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I need to put together a system from scratch for my mum and will have to buy everything for this build.
All she will be using is the internet and a small amount of word processing. I don't really want to go down the Dell route as I would rather build myself.
It is possible?
Yeah very easily.
core 2 duo Pentium
gigabyte G33 uATX mobo (on board Grpahics)
2gb of pc 5300 ram
hard drive around 160gb
dvd writer
cheap case.
Around £250.. i'll post back with links in a bit
QTY Price (ea) Ex VAT Total Inc VAT Remove
LN12200
2Gb (2X1GB) Corsair TwinX XMS2, DDR2 PC5400 (667), 240 Pin, Non-ECC Unbuffered, CAS 4-4-4-12 £43.54 £51.16
LN18818
Intel Pentium Dual-Core E2140, S775, 1.6 GHz, 800MHz FSB, Allendale Core, 2x 512KB Cache, Retail £36.15 £42.48
LN18891
Gigabyte GA G33M-S2 iG33 Express, S775, PCI-E (x16), DDR2 667/800, SATA II, uATX, On Board VGA £53.12 £62.42
LN8298
330W Tagan TG330-U01 Whisper aPFC quiet 20db 3 Years Warranty ATX/BTX £27.49 £32.30
LN15198
Akasa Zen Case - Black Silent Cool Midi-ATX Computing case w/2 silent 12cm fans w/o PSU £24.99 £29.36
LN9709
160GB Samsung HD160HJ SpinPoint T166, SATA300, 7200 rpm, 8MB Cache, 8.9 ms, NCQ £27.67 £32.51
LN19006
Samsung SH-S203/BEBN 20x DVD±R, 16x DVD±DL, DVD+RW x8/-RW x6, SATA, Black, OEM inc. Nero £15.99 £18.79
If you change any quantities, please re-calculate your basket
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now available from £300.00
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Net Total £228.95
Carriage £11.01
V.A.T. £41.99
TOTAL £281.95
Less the carriage as it will be free for you. £270
Also that will overclock to 2.8 - 3.0ghz without even overclocking the motherboard. These chips seem plenty capable of it. You may want to add a new HSF for that though something like an arctic freezer 7 pro for £12
Extra Value 5-in-1 MATX Case With 430W PSU (20+4pin with 1x SATA) - Wired PS/2 Keyboard and Mouse With USB Speakers
125346
£25.51
AMD (Venice) Athlon 64Bit 3000+ 512k L2cache 90nm Socket 939 Retail Boxed Processor
088105
£20.15
Asus A8V-VM SE Socket 939 VIA KM890 VGA AUDIO mATX
123866
£23.82
CRUCIAL 1GB DDR PC2700 333MHz 184-PIN UNBUFF Memory Module 128MX64
065723
£32.33
Maxtor STM3250820A 250GB Hard Drive 7200RPM 8MB Cache - OEM
120289
£29.74
Samsung SH-S182M 18x DVD±RW/RAM Lightscribe Black Bare Drive - OEM
129441
£16.15
Total is £173 :) Well within budget!
These are all from ebuyer - the 6 digit numbers are the quick find codes for you to find the products by searching. Hope this helps
2Gb is a bit overkill, and
Why would he need to overclock to 3GHz? My old 386 laptop (not even a 486 :( ) got onto the internet with its 33.3k modem and whopping 8mb of ram so the need for 3GHz and 2Gb of ram would be too much, save the money and buy her a bunch of flowersQuote:
Originally Posted by Nick F
Just showing him what he can get for < £300
Of course he can go lower if he chooses.
Plus he Didn't say xp or vista so 2gb wouldn't be overkill at all if its using vista ;)
Previously built this for a friend, re-using his HDD, monitor & peripherals. The biggest issue with your price range is that most monitors start around the £80-100 mark. If you're including that in your £350 limit things get trickier.
EZ Pack Cube Case - 34870 - £46.88
aBit Fatal1ty F-I90HD - 52050 - £71.22
E2160 1.8GHz Processor - 74678 - £54.82
2 GB OCZ Value RAM PC6400 - 14588 - £53.72
Seagate 160GB IDE Hard Disk Drive - £34.90
Windows XP Home OEM Inc Service Pack 2 - 498 - £59.93
Keyboard & Mouse - ??? - Roughly £20
Speakers - ??? - Roughly £20
That lot comes to £361.41 but doesn't include a monitor, which is usually the point by which self builds become more expensive that buying from Dell or similar. Either that or when you add in the OS costs (and I really, really recomend that you buy the OS)
You considered Ubuntu? That means you wouldn't have to spend on an operating system and it's meant to be very n00b friendly
Didn't notice the EVERYTHING part.
You could use Lucios build but but use the Motherboard and cpu from mine. Saves £20.
1gb of ram saves £25
vista basic OEM is £50 saving another £10 which gets you down to the £300 mark
bigpuns build is obviously a lot cheaper leaving room for a monitor
BUT: with the components hes suggesting you may as well buy the dell anyway
hmm I have come up with this
LN18818
Intel Pentium Dual-Core E2140, S775, 1.6 GHz, 800MHz FSB, Allendale Core, 2x 512KB Cache, Retail £36.15 £42.48
LN18891
Gigabyte GA G33M-S2 iG33 Express, S775, PCI-E (x16), DDR2 667/800, SATA II, uATX, On Board VGA £53.12 £62.42
LN8298
330W Tagan TG330-U01 Whisper aPFC quiet 20db 3 Years Warranty ATX/BTX £27.49 £32.30
LN15198
Akasa Zen Case - Black Silent Cool Midi-ATX Computing case w/2 silent 12cm fans w/o PSU £24.99 £29.36
LN19006
Samsung SH-S203/BEBN 20x DVD±R, 16x DVD±DL, DVD+RW x8/-RW x6, SATA, Black, OEM inc. Nero £15.99 £18.79
LN7769
512MB Corsair XMS2, DDR2 PC5400 (667), 240 Pin, Non-ECC Unbuffered, CAS 4-4-4-12 £14.69 £17.26
250 Gb Samsung SP2504C SpinPoint P120, SATA300, 7200 rpm, 8MB Cache, 9.0 ms, NCQ £30.50 £35.84
1 LN11461 250 Gb Samsung SP2504C SpinPoint P120, SATA300, 7200 rpm, 8MB Cache, 9.0 ms, NCQ
LN14701
17" Hyundai IT B70D LCD, 1280x1024, 700:1, 300 cd/m2, 8 ms, Speakers, VESA £99.99 £117.49
LN8041
Scan UN-6100 3 in 1 Office Desk Manager 2 + Speakers Wired Keyboard, PS2, 400dpi Optical Mouse, Blk £6.95 £8.17
Net Total £309.87
Carriage £0
V.A.T. £56.71
TOTAL £360.78
Not bad, what do you think?
looks good but i would get 1gb of RAM. It should only be £5 more and its a huge difference in performance.
Theres cheaper cases if need be. Or you could do a Case + PSU combo but i don't like those.
Echo what Mike says regarding the RAM and although I don't follow LCD's that much I know you can get a decent 19" for that price.
I personally wouldnt bother with dual core, just get an AM2 or 939 and a cheap uATX board.
fact of the matter is...for £42 why wouldnt you get dual core..whether it be intel or amd
These chips are capable of doubling their speed when overclocking so provide a better platform for future applications..especially when coupled to a motherboard with a 1333mhz FSB.. its almost criminal not to OC them lol
£59 for both mobo and CPU for AM2, as opposed to £105 above for c2d.
Also, does she need 250Gb HDD space Nick? Wouldn't an 80Gb be more than enough for word processing and internet.
Play.com sell 1gb DDR2 for £17.99 delivered.
For the work being done on it, a Sempron will more than suffice. No point in spending the money for the sake of it imo
LN17796
Asus M2V-MX, VIA K8M890, Socket AM2, PCI-E (x16), DDR2 533/667/800MHz, SATA II, SATA RAID, uATX, VGA £27.99 £32.89
LN14242
AMD AM2 Sempron 3600 Manila Core, 2.0GHz, 256KB Cache, Retail £22.64 £26.60
True enough but it also makes sense to spend the extra £40 on a better system that will last longer.
That said a good compomise may be AMD X2's which are also quite cheap and then use a cheap AM2 motherboard.
Spending £40 more for a system that'll last longer wont really be the case if he's going to overclock the nuts off it ;) Which he won't based on what hes said...Quote:
Originally Posted by staffsMike
And besides, just because its C2D theres no reason it'd last longer. If it were me i'd go for the C2D system, but based on their needs id go for a 939 type system and save the cash.
For someone who's just using the net, and word processing shes never going to need a more powerful pc....ever
For the use its gonna get, you wouldnt be able to tell whether its dual or single core. Fact is an old AMD XP would scream through this type of work. Dual core for the internet and word is just a plain waste.
I'm not suggesting that because it intel it will physically last longer..i mean a dual core (amd or intel) will be able to handle applications that may benfit them in years to come. Spending £10 less on a sempron doesn't make sense.
Think how long this PC is going to have to last...they will expect it to work for everything they want for the next 5+ years i would imagine.
Yeah it would. Vista x86 works just as well as XP did with 512mb on the testing I did. Have more bloat it may do, but it manages memory far, far better.Quote:
Originally Posted by staffsMike
I used vista with 1gb and was pulling my hair out..maybe there was something wrong with the laptop.. Time will tell on that one lol
I run Vista on my HTPC with 1Gb of PC3200 with a P4 3Ghz and memory usage sits at around 35-40% coinstantly. Its a lean install granted, but shows that you dont need to go ott with the ram. Media centre is perfectly smooth.Quote:
Originally Posted by staffsMike
2Gb is only needed for gaming on Vista.
I hear what you're saying there, but the other thing to consider is that AM2 mobos are alot cheaper that c2d ones. You can pick up a AM2 board for under £30 with onboard vga.Quote:
Originally Posted by staffsMike
I have already agreed amd would be a better route :p
its the best compromise for sure
Amazon have a £300 laptop if having something portable would be at all useful.
I know you said you want to build it but it does get the OS and monitor costs out of the way...
Well, I must admit, my setup was probably a little overboard as it was more than capable of running most games ~1yr old
I'd recomend as much RAM as you can fit into your budget, it does make a difference in the long run (most systems tend to bloat over time).
Antec NSK4400 ATX MiniTower, inc Hi-Efficiency 380W ATX12v v2.0
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Produ...oductID=509820
You could save another £15 easy by getting a combined case/PSU and cos its Antec, you know it will be good quality
Exactly. Im posting this from a laptop with 512MB PC-2700 DDR RAM and it's running fine, the rumour comes from people enabling all of Vista's memory hungry features on 1GB RAM and then trying to play games (which is dumb)Quote:
Originally Posted by this_is_gav
Includes 17" Monitor, Keyboard and MouseQuote:
£48.47 - Antec NSK4400 Super Mini-Tower Case Black/Silver - With 380W SmartPower PSU (1 @ 48.47ea.) [112648]
£17.65 - NEC Optiarc AD-7170S-0B 18x DVD±RW/DL/RAM Serial ATA Black - OEM (1 @ 17.65ea.) [125208]
£27.82 - Hitachi Deskstar 7K80 80GB 7200RPM SATA/150 8MB Cache - OEM (1 @ 27.82ea.) [087673]
£32.3 - MSI K9N6SGM-V GeForce 6100 Socket AM2 onboard VGA and 8-channel audio mATX (1 @ 32.30ea.) [126138]
£39.99 - AMD Athlon 64 X2 3800+ (2GHz) Socket AM2 Energy Efficient L2 1MB (2x512KB) Cache Retail Boxed Processor (1 @ 39.99ea.) [125200]
£26.31 - Crucial (CT2KIT6464AA667) 1GB kit (512MBx2) DDR2 PC2-5300 CL=5 UNBUFFERED NON-ECC DDR2-667 1.8v 64Meg x 64 (1 @ 26.31ea.) [106130]
£20.27 - Microsoft Business Hardware Pack - Black/Silver Wired Keyboard with Black Wired Optical Mouse - PS/2-USB (1 @ 20.27ea.) [108204]
£93.99 - HANNS.G HW173DB 17" Widescreen (1440 x 900) 250 cd/m2 500:1 8 ms DVI, VGA (HD-15) Black & Silver TFT Monitor 3 Years Warranty (1 @ 93.99ea.) [126874]
Net Total: £N/A
VAT: £N/A
Gross Total: £306.80
Try that. Maybe an X2 is a bit much? The extra power would be a bonus though, call it insurance room against her needs changing, and it's only adding an extra £20 :)