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What are you all putting in as desktops in small businesses right now?

I’ve got approval to do a desktop refresh, initially 4-5 machines to replace our oldest kit (7yr old Optiplex 760’s with Core 2 Duo E7400, 2GB) and then one a month to replace out the newer stuff (3-4yr old Vostro’s with i3-2xxx, 4GB) until we’ve replaced all 10.

Team are using Outlook, Word, Excel, some LOB apps hosted externally accessed via Citrix Receiver and several browser based services (CRM, vehicle tracking, HR system, etc.). Will be running Windows 10 on the new machines.

What would be the best components to focus the budget on?

  • Core i3 vs. Core i5?
  • 4GB vs. 8GB RAM?
  • HDD vs. SSD?

I guess adding extra RAM at a later stage would be quite easy whereas we’re not going to upgrade CPUs.

Is it worth going for a 4th Gen Core i5 or is it overkill for a business desktop? Would I be better instead looking at 6th Gen Core i3’s with SSD so we’re bang up-to-date and then using the spare budget to drop an extra 4GB RAM in?

We’re an all Dell shop at the moment but the HP ProDesk 400 G2.5 SFF’s have some quite keen pricing at the moment, any thought on these vs. the Optiplex 3020/3040’s ?

47 Spice ups
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For desktops doing basic stuff then focus on enough RAM and SSD (even if you have to retrofit) as this will give you far more real and perceived performance than getting a faster CPU

I would use an i3 with an SSD over and i5 with an HD all day long

66 Spice ups
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If you have kit that is i3 rated I would try throwing in RAM and an SSD - you will get another 12-18 months out of them

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Considering how long you ran the existing hardware, I think I’d rather go a little overboard. Some of the new i5’s are pretty fast, coupled with an SSD and I think you’ve got a pretty stable box. I picked a used Optiplex 9010, i5, 4Gb the other day for $200, $85 for a Crucial 240Gb SSD, 23.5" Asus VE247H and have got a real nice box for less than $500.

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Hard drives for a refresh should not even be considered.

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i3 vs i5 will really depend on the specific model. As far as RAM and storage, go with 8GB is you can (will allow Windows to cache more stuff in RAM vs having to hit the storage) and a SSD+HDD.

Windows, particularly 10, likes RAM. 4GB will work but you’ll see it run up against that limit fairly often, especially with a browser with a few tabs, Office programs and other apps along with the basic Windows services. With 8GB you should see the best performance with a little room to grow.

For storage, go with a SSD of 240GB+. That should give you enough room for the OS, updates and your programs. 120GB might be pushing it. I would then add in a small HDD for documents, version history if you enable it and other misc stuff. The best solution would be to keep everything on a SSD but that will depend on your budget though certainly less so today than a few years ago.

As or the processor, it will depend on your model. Whether you want dual or quad core, Hyperthreading or none, advance features like VT-x/VT-d or AES acceleration, etc. Generally a i3 is geared towards power/price savings at the cost of performance while the i5 is more expensive/power hungry but has better performance. Ultimately it will depend on the specific processor models available for the PC model you choose.

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I would agree with everything that Toby has said here, but not sure I’d bother with a Vostro. I’m kind of an Optiplex guy.

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Thanks, I’d pretty much convinced myself on the SSD and I think 128GB will be plenty, other than transient stuff we don’t keep files on the desktops. Our old kit only has 80GB drives and we’ve never had capacity issues.

If we go for the i5 it’ll probably be the Core i5-4590S in the HP ProDesk 400 G2.5 SFF

i3 would be i3-4160 / i3-4170 possibly the i3-6100 (just waiting for a quote back on the new Optiplex 3040 with this.)

The micro desktops are attractive from a reducing desktop ‘clutter’ view but you’re getting a T processor for the same price and I think this might limit how long we can drag out from them :slight_smile:

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i3 ssd and 8gb should future proof for a little bit

Just be wary of the staff filling ssd’d by dumping files all over the place

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If you absolutely had to pick one thing to save money on, I would say the CPU. Those tasks that you listed are not very CPU intensive, but they could eat up some RAM if lots of things are open. SSDs for new machines isn’t an option if you ask me, it’s mandatory. For the price, it’s the best upgrade you can make to almost any system over spinning rust. I would aim for this build if possible.

i3
8GB RAM
256GB SSD

I have had a couple of users who are pretty much up against the 128GB limit for some of our older SSDs and they have kept their machines pretty lean. It’s mostly Windows (Windows 7) files, so there is not much wiggle room. No clue how big Windows 10 is going to get, but it may be an issue down the road. The difference between the 128GB and 256GB is about $20. If it is in your budget, try and spring for the larger ones. It might save you from upgrading the SSDs prematurely.

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I just picked up a boatload of 120gb SSD’s on Black Friday for $40 each… Upgarding many spinning rusts as we speak, and its the only ways forward.

I also tend to buy new laptops, where laptops are still needed, and replace the hdds with SSD - it’s been working great so far, and still better value than getting it out of factory.

Best performance - SSD over anything else,

Then for your environment would be RAM

Last consideration should be the cpu

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Dont get stuck or sold on model numbers, Even 7 year old computers set up and configured right with an SSD are far more powerful then most end users need.

I3 or equivalent AMD.

Onboard video,

Smallest SSD you can find that fits your OS Windows 7 pro, cause duh EOL is 2026

4 gigs of ram is plenty for office needs

Done and done.

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While I can’t disagree with that statement, we go ahead and get the i5 so they will last longer.

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Most of our machines are quite outdated, but we did refresh all of our machines with 8gb of memory. The only people to have SSD’s, are our Engineers. Everyone else is using plain Jane slow as hell mechanical drives.

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Minimum that I am putting into our machines is this.

8GBs of RAM

Quad Core (Usually AMD for the better price)

120GB SSD

500GB Storage Drive

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Why would you put a local storage drive in a system now a days? It’s bad practice to do so.

Give the user a tiny little SSD to save on the cost, and force them to save everything to your network shares.

It is completely feasible to never have any critical data saved on an end-user system. Office 365, Google Docs etc.

A NAS would even work for this, and GPO’s to redirect their My Documents folders etc.

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i5 or i7 processor (Depending factors) 4-8GB of RAM, 120 or 250GB SSD dependant on how much storage they keep on their computer (Ex. If they’ve had it for 3 years and only have 50GB of storage they’re getting a 120…)

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We have the same workload. Majority of applications used in Citrix. For the latest batch, we went with i3, 8 GB RAM, and SSDs in a 3020micro. Super fast and will easily last through their 5 year cycle. Absolutely no reason to splurge even to an i5 processor.

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I would not put a storage drive in the machines and just go with a SSD. Make users save stuff to the server, and have folder redirects on. I would say 120GB would be fine. My personal opinion is limit desktop access to storage at local computer level. This does two things. Stops files from being saved to local machines, and can help flag users who have an issue with abusing IT resources.

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Core I5, 8GB ram and depending on the budget Spindle 500 GB or a 256 SSD. Everything in this day and age is 64 bit. So anything less than 8GB or ram is like running a dinosaur. Core I5 will run just about anything you throw at it in a business environment. I3 is good but it really comes down to the budget and requirements. However the cost difference is about 100 bucks so why not right ! The SSD is a good option for those who shut down a lot or run apps that are IOP intensive but again in this day and age almost everything is cloud based. SSD may be a little more reliable but if your buying from a good vendor and your DR plan is up to par spindle is a quick way to save the money and put the resources somewhere else.

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