New desktop/tower advice needed

Before 2000 i could afford to replace my computer every 6 months or so and kept very knowledgeable of the technologies.

Since 2000 i have been standing at the train station with the train (aka, technology) long gone past.

I need guidance.

The last computer i bought was in roughly 2013. I am not a gamer. Primarily i run a very large highly VBA coded Excel project for my own business along with other Office apps, Acrobat (pro) and GIMP, though i do enjoy excellent graphics even though my monitors (i use two) are older generation ASUS VS228.

Due to the extended time i keep my computer (courtesy of economics), i wish to plan on another long time solution.

Due to my thinking from roughly ten to fifteen years ago i recall that building my own computer from scratch was not much cheaper than a Dell computer deal, and as i no longer am intelligent enough to properly select components, i probably am safer with a Dell if i do not get external guidance otherwise.

It is therefore that i am considering a Dell XPS Desktop as follows:

• processor 12th Gen Intel® Core™ i7-12700 (25 MB cache, 12 cores, 20 threads, 2.10 GHz to 4.90 GHz Turbo)
  
• Windows 11 Pro, English
  
• NVIDIA® GeForce RTX™ 3060 Ti, 8 GB GDDR6
  
• 16 GB, 2 x 8 GB, DDR5, 4400 MHz; up to 128 GB (add'l mem sold separately)
  
• 512GB PCIe M.2 Class 40 SSD (Boot) + 1TB 7200RPM HDD (Storage))
  
• Performance CPU liquid cooling
  
• Intel® Killer Wi-Fi 6E (6 where 6E unavailable) AX211, 2x2, 802.11ax, MU-MIMO, Bluetooth 5.2
  
• 460W Night Sky Bezel Chassis not including optical drive

As to the drives, i really don't think i need the HDD they offer, i'd certainly prefer a second SSD of a 1GB to 2GB size, but i will have to ask them if i can do that. I prefer a smaller primary drive because i think (not know) that if the OS is on a smaller drive it will run quicker.

I also have to ask them if the video card can be reconfigured for a second monitor and if i need to get anything extra to make it connect to the two ASUS VS228 monitors i have.

I need to understand how all the changes to USB will impact what i am using, for all my USB interfaces are the original USB A type, two of them have dongles (? the little plugs without wires) for my Logitech keyboard and mouse, another for my camera (for video chats though rarely used) and one for my Epson Scanner. Perhaps all of these could be interfaced with adapters?

And so, the reason i am posting here is to get the advice of people who, unlike me these days, actually know what they are doing. The Dell, configured as outlined above, would be $1,259.99 (Why can't they just show $1,260???).

In that i am presently running 8GB DDR2, i suspect 16GB DDR5 is good, but how does this seem to you, given my lack of gaming?

I presume that it would have internal SATA connectors so i can connect my present internal drives and transfer data; i hope not to find out otherwise.

Is this a fair price vs. digging in my heels and researching all components and building my own from scratch?

Thoughts on other configuration changes?

I can't thank you folks enough - this is a very important purchase for me and one that i really shouldn't afford right now but my present computer is starting to glitch and instead of nickel and dime patches and upgrades, i wish a solution for some time to come. I got killed by the 1999 Michigan economy and never have really recovered, so retirement will come when i die. That isn't meant to be morbid for i doubt i would ever be comfortable not working; just that my computer is as important to my business as keeping most of my marbles in my head - without it i can not operate.

Once again, thank you for your knowledge, expertise and consideration; i am grateful.

P.S.: I am running W10 with all the updates presently and though i have no reason to go to W11, i guess that comes with the purchase.

In all honesty that is over kill if all you do is VBA like stated. XPS is Dell's gaming flagship its intended for gaming there is a lot of wasted and redundant potential here if you buy this for VBA lol.

Go with something consumer business grade. I mean if you got that money and don't mind and want overhead sure becasue that is good to have but i mean you could even go with something 10 years older than what you have currently and its going to be much faster.

You say DDR2 so this means anything after slot series and P4, 771 up to 775. You could go anything from the last 10 years and it will be substantially faster than what you already have and if sourced correctly on the used market would cost not much at all.

idk it comes down to can you justify the means? really depends if you want new? or you want to save money?

also this is just my 2 cents but you did ask, at the end of the day who cares what other people say do what you feel like.

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business grade computer will be more suited to application workloads like Excel which is what you want. There will be speed and performance in the places it matters vs XPS where all the performance is where you don't need it coz its suited to gaming, you don't need a gaming GPU for Exel for example.

Thank you!!!

Glad to hear; i am willing to spend a little more to achieve overkill just to cushion me for any more intense uses in the future as i expect to use the new box for five to ten years (if i am still alive). One of the most frustrating things i run into is what i believe is a cyclical save of the Excel program that i use for work, as this can take perhaps 10 seconds, give or take, whereupon everything comes to a halt (locks up) and if i dare try to do something in both Excel and Outlook at the same (almost) time, the lock up can extend well beyond that.

My concerns now are whether the processor is a good choice (for a while i was using AMD CPUs), and the choice of RAM & SSD.

Many thanks for letting me know; for a bit i thought maybe i posted in the wrong area, but i wanted the opinion of the best pros, and the folks that build their computers themselves are going to be the most knowledgeable!

edit: Interesting - Can you tell me what i should look for specifically that would provide me with those targeted capabilities? Such as manufacturer of CPU and attributes (threads, onboard cache,...) and likewise to that which i simply don't have the knowledge to look for?

Sure that Cpu is bleeding edge compared to what you will have now it really is overkill though for VBA though i am not being funny.

12 cores 20 threads 5ghz boost we are kind of talking like notepad vs Goliath here. Small n vs big G

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brucemc777 said:

edit: Interesting - Can you tell me what i should look for specifically that would provide me with those targeted capabilities? Such as manufacturer of CPU and attributes (threads, onboard cache,...) and likewise to that which i simply don't have the knowledge to look for?

Yep just buy something that is windows 11 compliant and you cannot go wrong. I only say this because it means two things one you can do win11 and two its going to be modern and modern means fast.

Outside of this 8gb ram is probably considered the bare minimum for business applications and 16gb would be the sweet spot price performance amount. Anything above this you would need to justify against your required workloads.

i3 or i5 again it depends really you need to know what your requirements are. VBA only then you only need an i3 go i5 for redundancy at the end of the day get what you feel. You ain't need 20 threads for VBA though lol.

This is gaming or other intrusive tasks like real time rendering or AI etc warranting these sorts of threads.

To be sure i don't do something stoooooopid, if i read you - i would be better off going with i5 and 32GB RAM than i7 and the 16 i a contemplating, right? And is there a feel for intel vs. AMD vs. anything else out there?

Many thanks!

Two remaining questions:

1. What the heck are you doing up at this hour (local)?
2. I also use the computer as a media server at home. Does this make any difference?

Yeah Night owl , media server is not really a defining factor unless you are doing some advanced networking but if you are doing just a basic file share type thing then you don't have to account for that because any computer on the network can do this. Depends what you mean by media server i guess as that can be as broad or not broad as it sounds.

I have a bunch of movies and comedy series on the hard drive that i watch on one of the televisions... :)

Many, many thanks for all of your help, you have saved me from making a pretty costly mistake. Now sorting out the differences between exactly what the primary difference is between OptiPlex, Precision and Inspiron, then applying your knowledge will work with an i5, 16GB RAM unit with a 256GB M.2 PCIE NVMe from them, and add an additional 2TB one from Crucial.

THANK YOU!

i guess also at the end of the day price is a big factor between two computers if you can get something that is way more powerful for similar price A vs B then you might as well as it does not matter at that point because price would be the defining factor and not workload requirements.