This is a great deal. No question about it. Just too bad it is 2007 and not 2004.

Darchonus wrote:Sorry woot! This is an awful deal. I got a Acer x2 4000+ 250gb 1gb ddr2 w/vista home premium for $240 new. Had to return the monitor, but just trying to point out there's a lot cheaper to be had for low-end comps with better warranties.

Compaq/HP make terrible machines - desktop and laptop. Compaq business used to be reasonable quality until HP merged with them and quality went the same way...

Point me in the direction of THAT deal!

This would make a great cheap home server.

The datasheet on the motherboard can be found here. Although most Compaq motherboards are made by Asus, this particular board is made by ECS. (Maybe that's why it is refurbished.)

VISTA FTL!!!!!

It has a 56k modem. I am in for 2.

The datasheet on the motherboard can be found here. Although most Compaq motherboards are made by Asus, this particular board is made by ECS. (Maybe that's why it is refurbished.)

i wonder how many 9 mm rounds that computer can handle . its only good for target practice or a door stop being a compaq and refurb (rox0rz!).at that !

What's up with the podcast?!?

P.S. Yeah, and Compaq also really does suck donkey balls.

They always have, they do now, and they always will.

I never forgave them from the day I realized that the BIOS on my mom's old 486 was put on the Hard Drive!!!! It had this cheezy Win 3.0 lookin GUI, and to have enough space to include that useless feature (because really, who needs a mouse to fiddle with the BIOS?) there was a 5MB partition on the hard drive just for their proprietary BIOS. So when the hard drive died (much too soon), we had to to toss the whole computer. Compaq tech said they couldn't provide those partitioned hard drives anymore because they changed how they did things (thankfully), so it would need a new motherboard, and that cost more than a decent new computer. Have you ever heard anything stupider than that?

More recent experiences with Compaqs have left me to conclude that they haven't learned a thing.

Stay away like this is Kryptonite and you're Superman. This honestly is a really really really bad computer. Not a bad deal, just a bad computer.

i was actually going to by something like that and install Ubuntu on it. would be a good back up PC, maybe even a crappy small media server/ network share-storage...

Compaq keyboard and scroll mouse (both with PS/2 connections) listed twice, better get two keyboards cause they wear out fast playing Frets on Fire...

Anyone have *nix driver link ? Then maybe i'd think about it. You pick the distribution. Keep the OS free please.

waldronj wrote:Uh, what if I want to play a CD? Will that work????

Sure, if you want an overpriced CD player.

Even though this isn't the greatest woot I have ever seen. I did get a txt from 'say now' an hour before midnight telling me exactly what the woot was going to be. So luckily I am not suprised...

but they did say they are going to take care of my goldfish! Thank the lord.

renovation wrote:i wonder how many 9 mm rounds that computer can handle . its only good for target practice or a door stop being a compaq and refurb (rox0rz!).at that !

Nice review. I forgot about the door stop angle.

thecapm wrote:This would make a great cheap home server.

This doesn't have enough power to use as a server.

That's actually a good processor. People have OC'd it to 8000Mhz!!! (with liquid nitrogen, of course!) See: here

zux1 wrote:anyone else get a text at 11:00 with todays "podcast", that might be the 2nd time woot ever told anyone whats coming up beofrehand

Um...

tehmatt wrote:Even though this isn't the greatest woot I have ever seen. I did get a txt from 'say now' an hour before midnight telling me exactly what the woot was going to be. So luckily I am not suprised...

but they did say they are going to take care of my goldfish! Thank the lord.

Again one of the most relevant questions. Is this CPU/ Processor unlocked for overclocking ?

csg2028 wrote:it was like looking in a mirror. I am on this right now. Not bad for a slow computer without much memory. For basic internet browsing this is fine.

Since when was a p4 3 GHz slow???

/typing this on a 1 GHz machine.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116004 $79.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822144454 $46.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820144209 $36.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827106083 $22.99
cheap mini-atx motherboard with integrated graphics - ~$35
cheap mini-atx case - ~$20
cheap 400W PSU - ~$15
mouse & keyboard - ~$10
total: $266.96

lulz and it's refurbished too.

No need to fear... the reason why it is so cheap is thet they have the wrong name on them. Compaq new name is CRAP-PAC, but bo not get it confused with the bag-o-crap.

Ya, this isn't a bad deal for the price, however it's just a bad deal in general when thinking of a new computer. If you're absolutely sure you just want a barebones desktop to get some basic tasks done, then this will probably be fine. However I'd say spend a couple hundred more and get yourself a budget laptop that will be just as powerful and infinitely more convenient.

captainproton wrote:Since when was a p4 3 GHz slow???

/typing this on a 1 GHz machine.

A e2140 or e4300 will tear that cpu to shreds, even being half the cpu speed.

Very inexpensive computer for someone who doesn't have one. That's like buying Vista and getting a computer free with it. lulz

If they had a 19" flat panel for another hundred, I,d consider it

The trifecta of suckiness here (and the trifecta of obnoxious posts from me) is the Norton 60-day trial. What a scam. So you get some sort of protection for 60 days, then they want to screw you for a monthly fee for something very basic that should be free. Speaking of conspiracy theories, how about the one that Norton/McAfee write most of the viruses out there?

Antivirus = USE AVG, USE AVAST, THEY ARE FREE AND GREAT, DON'T PAY NORTON OR MCAFEE A DIME - EVER.

Norton = Vista = Compaq = COMPLETE GARBAGE

This would be a decent Linux box, if you wouldn't mind if it bricked 91 days into owning it.

Why is everybody bashing Vista? I had my reservations about it at first, but after I've had it for awhile, I like it. Just like any new program, you have to learn the in's and out's.

chemwolf wrote:This doesn't have enough power to use as a server.

Sure it does. Servers don't need a lot of horsepower if all they're doing is dishing out files to a few people. A faster hard drive would be nicer -- but the point is the same, for a small server this is plenty adequate.

I'm kind of amused by all the people whining about how "old" and "crappy" this computer is. I still have a 1998 IBM 600E running Win98 that I haul out to work sites, just to show how well "old" computers can work... if you know what you're doing with them.

is the ram 2x 512?

vanhorne wrote:DO NOT BUY! I purchased one of these in May, and because it is refurbished, it has only a 3-month warranty. Three months and 5 days later, it completely died. Have been working with tech support, but they are no help, and they don't seem to want to replace the motherboard or whatever has died. $299 is way too much to spend on a boat anchor, and a bad one of those at that!

Ooh, sorry about your luck. I guess sometimes you get what you pay for. On the surface this looked like a good deal for some people.

brasda91 wrote:Why is everybody bashing Vista? I had my reservations about it at first, but after I've had it for awhile, I like it. Just like any new program, you have to learn the in's and out's.

In this ones opinion it's like every other M$ OS. First attempts are never secure and has many bugs. Even the final version.

Goes back to win95a b b with ie c .. ect.
Even 3.11

Defraggler wrote:I can custom build something much faster then this for less.
I'll pass.

Not including a legal Windows license, you can't.

BrotherFlounder wrote:Not even close, especially with Vista.

Not quite so. I've been running Ubuntu Studio on an older Athlon XP 2400+ CPU and 1GB of DDR333 RAM, and it's very competent in video and graphics editing, albeit with open source tools. I have to imagine that this machine will be able to performe even better than my current machine, given that it's specs are beefier. I would suggest perhaps purchasing a midrange PCI-E video card to go with this machine if you intend to use it for video editing, as the onboard video drains system memory to compensate for not having onboard VRAM.

msauder wrote:Not including a legal Windows license, you can't.

You can't build one, but you can buy one for the same with better specs if you wait for a deal...

This computer would be a great starter for someone who can't afford anything more. It does indeed have old specs. However, it might be worth buying just for the the hard drive, lightscribe dvd-rw drive, and if you currently have a machine that is using the same ram (and you have open dimms). The hard drive that is probably in this computer is the Seagate Barricuda 3G, IMO one of the most reliable hard drives on the market.

msauder wrote:Not including a legal Windows license, you can't.

Yea that's what I don't understand as it's pre-installed. The "Windows license" for vista. What if you happen upgrade the hardware then have to format ? Your SOL

nanobot wrote:I'm in for the troops for the ram alone.

Uh, so you're paying $300 for $45 worth of RAM?

CavalierX wrote:I'm kind of amused by all the people whining about how "old" and "crappy" this computer is. I still have a 1998 IBM 600E running Win98 that I haul out to work sites, just to show how well "old" computers can work... if you know what you're doing with them.

Yay..I have a 600E too that I found in the garbage of a pharmaceutical exec a year ago and spent a good deal of time resucitating (part of which involved using a power drill!)..installed XP on it, most important thing I did. It runs surprisingly well with 128 MB, though i'm going to upgrade the RAM soon, as well as flash the BIOS. The thing is a tank, I love it :D

The ironic thing is, with a clean install of the OS and minimal software installed, it's faster than a brand new big name laptop that has lots of crap software installed, at least for basic web surfing and office tasks. Very instructive.

Maybe the major computer manufacturers prop up the hardware companies by installing all this crap software which kills the performance, so people think they need 3 Ghz and 2 GB or RAM to read their email?