I'm building this PC for a friend and I wanted some recomendations with the parts. He has about 600 to spend and here is what we thought could be a possible solution:
Case: COOLER MASTER Centurion 5 CAC-T05 $ 49.99
Mobo: ASUS P5LD2 Socket T (LGA 775) Intel 945P $109.99
CPU: Intel Pentium D 930 Presler 3.0GHz $149.00
RAM: OCZ Gold Series 1GB DDR2 533 (PC2 4200) $109.99
GPU: HIS Hightech Radeon X1300 256MB $ 62.99
HDD: Western Digital Caviar 250GB SATA $ 79.99
Optical: LG Black 18X DVD $ 29.99
PSU: Rosewill RD400-2-DB ATX V2.2 400W $ 28.99
Total: $ 620.93
I want to lower down the prices actually (maybe $100 less) since the shipping to my country will rape me (well, him). So any suggestions are welcome!
[edit]: He will be mainly using this computer for college stuff, he doesn't game at all.
Budget PC
Moderators: NeilBlanchard, Ralf Hutter, sthayashi, Lawrence Lee
Hi m0l0t0v, I really wouldn't suggest buy a P4 at all. They're very power hungry for the performance they provide and since the introduction of the Core 2 Duo and lowering of AMDs prices not good value any more either.
Not sure where you price are from and if they're comparable with one I looked up on Newegg but I would suggest swapping the CPU, motherboard and graphics card for:
Abit NF-M2 ----------------- $90
Athlon X2 3800+ (65w) --- $135
Onboard graphics --------- $0
This will save nearly $100 off your prices and provide a machine that will perform similarly while using much less electricity. The onboard graphics aren't up to a lot by modern games but will play older stuff fine and run Vista with all the bells n whistles. It has DVI and VGA and supports dual screens, it's also very over-clockable and uses a heatpipe for chipset cooling so no noisy fan to wear out either.
Some time ago I spent a lot of time bench marking an Athlon X2 4200+ in a Nvidia 6100 motherboard to see the impact of memory speed/timings/ single dual channel. I've not thoroughly analysed the results but changing command rate 1T/2T had less impact than changing the latency eg 5,5,5 to 4,4,4 which had less impact to changing the frequency eg 533 to 667 which had similar impact to single to dual channel. There was about 10% between best and worst config, however, given that it's very little difference in money I would aim for at least DDR2 667 and preferably 800. If you want a quiet CPU cooler I suggest the Arctic Cooling Alpine 64 (or 7), $9.99 also from Newegg.
Hope this helps, Seb
Not sure where you price are from and if they're comparable with one I looked up on Newegg but I would suggest swapping the CPU, motherboard and graphics card for:
Abit NF-M2 ----------------- $90
Athlon X2 3800+ (65w) --- $135
Onboard graphics --------- $0
This will save nearly $100 off your prices and provide a machine that will perform similarly while using much less electricity. The onboard graphics aren't up to a lot by modern games but will play older stuff fine and run Vista with all the bells n whistles. It has DVI and VGA and supports dual screens, it's also very over-clockable and uses a heatpipe for chipset cooling so no noisy fan to wear out either.
Some time ago I spent a lot of time bench marking an Athlon X2 4200+ in a Nvidia 6100 motherboard to see the impact of memory speed/timings/ single dual channel. I've not thoroughly analysed the results but changing command rate 1T/2T had less impact than changing the latency eg 5,5,5 to 4,4,4 which had less impact to changing the frequency eg 533 to 667 which had similar impact to single to dual channel. There was about 10% between best and worst config, however, given that it's very little difference in money I would aim for at least DDR2 667 and preferably 800. If you want a quiet CPU cooler I suggest the Arctic Cooling Alpine 64 (or 7), $9.99 also from Newegg.
Hope this helps, Seb
There's two things you should never be cheap about when building your own computer, and that's the power supply and motherboard. Those are the two most crucial parts to any computer. Your motherboard choice is good, but a Rosewill PSU shouldn't be considered.
I'd suggest something along the lines of a Fortron 350W Blue Storm or Antec SmartPower 2.0. Even though you're giving up 50W, the most important thing about PSUs is quality. Antec, Fortron, Seasonic, and OCZ are quality brands, but Seasonic and OCZ are probably outside of your price range. Also, with your setup, the system shouldn't use more than about 150W under any circumstances. This will add about $20 to your setup though. (+$20)
To cheapen the setup some more, I'd suggest switching to AMD. An Athlon64 x2 3800+ will cost $135 and will be less likely to overheat on a hot summer day. (-$15)
With AMD, your motherboard options are also less expensive. Something like an ASUS M2N-E will cost $91 (-$18).
That will get you just barely above the $600 mark.
To lower your costs even more, you could consider going to a smaller form factor, especially since he probably won't be adding alot of additional components in the future. A mATX motherboard will only cost about $75 (ASUS M2N-MX), and you could buy a case/PSU combo like the Antec NSK3300 ($86 for case and PSU). Since he's not gaming a video card is probably not even necessary, especially since most mATX motherboards have built-in video. By going mATX and on-board video, your cost will probably be down near $535.
I'd suggest something along the lines of a Fortron 350W Blue Storm or Antec SmartPower 2.0. Even though you're giving up 50W, the most important thing about PSUs is quality. Antec, Fortron, Seasonic, and OCZ are quality brands, but Seasonic and OCZ are probably outside of your price range. Also, with your setup, the system shouldn't use more than about 150W under any circumstances. This will add about $20 to your setup though. (+$20)
To cheapen the setup some more, I'd suggest switching to AMD. An Athlon64 x2 3800+ will cost $135 and will be less likely to overheat on a hot summer day. (-$15)
With AMD, your motherboard options are also less expensive. Something like an ASUS M2N-E will cost $91 (-$18).
That will get you just barely above the $600 mark.
To lower your costs even more, you could consider going to a smaller form factor, especially since he probably won't be adding alot of additional components in the future. A mATX motherboard will only cost about $75 (ASUS M2N-MX), and you could buy a case/PSU combo like the Antec NSK3300 ($86 for case and PSU). Since he's not gaming a video card is probably not even necessary, especially since most mATX motherboards have built-in video. By going mATX and on-board video, your cost will probably be down near $535.
I like the integrated video card. He won't be using 256mb or anything like it.. Check this configuration out:
Case: Thermaltake Circle RH-F030-2SW $84.99
Mobo: ABIT NF-M2 nView Socket AM2 $89.99
CPU: AMD Athlon 64 X2 3800+ $135.00
RAM: OCZ Gold Series 1GB DDR2 533 $109.99
HDD: Western Digital Caviar 250GB SATA $79.99
Optical: LG Black 18X DVD $29.99
PSU: Antec EA380 ATX12V v2.0 380W $59.99
Total: 589.94
Case: Thermaltake Circle RH-F030-2SW $84.99
Mobo: ABIT NF-M2 nView Socket AM2 $89.99
CPU: AMD Athlon 64 X2 3800+ $135.00
RAM: OCZ Gold Series 1GB DDR2 533 $109.99
HDD: Western Digital Caviar 250GB SATA $79.99
Optical: LG Black 18X DVD $29.99
PSU: Antec EA380 ATX12V v2.0 380W $59.99
Total: 589.94
Well that's certainly an interesting case choice to say the least. Aesthetics aside, I don't think its a very good case. It has the exhaust fan at the bottom rear of the case. Cold air goes down and hot air rises. This means you'll be pulling the colder air out of the case rather than the hot air.
The PSU is up top, but you picked a PSU that doesn't have a bottom fan, so its not really pulling hot air from over the motherboard. It just seems to be a very poorly designed case for cooling. The front fan is also almost useless since it doesn't push air over the hard drive and just shoots air right into the exhaust fan, most likely reducing the airflow over the motherboard. IMO, the Centurion seems better than the Thermaltake Circle.
Check out the case recommendation article on this site for more ideas, but I think an Antec NSK3300 with included PSU would be your cheapest, best bang for the buck choice.
You also might want to look at mATX cases since you're going with a smaller motherboard. A mATX motherboard will fit in an ATX case, but since you're shipping it, you'll be paying more for a bigger/heavier box.
Also, as a warning, the ABIT NF-M2 board does not have a parallel or serial port like most other motherboards. This means that if you're hooking up to a non-USB printer, you can't do it without an add-on card that costs $10-15.
The PSU is up top, but you picked a PSU that doesn't have a bottom fan, so its not really pulling hot air from over the motherboard. It just seems to be a very poorly designed case for cooling. The front fan is also almost useless since it doesn't push air over the hard drive and just shoots air right into the exhaust fan, most likely reducing the airflow over the motherboard. IMO, the Centurion seems better than the Thermaltake Circle.
Check out the case recommendation article on this site for more ideas, but I think an Antec NSK3300 with included PSU would be your cheapest, best bang for the buck choice.
You also might want to look at mATX cases since you're going with a smaller motherboard. A mATX motherboard will fit in an ATX case, but since you're shipping it, you'll be paying more for a bigger/heavier box.
Also, as a warning, the ABIT NF-M2 board does not have a parallel or serial port like most other motherboards. This means that if you're hooking up to a non-USB printer, you can't do it without an add-on card that costs $10-15.
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angelkiller
- Posts: 871
- Joined: Fri Jan 05, 2007 11:37 am
- Location: North Carolina
I'm in agreement with others, with a mATX board a mATX case is a good idea. The NSK3300 is pretty good and costs about the same as your chosen case but includes a PSU so saves you $60. Or keep the good PSU and choose any budget case you like the look of. I would choose DDR2 800 RAM ideally, Newegg has several 512MBx2 kits at $109 like this one.
Seb
Seb
molotov. I send parts to your country all the time. I just came from there btw. If you're interested hit me up.
I can't stress the fact of having a middle man to send hardware overseas. I know many ppl that are willing to pay a bit more to make sure their hardware arrives functional. It's a huge hassle when it arrives DOA and you have to pay a ton of $ to RMA. I will give you more info via PM's.
I don't reco an Antec PSU unless it's a NEO series. At least in your price range.
If you want there is a case and power we can talk about. Again hit me up if you're interested. I'm guessing you will use business mail.
I can't stress the fact of having a middle man to send hardware overseas. I know many ppl that are willing to pay a bit more to make sure their hardware arrives functional. It's a huge hassle when it arrives DOA and you have to pay a ton of $ to RMA. I will give you more info via PM's.
I don't reco an Antec PSU unless it's a NEO series. At least in your price range.
If you want there is a case and power we can talk about. Again hit me up if you're interested. I'm guessing you will use business mail.
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flyingsherpa
- *Lifetime Patron*
- Posts: 475
- Joined: Fri Sep 26, 2003 6:28 pm
- Location: CT, USA
since this isn't a gaming machine, you can save even more money by buying a little older technology. newegg is selling A64 3400+ for like $55, and a mATX mobo w/ ndvidia6150 (like ASUS A8N-VM CSM if you can find it) to run that would probably be like $80. people will say socket939 is dead, but what does it matter if the system meets your needs? you can always go dual-core later with socket939 too if you want to, though you'd probably have to find the cpu on ebay since there won't be any new ones out there. the system above would be faster than my machine at work, and i'm an engineer at a fortune 500 aerospace company, so it should be plenty for a non-gaming college student 
.
.Wow, I really haven't build a budget PC in a LONG time, so I tend to forget cheaper components bring less features. My friend selected the case, I don't even know how it looks likes, but I looked upon the Antec and I loved it for the price it's being offered. I didn't like the PSU that much, but I guess it will work anyways for the computer I am building him.
I did consider the fact that old technology could be an easier and better way out, but he insisted he wanted a new computer with new things, so that's what I'm giving him.
I considered the fact of buying two 512 instead of one gb of ram, and I think it's a good idea. First of all, he won't even need the complete 1gb, and for the time he would like to upgrade, he might as well just fill the four DIMM instead of having two. It will run better and faster with two DDR then with only one since they will run in dual channel. So, here is the updated list:
Case: Antec NSK3300 $85.99
Mobo: ABIT NF-M2 nView Socket AM2 $89.99
CPU: AMD Athlon 64 X2 3800+ $135.00
RAM: OCZ Gold Series (2 x 512MB) DDR2 533 $122.99
HDD: Western Digital Caviar 250GB SATA $79.99
Optical: LG Black 18X DVD $29.99
Total: $543.95
By the way, what speed should the ram go to?
MC FLMJIG: I ship everything through Business Mail and they have worked fine, after I know what exactly I'm getting for the guy I'll talk to you about the shipping and consider my choices.
I did consider the fact that old technology could be an easier and better way out, but he insisted he wanted a new computer with new things, so that's what I'm giving him.
I considered the fact of buying two 512 instead of one gb of ram, and I think it's a good idea. First of all, he won't even need the complete 1gb, and for the time he would like to upgrade, he might as well just fill the four DIMM instead of having two. It will run better and faster with two DDR then with only one since they will run in dual channel. So, here is the updated list:
Case: Antec NSK3300 $85.99
Mobo: ABIT NF-M2 nView Socket AM2 $89.99
CPU: AMD Athlon 64 X2 3800+ $135.00
RAM: OCZ Gold Series (2 x 512MB) DDR2 533 $122.99
HDD: Western Digital Caviar 250GB SATA $79.99
Optical: LG Black 18X DVD $29.99
Total: $543.95
By the way, what speed should the ram go to?
MC FLMJIG: I ship everything through Business Mail and they have worked fine, after I know what exactly I'm getting for the guy I'll talk to you about the shipping and consider my choices.
Hmm, everything looks good as far as noise goes except maybe the DVD drive, but all DVD drives are noisy without software control. Just make sure you set the included Antec Tri-Cool exhaust fan on low or else it won't be anywhere close to quiet. Personally, I'd get a motherboard with a parrallel port, but other than those few small things, that list looks fine.
What do you mean what speed should the RAM go to? Unless you're overclocking, it should default to 533Mhz. Since it will not be used for gaming, I'd suggest just leaving it at stock speeds.
What do you mean what speed should the RAM go to? Unless you're overclocking, it should default to 533Mhz. Since it will not be used for gaming, I'd suggest just leaving it at stock speeds.
How about changing the motherboard & CPU to this?
Intel Core 2 Duo E6300
ASUS P5L-VM 1394
The difference is exactly 60 dollars.
Intel Core 2 Duo E6300
ASUS P5L-VM 1394
The difference is exactly 60 dollars.
Case: Antec NSK3300 $85.99
Mobo: ABIT NF-M2 nView Socket AM2 $89.99
If you wind up going with the 3800+, you can save some money on these parts without skimping too much on features by going with a couple components I did:
Case: CoolerMaster RC-541 mATX mini-tower : $70
- Comes with a 380W CM power supply. no comment on the PSU, I got the version sans PSU and went with an XCLio 450BL. The case itself is stellar. Never had the Antec, though, so I can't compare them.
Edit: You could save $20 bucks if you have an ATX PSU laying around, the no-PSU version is $49.99
Motherboard: ASRock AliveNF6G-DVI AM2 mATX motherboard : $67
- ASRock is apparently an Asus spinoff. The board is rock-solid for me, some decent overclocking features. No fans on it, so it's pretty quiet. Onboard video is a GeForce 6100, and the package includes a DVI add-in card that would be handy, if I didn't have a dedicated video card.
Mobo: ABIT NF-M2 nView Socket AM2 $89.99
If you wind up going with the 3800+, you can save some money on these parts without skimping too much on features by going with a couple components I did:
Case: CoolerMaster RC-541 mATX mini-tower : $70
- Comes with a 380W CM power supply. no comment on the PSU, I got the version sans PSU and went with an XCLio 450BL. The case itself is stellar. Never had the Antec, though, so I can't compare them.
Edit: You could save $20 bucks if you have an ATX PSU laying around, the no-PSU version is $49.99
Motherboard: ASRock AliveNF6G-DVI AM2 mATX motherboard : $67
- ASRock is apparently an Asus spinoff. The board is rock-solid for me, some decent overclocking features. No fans on it, so it's pretty quiet. Onboard video is a GeForce 6100, and the package includes a DVI add-in card that would be handy, if I didn't have a dedicated video card.
That would give you a pretty hefty perfromance boost. I think the E6300 performs about as well as an Athlon X2 4600+ in many tests. Personally, I think its worth $60, but on a machine used just for homework, email, and internet surfing, it might not be worth it. Especially since with on-board graphics, you won't be doing anything more than light to moderate gaming.m0l0t0v wrote:How about changing the motherboard & CPU to this?
Intel Core 2 Duo E6300
ASUS P5L-VM 1394
The difference is exactly 60 dollars.
The acutal performance difference when using Word, Excel, or internet browsers is minimal. Maybe you should save the $60 and spend it on your own computer
