EC Needs Computer Advice

[Reed]

I have a new MacBook Pro 14 inch and 3D play (playing OOTP) is the same as on a windows PC with a dedicated graphics card. If you are fast swimming some seasons, the new MacBook Pro is much faster (and VERY expensive).

[Eugene Church]

Originally Posted by Reed

I have a new MacBook Pro 14 inch and 3D play (playing OOTP) is the same as on a windows PC with a dedicated graphics card. If you are fast swimming some seasons, the new MacBook Pro is much faster (and VERY expensive).

Thanks for the info.

[Eugene Church]

Originally Posted by Syd Thrift

If you’re buying a Mac, it will still play 3D. It may not be as fast, although OOTP is not exactly a resource hog a la Flight Simulator or whatever. The trade off is that Macs are better I guess at working with directories with lots of files in them so if you’re simming through seasons, a Mac is faster. If you’re getting another PC or updating your current one, none of this applies.

Thanks for the explanation, Syd... appreciate it.

[Sweed]

Originally Posted by Reed

I have a new MacBook Pro 14 inch and 3D play (playing OOTP) is the same as on a windows PC with a dedicated graphics card. If you are fast swimming some seasons, the new MacBook Pro is much faster (and VERY expensive).

Originally Posted by Eugene Church

Thanks for the info.

I'm not a mac owner and never have been. Seems if speed is the goal it's a good way to go. I play out all of my games so it wouldn't benefit me, I guess. But have no fear the Dell will run OOTP in 3d for years to come with the 1660 super.

One thing to keep in mind EC is if you go mac you lose "text to speech". I think(?) you play out your games but don't know if you use TTS? I'm on PC and haven't read text in probably the last 4 versions. TTS, short pbp, and modern 3d for me as I watch and listen to my games.

[Eugene Church]

Originally Posted by Sweed

I'm not a mac owner and never have been. Seems if speed is the goal it's a good way to go. I play out all of my games so it wouldn't benefit me, I guess. But have no fear the Dell will run OOTP in 3d for years to come with the 1660 super.

One thing to keep in mind EC is if you go mac you lose "text to speech". I think(?) you play out your games but don't know if you use TTS? I'm on PC and haven't read text in probably the last 4 versions. TTS, short pbp, and modern 3d for me as I watch and listen to my games.

Sweed, I play out my South Island games entirely... sim my IPA dynasty league until the playoffs, then play out each game entirely.

I'm happy with the speed of my current computer... happy with the animation... but I'm willing to upgrade the computer if it will give me better animation and better processing in the future (hopefully OOTP will improve the animation in OOTP23, 24 and 25)... but there is a limit to how much I want to spend... I started off planning to spend $800... then went to $1100... and the last one was $1500... don't think I will go higher.

An IT guy with 40 years experience just told me to get Intel i7 11th Generation processor... 16 GB RAM... 1 TB boot drive... SSD... and 1 TB SSD for backup drive and NVideo graphics card... this could run $1700 or more... he designs gaming computers for competitive players... cost $6000... there is no way I would want to do that... I have been happy with every computer I have had since OOTP3... I'm not hard to please.

HP or Dell is fine for me... I have had both of them... people love their Macs, so I guess they are better... just don't think I need a Mac... I am not a serious gamer... OOTP is the only game for me... I don't play anything else.

[Pelican]

The game plays tremendously well on my brand-new Mac Mini Third generation with the Apple M1 chip, and the 1 TB hard drive should provide room for my various seasons and sims to accumulate. By comparison, I also occasionally play on my Dell laptop. I don’t normally play in 3D on the laptop, because the smaller screen is pretty jammed (and alas my eyesight is not perfect). But the Dell seems to run the game just fine, with no significant delays or hiccups. I don’t play any complex or long-term sims on there, so accumulating data storage is not an issue. I should also note that I opted for 16 GB of RAM on the Mini. I’m not enough of a computer geek to know if that helps play run smoother and/or faster. It clearly helps with multitasking, as I can have many files open and active while playing OOTP, with no loss of response time on any of the programs or apps. My guess is that a new Dell desktop with similar specs (including graphics driver) would perform about the same - or that most of us would not notice the difference in performance, if any.

[Brad K]

EC, just spend the $800 you originally planned on. Remember, you were perfectly happy with your old computer until the hard drive went south.

Some people aren't paying attention to your needs very well. For example, a SSD that won't hold all your music files.

Your priorities are to run OOTP and store your music files. Your old computer did that. So a big upgrade in performance is clearly unnecessary.

[Eugene Church]

Pelican and Brad K... thank you both for your help and advice... really appreciate you taking your time to respond to my computer situation and computer needs.

Taking into consideration all of the things the OOTP Community has advised... this is my plan... I have also consulted 2 local computer specialists that are gamers as well.

I think it is time for a new computer (6 years old)... I need a bigger hard drive (SSD)... and a better graphics card to run OOTP animation better... will probably buy 2 TB SSD hard drive... HP or Dell... whoever gives the best price for the computer equipped the way I would like... the Dell customer service guy said he will negotiate a better price if HP is lower priced for a similarly equipped computer... I will contact HP today and get a price... I realize that it may be overkill, but I will spend about $1500 to get a very good computer that should last me the rest of my life (EC is nearly 82 years old).

I still have 60% free space after 72 seasons in my 15-year-old Islandian Pro Alliance dynasty report... with a music library of 7550 songs (mp3 files)... the Good Lord willing, I plan to play the IPA for 100 seasons and then retire it.... that may take a few years (3-5 years at the current pace)... but 2TB should easily take care of me for the last 28 seasons.

My file folder has 11 millions files in 4561 folders in a 1TB regular hard drive (not SSD)... I don't know what that means... but it was important for my computer tech to know... he came yesterday and told me my current computer was not in danger of failing and ruining my leagues... he said the current computer would be fine to play until I get a new computer, which he strongly recommended for the improved processing, graphics, durabilty and advanced technology.

I have backed up all of my info on an external hard drive should my hard drive fail.

CLICK ON IMAGE TO ENLARGE

[AdequateRandomGaming]

Originally Posted by Brad K

Some people aren't paying attention to your needs very well. For example, a SSD that won't hold all your music files.

Files that are accessed repeatedly like mp3s shouldn't be put on an SSD to start with as it will ramp up the number of writes. For most users, it's probably not that big of a deal, but for someone like EC who is trying to maximize their computer's lifespan, it is not something I would personally recommend.


Regular spin drives are cheap enough now that a dual drive setup is not an outlandish setup that costs an arm and a leg like it did 10-15 years ago.

[Syd Thrift]

Originally Posted by AdequateRandomGaming

Files that are accessed repeatedly like mp3s shouldn't be put on an SSD to start with as it will ramp up the number of writes. For most users, it's probably not that big of a deal, but for someone like EC who is trying to maximize their computer's lifespan, it is not something I would personally recommend.


Regular spin drives are cheap enough now that a dual drive setup is not an outlandish setup that costs an arm and a leg like it did 10-15 years ago.

This isn't anywhere near an issue like it was even 5 years ago; people are now saying you should put your swap file on the SSD. Yes, there are an ultimately limited number of writes, but even for something like MP3s it's just not that huge. Samsung is stating that their 850 GB SSD is good for 150 terabytes of writes, which I know doesn't look like much necessarily but translates to 40 GB of writes a day for 10 years. In practice, these devices will die due to age much sooner than to the strain of rewrites.

Which, as far as that goes, EC, if you're concerned about your music in particular going away over time (which is a potential issue no matter what kind of hard drive you purchase), get a Google Drive or OneDrive account and back it up in the cloud. I think both have a limit of about 15GB for free at the moment.

[Eugene Church]

Thanks for the reply, Syd.

In your opinion, will a 2TB solid state drive be all I need?

I do have my music library backed up on an external hard drive, thumb drive and also on my laptop... I would think 3 external backups would be fine.

[Eugene Church]

Here is the latest quote from Dell.
An IT guy with 40 years experience told me to buy a computer with these specs.... this guy designs expensive gaming computers... he knows that I don't really need that type of computer, but he said it would take care of my needs for years.

Dell XPS 8940
Cost: $1590

Here are the basic specs:

Intel i7 11th Generation processor (8-Core, 16M cache)
NVIDIA (R) GeForce (R) GTX 1660 Super (TM) 6 GB GDDR6
16 GB, 8Gx2, DDR4
2TB SSD

Comments would be appreciated.

[tejdog1]

The first thing I'd do before anything else is restart in safe mode and run ScanDisk/CheckDisk to check for errors. And after that, back up every file you care about and reformat your HDD/reinstall Windows.

[Eugene Church]

Originally Posted by tejdog1

The first thing I'd do before anything else is restart in safe mode and run ScanDisk/CheckDisk to check for errors. And after that, back up every file you care about and reformat your HDD/reinstall Windows.

I have backed up everything on three devices... on external hard drive, flash drive and on my laptop.

Thanks for the help... not sure I have the computer knowledge to do what you suggested... my computer skills and knowledge are pretty slim.

Most of the time when I try to follow instructions to troubleshoot problems, I get to a point to where the instructions don't tell me the choices to make and it leaves it up to me... and I don't know what to do... or the next instruction in the process is left out of the instructions and I am left not knowing what to do... it has happened to me many, many times when I try to do computer troubleshooting.

So I usually leave things of this type to a tech guy, who knows what he is doing.

[Sweed]

Originally Posted by Eugene Church

Here is the latest quote from Dell.
An IT guy with 40 years experience told me to buy a computer with these specs.... this guy designs expensive gaming computers... he knows that I don't really need that type of computer, but he said it would take care of my needs for years.

Dell XPS 8940
Cost: $1590

Here are the basic specs:

Intel i7 11th Generation processor (8-Core, 16M cache)
NVIDIA (R) GeForce (R) GTX 1660 Super (TM) 6 GB GDDR6
16 GB, 8Gx2, DDR4
2TB SSD

Comments would be appreciated.

You're not going to load up OOTP and think "I wish I would have bought something with more power". You won't be posting "yes, I updated my graphics driver and it didn't fix the my 3d problem" There is something to say about not having to wonder if you will run into issues soon. If you're comfortable at that price then go for it and enjoy.

When I was a young man with kids at home I skimped on almost anything I bought for me. Second tier was good enough for me, they came first. Now that they are onto their own lives I treat myself. My year old computer isn't quite to those specs but it's pretty close. Every time I use it I don't regret spending a bit more.

[Syd Thrift]

Don’t listen to Sweed, EC! It’s never too late to have children!

[Brad K]

EC, this started off as you asking whether you needed a $500 computer or an $800 dollar computer. Lurking in the background was a probable $200 repair to your old one and whether you should put that money toward a $500 - $800 machine rather than repair the old one. Now it's gone to a $1500 machine and the $200 contribution from unspent repair money is insignificant.

Your gamer friends might change their minds about what you need if you showed the OOTPs 3D graphics. I mean seriously, the difference between the graphics in their games and OOTP is about the difference between the Mona Lisa and a five year old's stick figure paintings of mom and dad.

You had no complaints about the performance of your old computer. Yet people are saying you need a lot more of a speed increase than you'll get just by moving to a computer that's several years newer. As I posted earlier, I think people are not listening to what you've said, that you want to play OOTP, surf the net, and have storage room for the music files, and are especially ignoring the fact you had no performance complaints about your old computer until the hard drive started to quit.

[Brad K]

Originally Posted by Sweed

You're not going to load up OOTP and think "I wish I would have bought something with more power". You won't be posting "yes, I updated my graphics driver and it didn't fix the my 3d problem" There is something to say about not having to wonder if you will run into issues soon. If you're comfortable at that price then go for it and enjoy.

When I was a young man with kids at home I skimped on almost anything I bought for me. Second tier was good enough for me, they came first. Now that they are onto their own lives I treat myself. My year old computer isn't quite to those specs but it's pretty close. Every time I use it I don't regret spending a bit more.

About 1996 I decided to treat myself and go top of the line. At the time I was driving a 78 Chrysler Newport. I upgraded to a 69 Chrysler New Yorker.

(One time during that era older daughter said "You look so happy driving your big ugly old cars." She changed her mind a bit when she had to borrow one.)

[Pelican]

I love the old car analogy, because it demonstrates the variety of computer advice EC will get, coming from Prius owners to gas guzzlers. And don’t get me wrong, I would love to drive my Dad’s ‘65 Buick Wildcat, if one could be found, restored and still running. But I would never ever load my grandchildren into such a car. The new models (mine is a 2017) are safe, handle well, sip gas (or electricity) and last longer, for prices that are lower, in constant dollars. Just so with new computers. The advances are striking, and limping along with an older computer becomes cost-prohibitive and risks either a loss of data or diminished performance or both. (Of course there are those who take pride in keeping a ten-year-old machine running, just like keeping that ‘65 Buick purrring. All due respect, but I would rather spend my time playing OOTP.). It’s a good point that EC has gone way over budget, but I understand his reasoning, and I respect his choice. It’s not just about which computer will run OOTP today. It’s how he can put off having to buy a new computer in the near future. Looking that far ahead does generally involve more of an investment in the latest hardware. (Although I seem to have acquired the equivalent for just north of $1000, after trade-in from Apple.) To me, that extra investment buys not only time but piece of mind - a value that each of us would calculate differently.

[Brad K]

I drove those cars in the 90s when ABS and airbags were just coming in. The 69 models had shoulder belts and collapsable steering columns, and door guard beams showed up in 72. They had a weight advantage over newer cars. Compared to newer options I considered them acceptably safe at the time. Today, maybe not.