Budget build for my Dad.

[Free Thinker]

My Dad is in the market for a new PC and is looking at cheap Dell boxes. I want to spec up an alternative that will give him a bit more for his money and some upgrade options as well.

He has about £400 to play with and only wants it for viewing photos and web browsing. This is what I've come up with as a first run. (all from scan at the moment)

LN10546 AMD Athlon 64 3000+ Socket939 , Venice Core, 1.8GHz , 512KB Cache, Retail £44.79 £52.63
LN8232 Scan 3XS '2012' 4 in1 Kit. Black/Silver inc Keyb/Mouse/Speakers ATX Midi Tower 400W Passive PFC PSU £22.69 £26.66
LN8089 Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition SP2 OEM Single £48.99 £57.56
LN5013 120 Gb Seagate Barracuda 7200.7, SATA150, 7200 rpm, 8MBCache ,NCQ £32.32 £37.98
LN6802 512MB (2X256MB) Corsair Value Select, DDR PC3200 (400), 184 Pin, Non-ECC Unbuffered, CAS 3 £32.32 £37.98
LN13548 Samsung SH-W163A/BEBN Black SATA 16x16 ±R Dual Layer DVDRW Writer OEM UK inc Nero 6.x £21.39 £25.13
LN8350 17" LG L1715S Silver TFT,1280x1024, 12 ms, 500:1, 250 cd/m2, £99.89 £117.37
LN12214 Gigabyte GA-K8N51GMF-9 NF4, S939, PCI-E (x16), DDR 400, SATA II, SATA RAID, uATX, On Board VGA £34.25 £40.24


Does this look like a good use of £400? Does anyone have experience of the on-board graphics? Will it be enough until he can afford to upgrade to a PCI-E card?

Thanks in advance for any advice.

[Bluecube]

Have no personal experience of these exact onboard graphics but providing he's playing games it will be more than enough.

As for the PC, what you've come up with sounds good enough although you may want to change the monitor as it doesn't sound all that good for viewing photos on. Maybe a good 17" CRT monitor would be a better bet. Apart from that it sounds fab.

[Gibb0N]

Yeah, go for a crt monitor and put the difference on a gfx card. A must if he's using it for image processing at all imo. Also, if he just wants to process images and browse the net I think the cpu is a bit overkill. Perhaps a 2700+ or even lower?

[Free Thinker]

Thanks for the input Bluecube.

The choice of TFT over CRT is down to my Mum. She's absolutely determined that they must have one. I've already had the arguement with her that they would be better off with a CRT until they can afford a better TFT but it falls on deaf ears.

[cptwhite_uk]

The important word here is parents. I have a very good eye for noticing fine imperfections - but even I couldn't defend getting a CRT these days. We've not talking professional photo editors here - we're talking about mum and dad looking at their holiday snaps on the PC.

[james.robinson]

Conroe tbh.

CRT are the best hands down IMO. Providing you have the space.

[krazy_olie]

Um I don't think his Dad would really need a Conroe chip.

+1 on CRT though.

[Free Thinker]

If they splashed out on a conroe based PC they'd certainly see a lot more of me.

Bit over budget though.

It's got to be a TFT otherwise my Mum just won't buy into the idea of getting it. Her main concern is that it's got to look good.

[MadduckUK]

hmm.. buy a second hand piece of shonk (should be able to get a p3 1Ghz 512 meg of ram for a little less than £100)..

than combine it with THAT http://accessories.euro.dell.com/sna...dhs1&sku=59233

your mum will have the neighbours round for a look

[daverobev]

Dear god don't buy a CRT...

1) Space

2) Power

3) Lifetime

In the long term, the TFT will save you money because it costs less to run, and it will save you money because it should last approximately twice as long as the CRT.

As for the rest...I'd maybe go for 1Gb of RAM, but I guess you can stick another couple of sticks in later if needed. I say that, because its shared graphics RAM, you're getting towards the "very low end" with XP if you're running a few things...

The case - I have absolutely no experience with them, but...the PSU on that can't be that good, I would guess? The PSU is the thing that powers the rest, if you get a bad PSU you can end up with an unstable system. Just a thought.

[james.robinson]

The Image quality of a CRT hammers that of a TFT.

tbh.

[daverobev]

The Image quality of a CRT hammers that of a TFT.

tbh.

Depends on the CRT. For £120? For parents? This isn't graphic design ya know

[MadduckUK]

the PSU on that can't be that good, I would guess? The PSU is the thing that powers the rest, if you get a bad PSU you can end up with an unstable system. Just a thought.

its a 400w jobbie. and his comp is basically bare minimum. not like he's looking for a SLI setup...

[loki]

Some people may not like me for it but pick up a low end dell for £250-£300. For parents there is nothing better and let dell support take their "i've lost my mouse" phone calls.

[Free Thinker]

What about the Scan 3XS '2015' Combo on today only at Scan?

Looks like it might be just what the doctor orderd. What do you guys think?

[Zak33]

Some people may not like me for it but pick up a low end dell for £250-£300. For parents there is nothing better and let dell support take their "i've lost my mouse" phone calls.

i love you....

/\ what he said...with bells on

Dell allllll day long.