For the home user, there are three main choices of operating system available. Each OS has it's advantages and disadvantages and there is no perfect answer.

• For many years, Apple has been the easy to use system. The standards for application menus are carefully controlled so it requires less effort to learn a new application.
• Network setup and printer setup are easy compared to other systems.
• Security is good.
• A lot of applications come with the system.
  

• If you want Apple, you must buy Apple hardware and Apple hardware costs more (nice stuff though).
• Apple is easy to use and setup most of the time until something goes wrong and then you need a real expert.
• Linux desktop market share is/or has overtaken the Apple market share and software vendors are dropping their Apple versions of their software.
  

• By far, the most common OS out there so you can expect 99% of the hardware and software to support Windows.
• Most computers come with Windows installed.

• Windows does have a security problem. You will need to buy and install third party software to make it secure enough to use on the Internet.
• Windows has the problem called DLL hell. What that means is, you can break applications you have running when you install a new application. The fix might be to format and reload your system.
  
• The fix for some Windows problems is to format your computer and reinstall everything. A very unpleasant task at best and the need to do this about every six months is the reason I moved to Linux three years ago. Moving to Linux was the end of my format and reload problem.
  
• The cost to upgrade Windows is getting expensive and you can see Microsoft making every effort to change things so you will be compelled to upgrade Windows when they want you to.
  

• A secure system if you do not turn the security off.
• Runs faster than Windows on the same hardware.
• A lot of applications come with the system or can be downloaded for free.
• You can legally install the same Linux on all your computers at home if you have several.
• You can run the major Windows applications under Linux like Microsoft Office and Photoshop using Wine.
• If Linux is setup, any Windows user should be able to do their tasks with no extra training.
  

• A lot of issues with hardware drivers. As the Linux desktop market share increases, this should get better but this is the reason I don't tell friends and family to move to Linux for their desktop.
• Linux installs secure so you have to learn how to set all the levels of security if you are running a home network. I would not call network setup or shared printer setup in Linux easy.
  
• Most games do not support Linux.
  

The office suite is a collection of the most valuable productivity applications and can be expected to be a good value for the home.

You have five main choices for office suites:

• Microsoft Office Suite (Note: the cost is high for the normal version but the student and teacher version is going for $122)
  
• Corel Office Suite ($80 for the student and teacher version)
  
• Star Office Suite ($60 for the full version)
• Open Office ($0) for the full version)
• Lotus used to have a very good suite but I don't know if you can still get it.
  

For me the purchase of a new computer does not require that much thought. I run Linux so I need to check for driver support but I don't spend a lot of time on mhz etc.. Bus speed and CPU caching make the most diferance so if you want to check numbers those are good ones to look at.

I have found that buying the cheapest computer can cost more in the long run. If you look at computer prices, there is a point where the cost goes up sharply and just before that price point is where I shop. If I get a system that is a little over kill, I seem to be able to get good use out of a computer for around five years. If you want more performance, spend your money on more memory. I have started loading computers with the maximum memory they will handle when I get a new one. The cost per meg of storage on large hard drives goes down so do the math and avoid a small hard drive when a larger one is a better value.
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When selecting a printer for home use, a deskjet printer can be the best value because the purchase cost is so low and print quality is good.  If for some reason, you will be printing over one hundred pages a day, a laser printer will give a lower cost per page because the ink cost per page is lower.

A good quality deskjet printer is a real steal because they are a loss leader for selling ink.  I am currently running a Epson C82 and just got a Epson C84.  Why do you need two printers you ask?  There is an issue with printer cartridges.  Because they sell printers at cost or at a loss the deskjet manufacturers want to make sure they get the income from the printer cartridges whichI think that is fair because it is part of the deal.  The rot sets in because they expect people to try to refresh the ink in their printer cartridges without buying new ones from the manufacturer.  To keep people from reusing the cartridges, they do things like checking the cartridge date and tracking the number of pages that the cartridge was used to print. 

The part the vexes me is that once a cartridge gets to a high page count, they make the printer pretend to not be working (it will still have ink).  If you replace one cartridge, the printer does not start working and I have found I need to replace all of them at a cost of $80 before the printer works again.  I think my C82 currently has a cartridge page count problem and will start working when I replace all of them but because the printer pretends to not be working I can not tell if the printer needs repair until the $80 of cartridges are installed. 

I am 20 miles from the closest store and I can not stock extra cartridges at the house because of the date checking.  This is a real problem if I need to print a check or some other business item because I might not have the time for a 40 mile round trip in traffic.  Because the cost of a printer is very close to the cost of new cartridges, I ordered a new printer.  When the new printer is connected and working, I could install new cartridges in the old printer to see if it needs repair and if it did I would be out the $80 if the cost of repair was to high. 

Ahh, not so I say.  I ordered a tool to reset the chips in the cartridges so they will think they are full again and I will be able to see if my printer is working without the $80 investment in cartridges.  I still plan to buy new Epson cartridges because I don't print that many pages and the cost of the ink is not that much per year but I hope the tool will work and I will avoid the vexing trouble shooting when the people control programming kicks in on the printers.   The tool should give me the option to reset the cartridges and make sure every thing is working the next time my page count gets to high before I buy a new cartridge set.  I would have been much happier without the fake malfunction feature, why would it be so bad  if the printer gave a message that you had to buy a new cartridge set before it would work again?

HP and the others have the same type of people control in their deskjets so I got one more Epson because of the print speed and the quality of the print.  Epson also works good with the Linux drivers.
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