I kind of inheareted an old Gateway a while back. P3 800mhz, but with a lacking 64mb of RAM and intel integrated video. All attempts to upgrade the machine thus far have failed. Can't add a PCI video card because the case is too small, and can't add more RAM because it will crash when it gets to the desktop. It was good enough for what I needed, Internet Explorer. However the power supply eventually went kaput on it. Being that it was a proprietary P/S, we didn't really want to mess with it. But I got tired of no longer having it, and grabbed my old ass 125watt and slung it out through the hole where the old one used to be. It sits on top of it, power cord to the power strip, and power wires in through the hole where the original one used to go. But I love it anyway and use it to totally geek out and multi task on two computers.

But now for the monitorial dilema. We had 2 monitors to use on the Lag-Beast(it's network name, and refrence in conversation). One is a monitor that came with an even older Gateway 386 machine which boasts it's 1024x786 max rez proudly. Unfortunatly most of the screen is unused at that resolution, and it doesn't support 800x600, go figure, oh and it's like a 13'' screen. The second monitor I unknowingly fried by turning it on and off a few to many times. It no longer turns on and that makes me sad.

Now, I don't really have a problem with using the 1024x786 rez, I'm more of a 1280x1024 guy, but oh well. The problem really comes from the fact that the monitor has been dropped and abused so much that it nearly always makes a loud ass screching sound while on, at any resolution. It is quite annoying.

So, the question I propose: Should I get a 15'' or so LCD and use my current 17'' flatscreen CRT on the beast, or should I scrounge around for a cheap 15'' CRT for it and keep my current monitor. I'd like to minimalize costs as much as possible, but I'd also like to have some room left on my L-shaped desk when using both comps.