Re: Upgrade necessary?

On 25/06/2007 21:15, Steve W. Jackson allegedly wrote:
In article <1182788960.443511.33600@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
ebrian <ebrian@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Hi folks,

Sorry in advance that this post isn't specifically about programming.
I have question for some of you seasoned programmers. My kid brother
has asked my parents to give him money to build a new computer. He's
in University taking Computer Science, and says the computer he has
right now isn't powerful enough to handle the rigors of projects he
has to do at school.

He claims when he runs two compilers at once, his computer crashes.

The thing is we just got him a new computer last year, it was a Core 2
Duo processor with 1 gig of ram (it's a laptop). Having already spent
a good $1200, we're wondering if his claim is legit or not. I took
Software Engineering in college years ago and not once did I ever have
to upgrade my computer for the sake of school projects -- I only
upgraded for games! Furthermore I had friends who didn't even have a
computer at all, they did all their work in the computer labs. So I'm
just wondering whether or not we really need to shell out more money
for him; or is it more likely he's using school as an excuse to
upgrade his box for other (gaming?) purposes?

Thanks

It's an excuse, definitely. :-)

A Core 2 Duo system is obviously pretty new, and 1GB RAM is reasonably good for most anything he'd be doing in school. If he's crashing frequently, he should fix his other issues and not claim he needs a new box.

Load o' bollocks.

Give that kiddo his new machine, for ***'s sake. You can't get anywhere with a Dual Core laptop ... it surely is slow as hell for Medieval Tota^H^H^H^H^H COBOL 2010. And there's a known and well-documented issue when running two compilers that it will crash any intel dbl-core proc.
A one-year old computer for a CS student... HA! That's no proper hardware for even a middle-sized project. Surely not with that brand-new HL3 scripting engine.

What's the matter with you, OP -- what's you playing gestapo here, fancy brownnosing for your parents' money to support your drug-addiction. Such hypocrisy. You make me wanna puke me guts out.


[switches back to Monkey Island on his quad-core & mini-bar]
df.
.