?
can use one of those little dell things, with the small boxes that have a serial port.

No - parallel only unless you use a external motion control like
smooth stepper.
olf20 / Bob

thats what I meant parallel
i think

You have to watch the serial ports now on laptops and some desktops as the serial port is emulated now and not a traditional port and most all laptops are emulated serial ports.  The trend is moving toward smooth steppers as parallel ports are not always supplied on all motherboards anymore.   I would stick with 32 bit of XP, Vista or 7 as they have been used but it seems XP is the flavor.   

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Dell-Optiplex-GX620-SFF-Small-Form-DVD-ROM-CD-RW-Nvidia-3GB-RAM-HDMI-Media-PC-/161047505262?pt=UK_Computing_DesktopPCs&hash=item257f2de96e#ht_3330wt_1264

what about one of those.
dell optiplex gx620

All I can say is I tried 2 computers until I had one that worked with Mach3 and both computers are the exact make and model of Dell.  Others here have never had a problem.  Sorry I can not be more help but if you have a computer to test it with go for it but to purchase one I would say it is a 80 20 shot with lean more toward the 80.