Guesstimation at Longevity?

So right now I am at somewhat of a crossroads in my computers life. I am currently in Grade 11, finishing very soon (like 4 days), and I am thinking about my next/further future computer purchases. But I am worried about the future (like I always am). I have to finish next year (senior year), do one victory lap, then off to college for four years. ideally, I will not have to buy anything IN college, just before. Anyway, here is the list of things I am considering:

1. Get a new Mobo + Case and build 'Rig 1' now.
2. Wait until just before I got to university, and build 'Rig 2'
3. Get an iMac now.
4. Wait until just before university and buy a pricey laptop (likely a macbook pro)

Rig 1 :

• Current Q9950, 8 GB DDR2 RAM, 1 TB HDD and 640 GB HDD + more eventually.
• New Gigabyte EP45 - UD3P
• New GTX 260 Black edition from XFX

Rig 2:

• All new system, just whatever kickass tech that is on the market, think i7 and SSD's

Remember, what ever happens, the "buy now" systems would hopefully last for the next 6 years, with minor upgrades to the PC's as needed.

Thank you to everyone who read this entire post, and especially those who leave a comment/suggestion.

well, what will you be using it for and what do you have now? also, are you planning on getting a laptop at some point regardless of what desktop you get?

flagship said:

well, what will you be using it for and what do you have now? also, are you planning on getting a laptop at some point regardless of what desktop you get?

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Nothing beyond DVD ripping, possibly gaming (but like, The Sims). Also, if I do not purchase a laptop, i would get a netbook.

x30Jx said:

Nothing beyond DVD ripping, possibly gaming (but like, The Sims). Also, if I do not purchase a laptop, i would get a netbook.

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then i would probably suggest getting a laptop, like 14 inches/fairly light, with a decent video card, that you would be willing to carry around campus in a backpack. that worked for me when i went to school and just wanted to play some lower end games (i had an external monitor that i kept in my room).

For the uses listed an iMac or notebook would be plenty sufficient. Your "Rig 1" is complete overkill and for what you do a waste of money. If mac's are your thing get an imac or macbook and be done with it. A quad and high end video card is just going to run hot, heat your room up, and run up your power bill without any real advantage you are going to see with your uses.

A quad CPU won't help with ripping speed. That is based on DVD drive. However a quad can still encode from MPG2 DVD to anything else faster. Some free programs like TMPGEnc can use more than 1 core (3 core max I think)