refurbished HP DX5150 SFF

Hi I'm wondering if i should buy a refurbished HP DX5150 SFF for 199$.

cpu: 2g
ram: 1GB
HDD: 400
video
sound
USB: 8
Optical: DVD/rw
net: 10/100
OP: XP pro
warranty: 30 day

As money is tight for me I decided to look up reviews first and found this site:

http://www.pcpitstop.com/satisfaction/review/desktops/model/hp/HP~dx5150~SFF.html

I'm confused on whether it's a bad model because there where bad reviews but then
64% gave it three stars and 22% gave it 4 stars. I don't if those where from new or used systems.

44% of 106 hundred reviewers said it was "slow" . One guy left a post saying
"hardly any programs on it and is lagging really bad".

I know this site only allowed these personal comments in 2009 so these had to be refurbished models. Most of the reviews of this model dated form when it first came out in 2005 list the RAM as 512mb.(vs. the 1G above).

So I'm wondering how much of these 'slow' comments might be because of:

A) old hard-drives on the machines or

B) because these where probably 512 machines being reviewed by tech-guys who are really hard to please.

I would especially like some feedback on whether an old hard-drive will be slow even if it's just been wiped and reformatted or if it should be just fine. If the hard drive wouldn't be the problem with these models and upgrading the ram should fix any performance issues then I will buy this model.

Thanks for any feedback

 

I guess a lot depends on what you intend to do with it . . . for basic internet surfing and basic tasks it should be fine. The hard-drive in it is probably 5400rpm type, where the newer ones are 7200rpm

For gaming not so much - though I think it does have a low profile PCI-E port for an add-in video card (according to this page http://h18000.www1.hp.com/products/quickspecs/12105_na/12105_na.HTML).

But any really decent video card will require being hooked up to the power supply, and the 250W supply listed for that system probably couldn't handle it.

Again - what do you want to the PC to do?

 

Mainly surf and stream video , however with I also work in illustrator and photoshop alot..
would like to dable in 3d-graphics programs like 3d-studiomax...but it's not a priority. Right now I'm just wondering if it's a creaker just for opening up folders and programs and such.

 

There are only two reviews posted at the link you posted, so not much to go on. I see at http://www.dooyoo.co.uk/pc-desktops/hp-compaq-business-desktop-dx5150/details/ that that computer supports up to 4GB of RAM. The hardware specs shown there seem like it would be a decent machine for your usage.

You might try some HP-specific forums and see whether you can get some meaningful input: http://www.google.com/#hl=en&source=hp&q=hp+forums&aq=0&aqi=g10&oq=hp+forum&fp=b03f3b2a1b734003. Sorry I can't recommend specific HP forums since I'm not a user of any of them.