building a PC

[Kramer]

hey guys, i am interested to know if i can build a pc for $800'ish that would be better than one i could find online.

i am trying to get straight on exactly what i will need to do that so my figures can be relatively accurate, please add/ammend this list if anything is missing.

What i will need:

1. chip
2. motherboard
3. RAM
4. Hard Drive
5. cd/dvdrw drive
6. enclosure
7. video card
8. monitor

thanks for the help

[Harrison]

Most cases come with a power supply, but make sure you have one.

A floppy drive isn't entirely useless yet either. But your typical end-user likely isn't going to use it anymore and since you're asking, that's you

[Harrison]

There's a lot more specific things you will need to make sure are compatible.

Motherboard has integrated sound, ethernet, etc. If it doesn't, you will need a separate PCI component for those. I haven't seen a motherboard worth a shit in years that doesn't come equipped with both, but you never know...

If it's a PCI-E or AGP slot on your MB for the Video Card... (do they still make these? I know they were becoming increasingly rare even last year)

Make sure your processor even fits your motherboard...

blah blah blah, I don't really know what you know and what you don't so this is just rambling on my part.

[Kramer]

thanks so far, keep the info coming, can i save a bunch building my own for just $800?

[Tossica]

You can get a decently equipped PC from many major manufacturers for $800 but if you want to build your own, I suggest you buy a "bare bones" system from a reseller like newegg which usually contains, case, power supply, motherboard, chip and ram. You can then pick out how much drive space you want, what kind of video card you would like, your own optical drive and finally a monitor to "build" your own PC. The good thing about the bare bones system is they often come "burned in" which means it's benched for a day or two to make sure the base components are not DOA. You probably won't save any money doing it this way but you may enjoy putting everything together and loading the OS and drivers. I personally would rather not EVER do that again but some people still get a kick out of it.

[Tikker]

i am trying to get straight on exactly what i will need to do that so my figures can be relatively accurate, please add/ammend this list if anything is missing.

what do you want to do with it?

if you're not going to do some hardcore gaming, I'd pick something with a nice onboard video and audio chipset (geforce 6150, or 7150 are great onboard chipsets)

that way you can save money on a seperate discrete vid card, yet you'll still end up with a 16x pci-e slot that you can stick a big vid card in later if you need an upgrade

I like the nvidia onboard chipsets better than ati, simply cause nvidia ones allow you to use onboard and discrete at the same time if you ever want to do some cool multi-monitor stuff

[10sun]

I'd buy:
http://www.refurbdepot.com/productdetai ... ct_ID=5763

& buy a video card + monitor separately.

First thing I'd do probably is install a copy of XP Pro on the thing, but other than that... I'd be set.

-Adam

[Kramer]

that's pretty much what i am wanting

and yeah, i would rather have it burned in than try to troubleshoot

and it's going to be at most a home comp for low-end graphics/music and gaming

[Gidan]

http://www.cyberpowerpc.com/system/Mega_Special_III/
(changed the video card from the one it had by default)
You can customize everything down to the case and ps in the case. May want to check it out. There are places out there that actually can provide services close to that of building your own now and comparable in price.

$687.00
(before all applicable rebates)


CASE: ($20 off Mail-in Rebate) X-Cruiser Mid-Tower 420W Case W/ WINDOW, MultiMeter Display & Control (Silver Color)
CPU: (Sckt775)Intel® Core™ 2 Duo E6550 CPU @ 2.33GHz 1333FSB 4MB L2 Cache 64-bit
MOTHERBOARD: Asus P5N-E nForce 650i SLI Chipset LGA775 FSB1333 DDR2 Mainboard
MEMORY: (Req.DDR2 MainBoard)2GB (2x1GB) PC6400 DDR2/800 Dual Channel Memory (Corsair Value Select or Major Brand)
VIDEO CARD: NVIDIA GeForce 8600 GT 512MB 16X PCI Express (Major Brand Powered by NVIDIA)
VIDEO CARD 2: NONE
VIDEO CARD 3: NONE
LCD Monitor: NONE
HARD DRIVE: Single Hard Drive (320GB SATA-II 3.0Gb/s 16MB Cache 7200RPM HDD)
Data Hard Drive: NONE
Optical Drive: (Special Price) 20X DVD±R/±RW + CD-R/RW DRIVE DUAL LAYER (BLACK COLOR)
Optical Drive 2: NONE
SOUND: 3D WAVE ON-BOARD 5.1 SOUND CARD

[Kramer]

cool. thanks for the site.