地道美语听力播客:Buying a New Computer（在线收听）

地道美语听力播客English as a Second Language Podcast (ESLPod)，是一家位于美国加州洛杉矶的英语教育研究机构推出的英文听力会话，于2005年7月23日首播， 主播Dr. Jeff McQuillan为南加州大学的语言学博士， 现专注于外国语学生的英语学习研究。该播客在iTunes store播客的教育子分类中，与Grammar Girl Just Vocabulary常居前三甲.

My computer has been acting up on me. It's a pretty old model, and I need to replace it. So I decided to call up my friend Kevin to ask for his two cents. Kevin is a computer whiz. He knows PC really well since he worked on them for years, but in his heart of hearts, he is a big Mac fan. So, I thought he would be good person to ask.

I have always used a PC. I do mostly word processing so I don't need anything fancy. But, I see people I know doing cool things with photos and video, so I’d like to take a crack at some new programs in the future.

Well, I called up Kevin to tell him what I needed. He immediately started throwing out specs: "You need at least a 2 Gigahertz processor and 1 Gig of memory, and make sure it has a writable DVD drive." "Whoa," I said. "All of that is way over my head. Let's back up for a a minute." Then he laughed and said he had gotten carried away . "Okay," he said. "Let's start at the beginning. Now, the processor determines how easily and how fast you can use the programs on your computer. Got that?" I said that I did. Then he continued, "How much RAM memory you have is very important, too. Your computer will go faster the more you have. So, I recommend getting at least 1 Gigabyte of RAM memory." "I think I'm following you so far, " I said. "Great," he said. Another thing you want is a drive that handles both CDs and DVDs. Some drives can just read DVDs and some can record onto blank ones. If you want to burn your own videos, you'll want a writable DVD drive. Remember though, that's just the computer itself. Don't forget that you'll need a monitor, a keyboard, a mouse, and speakers."

"OK," I said. "I think I've got all that. Now, here's the burning question: Mac or PC?

He said: "Now that's a whole different thing. Do you have a couple of hours?‚"

Script by Dr. Lucy Tse