Getting New Computer. Help?

My 2003 HP finally died and can't be recovered. I'm using
my laptop hooked to the big monitor and I need a new
desktop. I only use it for the internet, what should I get?
Are refurbished any good? I see eMachines are cheap.
I'm shocked at how the price has come down in the last few
years. Twice as much RAM, twice the storage, for half
what I paid for the HP in early 2004. I don't use a camera,
my hard drive is always 80% free space, no games, just
the basics.. Looking for suggestions.

Quote: EvenBob

My 2003 HP finally died and can't be recovered. I'm using
my laptop hooked to the big monitor and I need a new
desktop. I only use it for the internet, what should I get?
Are refurbished any good? I see eMachines are cheap.
I'm shocked at how the price has come down in the last few
years. Twice as much RAM, twice the storage, for half
what I paid for the HP in early 2004. I don't use a camera,
my hard drive is always 80% free space, no games, just
the basics.. Looking for suggestions.

I'm surprised it's only twice the RAM & Storage and only half the price from 8 years ago. You must have gotten a good deal in '04. Anyway my suggestion is to get the cheapest one you can find if all you want is internet. I got my mom an emachines because she just wanted email and some light surfing, and she's had zero problems in 3 years. Most of the problems with computers is all the other crap you put on. Keep it clean and you can keep it cheap.

When I got my current laptop, I used www.techbargains.com and checked that daily for about 3 weeks or so to get a good deal. The site posts a whole bunch of discounts from different retailers so you don't have to go shopping around, they just do it all for you. If you're just looking for internet, look at the most basic computer you can find as you really wont need too much RAM and/or HD space to surf the web.

Best of luck.

I have no problems with cheap computers, I've bought lots of them. I had an eMachine, it was OK enough.

Quote: EvenBob

I'm using my laptop hooked to the big monitor and I need a new desktop.
I only use it for the internet, what should I get?

Can you build your own white box PC? It's little more than putting everything in place and tightening a few screws. You won't necessarily save money over a beige box, but you can ensure higher quality.

However if all you need is internet, and there isn't anything high-performance involved, not even 1080p movies, you could be fine with what's called a nettop. The advantages of these are small size, low noise and very low power consumption.
You can look up Asus EEE Box, like this baseline model.

It runs Linux though, which is fine, but instead of Ubuntu or Kubuntu that sane people use, they went with some custom junk. Unfortunately commercial OS can be a very large fraction of a low-end computer's price. It's best to install a proper Linux distro, it will have Firefox and everything, and you don't need to worry about virii and malware (the risk with Linux is on the order of 1/100 that with Windows).
Presuming you aren't considering other than legit software (in my opinion you have the moral right to reinstall the same OS you've paid for already on a new PC). Either will take some time to perform. You'll also need some effort to transfer your data.

Quote: cclub79

I'm surprised it's only twice the RAM & Storage and only half the price from 8 years ago.

My old one has 512 RAM which I upgraded
to 1024. 120GB drive, a CD Writer which I
never used once. Whats the deal on refurbished
machines, I see Walmart has a bunch.

Make sure you
get one with a
screen that's
more than 40
characters wide.

Better quality components than a cheap ready made PC plus a learning experience/fun project for 281 bucks:
http://www.hardware-revolution.com/best-budget-gaming-pc-february-2012/

Never mind that it says gaming in the url, his lowest tier build is pretty much for internet use only. Since you said you didn't use your HDD, you can even save 17 bucks more and replace his suggest HDD with that 32 GB SSD that will VASTLY improve your start up speed (turns out electrons move faster than spinning magnetic disks). That's just big enough to hold an operating system, some basic utilities like anti-virus, and your web browser cache, but sounds perfect for your use.

All you'll need to put it all together is a screwdriver. If you can keep those classic cars in working shape this will be a piece of cake.

Quote: P90

You can look up Asus EEE Box, like this baseline model.

I have a netbook with an Intel Atom, and youtube doesn't run the best. Even a dual core Celeron will be a huge step up.

Is Dell any good? Walmart and Staples has some
good looking refurbished Dell desktops.