Well, from your statements, it seemed you were advocating saving money as much as possible, even when said savings came at the expense of features those users  would notice in every day use. Remember about 2-3 years ago, firefox and chrome used vastly less memory than it does now,  so for everyday web browsing, memory usage is likely to increase further as processes of the browser are split out. Therefore, the user should get 16 gb of memory, which is the absolute minimum for desktops these days, while it is the midrange option for laptops.

If someone uses a computer for browsing, e-mail, streaming, and word processing and they don't anticipate doing anything of a computer intensive nature in the future, why overspend and overpurchase.  A lot of people know, or can be reasonably confident, of approximately how they will use computers.  If someone anticipates that they will do something like video editing in the future, they may want a higher capacity computer.  If someone anticipates becoming a gamer, playing games that do well on very powerful computers but they aren't now, that's one thing.  But a lot of people pretty well know that they want and will probably continue to want to use a computer in x or y ways without much change or without much change that will require more capacity.  I am not, nor did I, advocate buying the cheapest computer you can find, but would you tell someone to buy a racing car if they intend to do typical city and highway driving and have no intention of racing? 

 

Gene

----- Original Message -----

From: enes sarıbaş

Sent: Tuesday, May 26, 2020 8:36 AM

To: main@TechTalk.groups.io

Subject: Re: [TechTalk] Question: Comparing Performance of Modern 8th, 9th or 10th gen I5 vs I7 Intel Chips

If you buy a machine that just barely meets your needs and has nothing extra to future proof it, it is like buying a horse when you need a car. It might look smart  initially, but it is a really bad idea, as you will more than likely need to upgrade down the road. But at least for ram usually it is upgradable, not so with the processor in laptops, though even in desktops you can dismount it and upgrade.

On 5/26/2020 2:47 AM, Gene wrote:

I don't know what you are running burt I really don't think your experience is representative.  I am very skeptical that typical computer users would come anywhere near using eight GB of RAM.  This needs to be discussed.  My guess is that by adding 8 more GB of RAM to a machine that already has eight, you may spend one-hundred more dollars, which is a lot of money to spend if you don't need to. 

Gene

----- Original Message -----

From: enes sarıbaş

Sent: Monday, May 25, 2020 10:33 PM

To: main@TechTalk.groups.io

Subject: Re: [TechTalk] Question: Comparing Performance of Modern 8th, 9th or 10th gen I5 vs I7 Intel Chips

But the real problem is, will 8gb  be enough for the future? When I was given this laptop,  it had had ram downgraded from 8 gb single channel to 4 gb single channel. After a year, to improve performance, and because ram was being used alot by windows and the antivirus, I got 8 gb, another 4 gb stick. Now I would  not get anything under 8 gb. With a single browser, and a few standard background apps running, I only have around 2 gb of ram free, which is a really small margin for error. If she can aford it, I would also recommend a minimum of an i5 of the newer generation, or even better an AMD ryzen 3000 series processor, which deliver superior performance without being too expensive. The generations the older they are with Intel are worse affected by the meltdown and spectre fixes, which continuously degrade performance. An i3 or lower also lacks many standard features on a processor, such as turbo boost, and hyperthreading, which will be clear to see in daily performance. Remember it is essential that you buy a system anticipating the needs of the future.  In my experience, browsers appear to be the programs that are most resource intensive.

On 5/22/2020 8:34 PM, Gene wrote:

To clarify, I'm not saying performance would be roughly equivalent if she were a demanding user.  There may be no way to get this person to change her mind if, for some reason, she Is determined to get what she wants.  If she wants to spend hundreds of dollars for performance she will never use, get a sports car when a compact would do fine, that Is her decision. Performance will be fine for what she is going to use the computer for, I would expect it to be about the same. 

 

Extended warranties are generally a waste of money for computers.  If nothing goes wrong within the first few months and the computer is used a good deal during that time, the odds are that nothing will or nothing serious for years.  To document what I'm saying, if you do a search for somethin like is extended warranty worth getting for computer, you will see result after result saying generally not.  I saw one or two saying that it might be worth it if you anticipate placing a lptop in situations where damage is likely but in general, I didn't see one of the first six or seven results advising people to get one. 

 

The person may, of course, spend money in any way she wants.  I am trying to save her perhaps hundreds of dollars.  She definitely doesn't need more than 8gb of RAM and her uses are, by today's standards, very undemanding of computer power. 

 

I more or less discussed my thoughts before but I'm expanding them to discuss other things such as the warranty.  I don't recall if you discussed memory before, but the majority of users will never use 16GB of RAM and she won't ever come anywhere nere exceeding 8 if she uses the computer as described. 

 

My concern isn't particularly whether she gets a Del, since I don't know how their prices compare with other brands.  My concern is that, whatever she gets, she for some reason has ideas of what she wants that bear no relation to what she needs and may well cost her hundreds of extra dollars.

 

Of course, if she is determined to get what she wants, that's up to her.

 

Gene

----- Original Message -----

From: David Goldfield

Sent: Friday, May 22, 2020 1:27 PM

To: main@TechTalk.groups.io

Subject: [TechTalk] Question: Comparing Performance of Modern 8th, 9th or 10th gen I5 vs I7 Intel Chips

I initially posted this series of questions on the NVDA chat subgroup. I
received some helpful and interesting messages from Gene, which gave me
a lot to think about. I'd like to repost my questions on this group to
seek additional opinions, particularly from those of you who may have
some direct experience in using and comparing these chips.

I'm assisting a friend in purchasing a new computer. At the moment she
feels that she wants to stick with Dell. She wants a desktop with an SSD
and, to best future proof this machine, I'd like it to have 16 GB of
RAM. Her needs are modest: email with Outlook, document editing with
Word, Web browsing and basic Excel functions. In other words we're
talking about Office and Web browsing.

No video editing, no gaming and likely not much even with audio editing.

Considering that the machine would have 16 GB of RAM and an SSD is an
8th gen or 9th gen I5 going to give her good performance, particularly
compared with I7 processors? Gene had already told me about more
inexpensive machines which might give her similar performance, such as a
review he provided for an Acer machine. I'm personally fine with
considering other brands but my friend may or may not feel that she may
want to stick with Dell. She also wants a fairly extended warranty along
with on-site service in case of an unforeseen hardware failure.
Obviously, a slightly older I5 will cost a bit less but I don't just
want performance to be OK or barely adequate. If we go with AMD are
there things I should look for or avoid? I just don't have enough
hands-on experience using some of these more modern computers and would
like feedback from those who have.

I should also mention that she'll be using JAWS.

Many thanks.


--
David Goldfield,
Blindness Assistive Technology Specialist
JAWS Certified, 2019

WWW.DavidGoldfield.org