Well, I was hunting around on fleabay for a new tower system for my PC. Mine's getting a little long in the tooth.

Put what I thought was a bit of a cheeky offer in on an athlon 64 (tower only) system and lo and behold it's been accepted. Damn, now I need to go get it.

The spec is:

Athlon 64 4200+ dual core

2Gb RAM DDR2, kingston

120GB HDD (I never really need the space)

Sony DVD Rom

256mb onboard graphics

6 x USB

Asus M2N8-VMX board

NVIDIA geforce 6100 graphics

6.1 surround output.

Legit version of windows XP Home too.

Can anyone tell me what kind of network cable I need to transfer all the stuff on this PC to my new one? Got loads of car stuff in a big "briskoda" file. Several gig.

Jase can't you just use a direct 'null modem' cable, or a regular LAN cable that's been "crossed" between two LAN cards.

Alternatively a big USB flash memory dongle thingie could do it with a couple of trips back and forth?

Also if you backup the stuff you want to transfer onto cheap cd roms you can do it that way, asa well as having a permanent backup in case your PC tries to imitate the smoke output of the mongrel...

Good luck

You make me jealous that I can't get Paypal out here and get onto ebay!

HTH

Bas

Jason the spec looks ok'ish. The graphics card is very dated and will be slow for modern games, but will be ok for normal apps.

Forget using cables for copying data between machines, these days its much easier to get an external USB hard drive and copy the data to that, then to the new machine. It doesnt go to waste either, as once you have finished you can use the drive for normal storage or backing up the main pc. a 400GB external drive is around

Can't you just add the new one to the network and then pull the files you need off and onto the new PC

I won't be using it for any modern games. Just as a fresher, faster system. Folding "might" get added.

That's not a bad system. The motherboard is a micro ATX size and very well loaded for the features. The nvidia on-board graphics isn't that bad and you get dual-screen / extended desktop capabilities out of the box

Re copying data across, I reckon it's easier to use a USB hard drive or flash memory as others suggested. By all means try a crossover network cable, but you'll have to faff around more to get it talking and it'll probably be slower anyway...

Shows how little I know. I wasn't even AWARE of USB had drives. Hope I can get one cheap.

In my case I have a GBit network at home, even 100Mbit is easy enough.

If you have a wired network, and both PCs are on it, it's a piece of cake to set off a file copy, all it takes is to set them up on the same workgroup, don't use the 'simple' file sharing (as it imho sux) and you can copy stuff over.

That's not to say using a USB device isn't a great option, as it is too

I copy 15GB files over the network in the office all the time, and it's really not that bad - it is on a GBit switch though, and it needs that vs the 100Mbit backbone it had before to keep me reasonably happy

Why not just piggy back the old drive onto the new one?

Why not just piggy back the old drive onto the new one?

Thats what I was just thinking

Also a good idea

hang on, I can set up my current HDD as a slave 2nd drive? Well, that would be an idea, but I've already committed to buying a local 160gig USB drive. I would like to keep this current PC in it's current state if I can. I'll end up having to sell it on once I get the new one up and running fine. The USB drive will prove a handy back-up device too.

That's the idea!! - If i understand correctly - take out your HD from your old PC, plug into the new one's motherboard, copy whatever, take it out again and put it back home...

No expense, fuss or whatever

as above jsut stick the old HDD in the new computer, copy stuff over then return it to the old PC, no cost, no hassle, no setting up just quick easy transfer.

When you sell it don't forget to securely wipe your hard disk. I would guess this is doubly the case when you work in accountancy.

Darik's Boot and Nuke (Hard Drive Disk Wipe)

If you download the CD ISO, burn it and boot the PC you will then be able to overwrite the data on your hard disk with random data many times. This should be good enough to make sure that your average person without a clean room won't be getting any of your data.

HTH

TBH it's easy enough to wipe a hard disc - drilling through an old HDD and/or wipe with strong magnet is pretty much a guaranteed 'sorted' too

Well, I've committed to the USB one now. It's a lot bigger, and is at least a good way to keep a backup of everything.

I also found out the DVD-ROM in the PC is actually a re-writer as well so I don't need to look out for a RW drive now.

Got a Western Digital 160Gb USB HDD for

TBH it's easy enough to wipe a hard disc - drilling through an old HDD and/or wipe with strong magnet is pretty much a guaranteed 'sorted' too

Actually You would be surprised at how much data can be taken off a drive, even with a hole in it.

We have even had some where the drive was shot at using a high calibre rifle and the data was still retrievable.

The only real way is an acid bath then burn the remains I am told, but then it is a matter of how sensitive your data is and how much somebody wants it.

In most cases I think the run wipe and take the lid off, or hole through it should work as a deterrent.