Forum Discussion
Computer Advice
My home/office computer is getting to the point where I am considering retiring it. Its been a good machine and held up to heavy use throughout lockdowns, programming and various document production. Generally, I maintain the computer rigorously having been using PC in various forms since 1978 (yes before IBM Clones).
I am now finding some of the demands I am placing on the machine may be a bit heavy in Word. So thought I may come and ask what specifications may I look for in a machine to handle my specific productions.
Typically I am compiling technical manuals. These are a hybrid of Word, Jpg, PDF and similar with heavy use of bookmarks, cross-references and similar. The one I am currently working on is just over 1600 pages and 254 mb. I am finding my old computer is taking time indexing and saving etc when I am making changes.
So what specificaiton/s should I be looking at, as these manuals have gown substantially in the last six or so years, and I am concerned they may double in size in the next six?
- I would be getting something with plenty of memory (say 16 GB) and a good size SSD drive (Min 500 GB)
- Yes, 16 or 32 GB of RAM can be actually put into good use in your use case, also anything Core i5 or Ryzen 5 and not bellow. GPU does not matter for you as long as the CPU is recent. 1600 pages is a lot, anything over 150 pages with images in Word can be a pain to work with regardless of the system. For technical manuals, maybe good ol Framemaker should be a way to go...
