Search desktop computers suitable for Quarkxpress and Pagemaker - Assignment Example

SEARCH DESKTOP COMPUTERS SUITABLE FOR QUARKXPRESS AND PAGEMAKER Rationale: The management with its vision of establishing a firm position in the competing advertising industry is now on a full effort of upgrading its facilities and conducting trainings to its staff. Aiming to break barriers with competitors by bringing up good quality service to all clients at all times. The management strives to develop a communion in its mission by reaching out to all of its working staff to work towards the realization of the company's vision of establishing good relationship with its clients that will be the key to the success of the company. Objectives: 1. To identify a desktop computer suitable for heavy applications for designing especially Pagemaker and QuarkXpress. The Project has 4 phases: 1. Organization of Research Team 2. Determining Computer Specifications 3. Price Canvassing and Comparison 4. Purchasing Below is the action plan with the span of 14 working days from April 12-16 Gantt Chart PLANNED TASK SCHEDULED DATES March April 19 20 21 22 23 24 26 27 28 29 30 31 1 2 1. Support Staff Meeting 2. Organizing the research Team 3. Proper Assignment of the organized research team. 4. Research system requirements for the heavy application design software. 5. Research computer specifications that meet the system requirements of the software. 6. Research retail stores for prices, and other information. 7. Price Comparison. 6. Purchasing Members of the Organized Research Team: To ensure effective administration of the project a team of representatives from various department of our company has been organized. The name of the members of the team and its assigned task appears below: 1. Miss Jane Lumantas - System Administrator of the company will submit the report on system requirements required by the QuarkXpress and Pagemaker to work properly 2. Mr. Joel Mar T. Escudero - System Programmer, work together with Ms. Lumantas 3. Mrs. Shiella Michelle Pino - Graphics Designer and Layout Artist, will work together with Ms. Lumantas and Mr. Escudero. 4. Mr, Renato Rosal - Finance Coordinator, allocates budget for the purchasing that will be done. 5. Ms. Merli Paler - price canvasser 6. Mr. Louie Guttierez - price canvasser RECOMMENDATION FROM THE RESEARCH TEAM Miss Jane Lumantas, System Administrator together with Mr. Joel Mar Escudero, and Mrs. Shiella Michelle Pino submitted a report for the recommended computer specification that would fit the applications QuarkXpress and Pagemaker. This was based on the intensive study of the two applications. No computer with specifications lower than the recommended specifications shall be purchased. This will be strictly followed to prevent future ineffectivity that might result from using the lower specs computers. Advantage of following proper specifications: 1.) Maximization of the performance and capabilities of the application. 2.) Reduces cost by preventing hardware and software damages that might arise from using the lower specs. Disadvantage of not following proper specifications: 1.) Lower performance level resulting to slower processing. 2.) Application error may cause hardware, or software related damages. Oftentimes, this damages costs bigger amount of money. How the purchasing will be done To ensure the purchase is worth the price, we need to contact various computer stores for price comparison, support services like warranty period and training, freebies items. Comparison shall be presented on graph and each item will be provided with detailed explanation which will be the basis for choosing how, where, and when the purchase will be done. Below is the system requirement of the QuarkXpress Application 1QuarkXPress is a powerful design and page layout software with an intuitive, versatile interface that lets you combine superior typography with color and pictures to produce dynamic final output for print and Web delivery. QuarkXPress is widely used by magazines, newspapers, advertising agencies and design firms, marketers, printers, corporate publishers, catalog houses, and book publishers. Mac OS Windows Software Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger) Hardware G5 or faster PowerPC-based processor or Mac Intel-based processor (G4 minimum) CD-ROM drive for installation 1GB of available RAM recommended (256MB minimum) 950MB of available hard disk space for installation of QuarkXPress 7 or QuarkXPress Passport 7 Software Microsoft Windows XP (service pack 2) or Windows Vista Hardware CD-ROM drive for installation 1GB of available RAM recommended (256MB minimum on Windows XP, 512MB minimum on Windows Vista) 450MB of available hard disk space for installation Table. 1 System Requirement of QuarkXpress for Windows and Mac OS Below is the system requirement of the Pagemaker Application Pagemaker is ideal page layout programme for business, education, and small- and home-office professionals who want to create high-quality publications such as brochures and newsletters. Get started quickly with templates, graphics, and intuitive design tools; work productively across Adobe applications; and easily leverage existing content to create customise communications. Mac OS Windows PowerPC processor Mac OS 9.1 or Mac OS X (Classic mode only) 30MB of available RAM (45MB recommended) 150MB of available hard-disk space for installation (200MB recommended) 800x600 monitor resolution with 8-bit/256 colors (24-bit, high-resolution screen display recommended) CD-ROM drive For Adobe PostScript printers: Adobe PostScript Level 2 or later Intel Pentium processor Microsoft Windows 98, Windows NT 4.0 with Service Pack 5 or 6, Windows 2000, or Windows Millennium 32MB of available RAM (48MB or more recommended) 175MB of available hard-disk space for installation (200MB or more recommended) Video card with 800 x 600 resolution and 8-bit/256 colours (24-bit, high-resolution display recommended) CD-ROM drive For Adobe PostScript printers: Adobe PostScript Level 2 or later. Table 2. System Requirements for Pagemaker Desktop Brands Recommended Presented below are 5 desktop brands were found to be compatible with the QuarkXpress and Pagemaker application. All brands have met the requirements of the two applications in terms of Memory and Hard Drive Capacity. Brand Names Memory Hard Drive Capacity Processor Compaq dx2000 Business Desktop 512 MB 40 GB Intel Pentium 4 Pavilion S7712n Slimline PC 1024 MB 250 GB Intel Pentium Dual-Core T5082 Minitower 512 MB 160 GB Intel Pentium 4 Pavilion a7140 minitower 1024 MB 320 GB Intel Core 2 Duo Processor ZT Affinity CI-PV04C Minitower 1024 MB 320 GB Pentium D Processor Table 3. Computer Specifications The amount of memory and Hard Drive Capacity of the five brands were presented in graph below. As we can see, three brands were found to be of very high memory installed at 1024 MB. QuarkXpress needs a maximum of 1GB and a minimum of 256 MB of memory for both Windows and Mac Operating system. All brands had passed the minimum requirement. Why need to pass the minimum memory requirement Because all applications will used certain amount of memory for them to work successfully, it means all features of the application could be used without experiencing problems. When you are below the minimum requirement, it will cause slow processing, the monitor screen will flicker, and as regularly experienced will cause the system to halt and the application will no longer respond to the user. This will be a big problem especially for urgent works. When it comes to hard drive capacity, all brands has also meet the minimum requirements which is needed only for the installation purposes. Usually, installing programs like QuarkXpress and Pagemaker will use hard disk space for its installation files, and this amount of space are the ones specified in the minimum hard disk space requirement. Graph 1. System Requirements for Adobe Pagemaker in Windows and Mac OS in terms of Memory and Hard Drive Capacity. In terms of Processor, all brands met the requirements. This are the top processor class widely used nowadays for high level applications. So what is the choice As of now, the best choice is the ZT Affinity CI-PV04C Minitower Desktop for having the highest amount of memory and Hard Drive Capacity, and for having a high speed processor. PRICE CANVASSING Price canvassing was made for all the 5 Brands disregarding the team's choice. It is done because the price will also be the basis for the choice of which brand will be purchased. Shown in the name below is the result of price canvassing as submitted by Miss. Merli Paler and Mr. Gutierrez. See graph on next page for graphical representation of the prices. Prices are in US Dollar Currency. Store Name Compaq dx2000 Business Desktop Pavilion S7712n Slimline PC T5082 Minitower Pavilion a7140 minitower ZT Affinity CI-PV04C Minitower LinkWorld Inc. 684 549 329 699 549 DigiCom International 683 550 332 700 551 John's Computer Center 685 551 331 701 548 NetGate 681 550 330 702 547 MyPC International 682 548 328 697 695 Table 4. Price Comparison among selected stores Graph 2. Price Comparison among 5 stores Based on the graph above, we can see all prices of the 5 brands in 5 top stores. Our choice was ZT Affinity CI-PV04C minitower. It becomes confusing now, T5082 Minitower has the lowest price, if this will be our choice, we could save on the price. But we should also consider the specification of the brand. Based on experience, it is always recommended for wise computer users that all computers should be on high specifications because the higher the specification is, the greater the performance also. The team had decided to stick to the first choice. NetGate has the lowest price for our first choice, we will now consider how we could get training and support. Based on inquiries, we have come up to this final ratings of each stores below shown in the table. Computer Stores Training & Support Accessibility LinkWorld Inc. 99 % DigiCom International 98 % John's Computer Center 96 % NetGate 99 % MyPC International 94 % Graph 3. Training and Support Rating Training and Support services are rated with the highest of 100%. All stores were rated based on how immediate the support can be accessed, and the effectivity and reliability of services. Most of the stores are from neighboring cities. NetGate and LinkWorld Inc. has equal rating of 99%. Final Recommendation The company much purchase the ZT Affinity CI-PV04C Minitower with 1024 MB of memory installed, 320 GB Hard Disk Capacity, and Pentium D Processor. The specifications fits the system requirements of the project. The store that we have chosen is Netgate for having the lowest price and a rating of 99% of training and support accessibility. It is one of the reputable computer stores selling genuine computers and softwares. Read More