc drive to create DVDs.

Buying a new processor may work or may not, McCormick said.

It depends on the price of the all the parts and what someone wants to do, and in some cases a new computer may be cheaper than buying a bunch of separate parts.

Computer parts are like car parts, Pitsch said. The ease of finding them is related to how old a machine is, and eventually buyers pay a premium for the time parts have been sitting on a shelf.

That brings up another point which the independent dealers talked about—the advantage of buying from a local firm.

Computers leave Tech Corps with an operating system installed, with anti-virus and anti-spam software, and with either Microsoft Office or, for lower priced machines, the free Open Office alternative to Microsoft Office.

McCormick said Microcomp will install software depending on what people want to do with their computers so that it becomes almost a custom product.

And there’s care. All these used computer dealers offer warranties on their machines. Customer service is the bread and butter of small businesses, Conrad said.

“We’ll be taking care of the people who purchase stuff here — always,” he said.

Reuse better than recycle

“Recycling is good, but reusing is great,” said Micheal Pitsch, executive director of Tech Corps Wisconsin.

That’s because while recycling saves on resources to make materials from scratch, reusing an old computer doesn’t require anything at all, other than perhaps some fuel to move the machine around.

The Indiana Recycling Coalition puts it this way: The manufacture of one desktop computer and a CRT monitor (the big ones that work like old televisions) requires 1.9 tons of materials. The reuse of a computer, by resale or upgrade, uses between five and 20 less energy than recycling.

Looked at another way, and based on an article in Microsoft’s Technet magazine, resuing a computer is the equivalent of removing one-half of a car from the road for a year.

Tips for buying used

Going out for a used computer? Here are some points to keep in mind.

* Have an idea of what you want to do with your machine. Are you a complete newcomer to computers? Will you be doing only e-mail and Internet browsing. Will you also be working on photos or home videos, or do you want to create CDs or DVDs? Knowing this will help you determine what computer will suit your purpose?

* If you have a piece of software that you want to use, check the box. It will tell you how powerful a computer you must have in order to use the program. Likewise, if you’re going out to buy software, make sure you check the specifications of your computer first so you know that it can run what you buy.

* Make sure you have the license codes and any other documentation that may come with software on a used machine. Without those license codes, said Kevin Conrad of Harbor PC in West Racine, you aren’t entitled to whatever support software makers may provide, and you may not be eligible for software upgrade discounts.

* Go with someone who knows computers, or educate yourself. You need that, said Jimmy McCormick of Microcomp Services Inc. in Union Grove, because sales people will throw a lot of words at you that you may not understand, with the result that you buy more computer than you will use.

“We’ll tell you all about it, but I can’t speak for everyone,” he said.

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