Desktop ... where to buy and what to buy

unable to make it to PM this morning--Traffic nightmare out there due to road work--Masaya highway--work starting around Galerais mall

I couldn't find either by Googling, but one is near Metro Center and the guys in the Radio Shack there can tell you where it is if you ask them for DSLR cameras (which they don't have). There's also another store in the same general vicinity (the guys at store one sent us to store two when I was looking for camera gear). One of them had Nixon's low end model DSLR, the other had Canon's. The one selling Cisco routers is probably the better of the two. They looked like MicroCenters in the US, and one had a name that sounded like a US computer store name (maybe actually CompUSA).

Every computer out there is made from components the computer assembly company didn't make themselves. What's inside the machine is more important than which company plugged stuff together.

Try to find a store that does in-house warranty work if possible (licensed by sellers to do that). If there is such a place, it's likely to be in Managua, and is likely to be one or both of those stores. They looked pretty much like CompUSA, MicroCenters, etc. sorts of computer stores in the US, not mom and pop operations such as I see in Jinotega.

My experience with modern computers is nothing I've bought or things my employers have bought failed during usual warranty time (three Macs, one Intel box, and knowledge of various computers in the colo facility plus earlier work computers). Once, my extended warranty came in handy with replacing a hard drive (on an eMac).

Hard drives fail more than about any other component, generally after about three years (out of usual warranty, often out of extended warranty). I have two bootable external backups, one on the machine and the other only attached when making a backup. Lacie makes a range of external drives in cases with various ways to connect to the computer.

The best connection would be the cable that's like an internal hard drive cable. I don't have that and would look for it if I bought a new computer. I can replace hard drives in my bigger metal case, not sure of the smaller plastic case. USB is the most common connector, but you're not going to want to run a computer for very long on an external USB drive. Firewire 800 is fine; also the newer connection that's like the internal hard drive connector, just in a round cable rather than a ribbon cable. You can run a computer on an external drive for quite some time with either of those connectors. Set an external hard drive up to run regular backups automatically; make sure it's also bootable if you can (easy with Macs and Carbon Cloner, don't know equivalent Windows programs but I think Key West Pirate can advise you here).

Hard drives have a mean time to failure -- and are very sensitive to power fluctuations. UPSes are crucial in Nicaragua. The cheap Chinese ones work, but you can get Tripp Lites here for the name branded and can set one up to automatically shut down the computer. This isn't critical with laptops as they've got battery backup built in and the power adaptor serves as somewhat of a line conditioner and surge protector, but it is critical for anything that's not battery-powered. Buy a UPS where you live or close enough to be able to buy a replacement easily. They don't last forever, but parts can be swapped out if you have two of the same model.

Memory -- Most of the time, you can upgrade the memory when you buy the machine. Unless they're charging obviously silly prices, max out the machine when you buy it, especially if you plan to use it for any graphics. Better graphics cards have their own memory. I'm living with 4 GB and a graphics card without its own memory, but I'm not doing a lot of photo processing (almost never with multiple files open) and almost no video processing, and I don't tend to have a lot of programs open at once, and I'm not a gamer. If you like to have a lot of programs open at once, if anyone in the family does gaming, if anyone is editing videos more than occasionally, the more memory and the better the graphic card, the happier everyone will be.

A good monitor is worth putting money into -- you will probably have several machines using that monitor before the monitor goes. Stores should have sample monitors running. If you can find a store that lets you mix and match on the peripherals, you can upgrade the monitor. If your store test machine is online, this site can test the system: http://www.lagom.nl/lcd-test/contrast.php and http://www.lagom.nl/lcd-test/sharpness.php, in that order. There are other tests on that site, but those two are the most useful for a quick check. At least, spend a few minutes looking at the screen and comparing it to others.

Keyboards crap out or die because someone spilled something -- don't spend money on special features. I like having a bluetooth mouse (one less wire on my computer stand to tangle with another wire), but they eat batteries (I use rechargeable) and don't work well with some programs (Kindle.app, but I think that's been fixed with the upgraded Kindle.app). Spare optical USB mice are cheap. Roller ball mice require more ball cleaning than I care to do and probably are obsolete.

Whole other list of what to does if you're going with home-built, but learn how to open a case and install memory and hard drives before going that route.

Rebecca Brown