Energy sipping 5yr life machine

[septagon]

Hi, sorry abt the bad title.

But this is what I want. A machine which consumes very low power, but has enough in it to allow me to game games like Most wanted, do some basic video editing, use Corel Draw and photoshop and do lots of uploading and downloading on. As I'm blowing up my savings, I want a system that'll last a bit esp with the Win OS8 claiming to be 128bit enabled and all.. I want it to support atleast another 1 OS release with ease.

I read a post stating basic question to be answered. So here goes.

1. What YOUR PC will be used for. That means what types of tasks you'll be performing.
I wish to do a lot of uploading and downloading, so when i leave it running, it ought to sip the power. I do some work on excel, watch movies, and am now doing some coding work. I plan to also do some trail video and photo editing using Adobe Photoshop and Premiere. I also want to do some basic gaming. I'm into strategy games and slightly old games like mostwanted etc. I have no basic purpose, this will be my experiment machine. My uncle is a fan of OS X. So i intend to run it on my machine somehow.

2. What YOUR budget is. A price range is acceptable as long as it's not more than a 20% spread
I am in India, so I can spare bout 30k rs ie about 600$. If the cost is really giving me super savings in electricity, i dont mind going upto 800USD. (i know its more than an 20% jump, but if i can save power, a very big growse at my place, I am willing to spend.)


3. What country YOU will be buying YOUR parts from.
Mainly India, but some friends are coming over this month end from the USA. So some parts I get cheaper in USA i plan to get with them.

4. IF YOU have a brand preference. That means, are you an Intel-Fanboy, AMD-Fanboy, ATI-Fanboy, nVidia-Fanboy, Seagate-Fanboy, WD-Fanboy, etc.
NONE. As long as its energy efficient, i'm in.

5. If YOU intend on using any of YOUR current parts, and if so, what those parts are.
None

6. IF YOU have searched and/or read similar threads.
None.

7. IF YOU plan on overclocking or run the system at default speeds.
Will use it at default speeds.

8. What resolution YOU plan on gaming with.
I think 1204*1024 or whatever the monitor supports. I'm not into FPS, so graphics detail only comes in for games like NFS MW.

9. WHEN do you plan to build it?
Month end cos I'm hoping to source some parts like motherboards which can cut down power bills from USA. maybe the processor and RAM too

Thanks in Advance,
Gautam

 

[RebateMonger]

As soon as you mention "Photoshop" and "gaming", you are pretty much out of the ultra-low-power world. Spending more money won't help, since the higher-end stuff usually uses MORE power.

Given your varied requirements, I'd go with an Intel 45mm Core2Duo or Dual Core processor. If you can get by with a built-in video chip for your gaming, that'd be a big help. Letting the whole thing Sleep or Hibernate a lot would vastly reduce energy costs.

No matter what you buy, it isn't going to support a 128-bit OS.

 

[Red Squirrel]

lol think that windows 8 thing was some joke someone made. I highly doubt it's actually something comming out any time soon, unless MS knows something about the processor industry that we don't. I'm sure some day we may see 128-bit processors but I doubt that's any time soon, and don't even think there's a reason for it.

The only machine I can think of that would draw very little power and be able to do that kind of stuff is maybe a XPS laptop and a bicycle. Hook up the charger to an alternator and start pedaling.

 

[0roo0roo]

I want a system that'll last a bit esp with the Win OS8 claiming to be 128bit enabled and all.. I want it to support atleast another 1 OS release with ease.

forgetaboudit

128bit lol...

imagine trying to build a win7 system 5 years ago. it woulda been a pointless and expensively wasteful task.

 

[RebateMonger]

lol think that windows 8 thing was some joke someone made.

Yeah. It took ten years to get from 16-bit to 32-bit, and another ten years to get to 64-bit. Probably at least another seven years to 128-bit now. Windows 9, maybe.

 

[piasabird]

Normally for photoshop I would suggest 8 gigs of RAM and a Quad Core Processor. However, for a lower end build you might try something like an Intel E7400 CPU and an Integrated MATX Intel Motherboard and a fairly small 18.5" Dell HD Widescreen LCD flatscreen monitor. 4 Gigs of RAM (minimum) would be recommended for a 64 bit OS. The newer the integrated video the better it is. I recommended the Intel Brand motherboard because they tend to not be built for overclocking and they should be better in Sleep Mode for conserving energy.

A laptop may conserve a little more energy. If you could find a Solar recharger kit that might make it possible to run off of just batteries, but that would raise the cost. I have seen some books on purchasing solar panels used from places like Phone companies. (They use them in areas with no power on cell towers). In some places like India they sometimes have Solar panels for Water pumps, but this would be in outlying villages.

The drawback to using a laptop is that the batteries may go bad before 5 years and they breakdown easier and can be costly to repair. Any computer may have problems after about 3 years. Hard drives or power supplies sometimes go bad over time.

Someone else may be able to recommend an AMD build.

I have no idea what kind of technology will be available 5 years from now. I know MS is working on Word 2010 and it is coming out in Beta for testing. Depends if you have access to MS Office or you use some kind of other product. We have not got rid of all the 32 bit computers yet, so a 128 bit system seems like a pipe dream. As long as microsoft keeps supporting 32 bit software, a 128 bit OS seems far away. I cant imagine them supporting 32 bit, 64 bit, and 128 bit at the same time. First comes the hardware and then the operating system 5 to ten years later.

 

[0roo0roo]

laptops always a poor value unless you factor in the carry around convenience. by default its a lot less power per buck, so obsolete all that much faster, bits go bad, and you can't fix cheaply if at all. upgrades are not really possible.

but yes its no point trying to look that far ahead, by that time a 200 dollar portable pc will probably smash your current pc's performance.

newer gpus and cpus are power conserving, newer intels and such even quads are very aggressive on power conservation during idle. even new gpus are pretty good at low power consumption during idle. buy an older card and yes they are a bit piggish. its not to say they don't use a lot of power at full load though, they still do.