Buying a new computer is usually not an easy task, since many things have to be taken into account. We have a wide range on the market, including gaming computers, laptops, Mini PCs and many other systems. Well, we have found that this HP PC is the best seller on Amazon and we explain why you should not buy it.
Although we have looked at the best seller, there are several similar systems that are among the best sellers. These computers present different types of problems, one of the most important being the guarantee. As it is not a new product, which is refurbished, they simply give you a one year warranty.
A cheap purchase that can be expensive
The first thing we should know about these HP computers is their origin. It already tells us in the name of the product that they are “Reconditioned” , come on, that they have been cleaned and put up for sale again. The origin of these systems are the offices and it is that these systems fall within the program of office solutions offered by HP.
Within this system, the company sells the product to medium and large companies with a large number of workers. From time to time these systems are retired and newer systems are added. These old retired systems are put up for sale again , in this case, on Amazon. The problem with these systems is that they have hours and hours of use.
We can see that this HP Elite 8300 has an Intel Core i7-3770 , a processor from over 10 years ago. It is not a bad processor, since it has 4 cores and 8 threads, but it uses DDR3 RAM , an obsolete standard that offers worse performance than DDR4. But it is not by far the biggest problem of this computer.
The biggest problem with this office computer is the number of hours of use of the storage units. A user on Amazon has found that the HDD has over 55,000 hours of use and the SSD has almost 21,000 hours of use. Regarding the SSD, there is no problem, since the volume of reading and writing of this storage unit will not be large. But, when it comes to the HDD, 55,000 hours of use is just bullshit.
It is not the only flaw. Some report that the power supply is very noisy or the case is broken on the front. Perhaps the most brutal case that we have seen is the SSD attached to the chassis with some flanges, which is a botch.
The only positive thing about these systems is that we give a second life to hardware that is already years old. We cut down on the amount of e-waste a bit.
Best systems we can buy for this price
This system is sold by HP for about 200 euros, a fairly high price, especially considering the time of use of some of its components. For this reason we have looked for equally good quality solutions for similar prices.
A very good alternative is Mini PCs, which are more modern, more efficient and much more compact systems. In addition, the Mini PCs incorporate WiFi , which this HP system lacks for this type of wireless connectivity.
For a little less we have the CHUWI Herobox that offers us performance quite similar to the HP model, but with more modern hardware. It is much quieter and more efficient and has WiFi 5, to be able to connect to the internet without cables. In addition, it has several USB 3.0 ports and even a USB-C on the front.
If you don’t mind spending a bit more, there’s the Beelink U59, which uses an 11th Gen Intel processor, improving system efficiency and performance. This also offers a large capacity SSD and support for WiFi 5. It also has several USB 3.0 ports, as well as a USB-C port.
