Barebones budget build

[Surf314]

Those that are skilled at piecing together good deals, absolute cheapest budget build that has decent speed and is upgradeable for the future.

Priorities:
Mobo/Chip
Ram
HDD
Graphics Card
Case

Everything else might be salvaged from my mom's old Desktop but it couldn't hurt to post some decent cheap stuff.  It's mostly an internet computer so graphics card is not needed to be fancy, she will probably need one though.  Shooting for $200.

[Vandamguy]

im helping.

[CaffeinePowered]

$200?

Good luck, would you like a 486?

Any scalable motherboard is going to cost $100, a case would be around $20 - $30 for a POS one, just watch the sharp edges

HDDs are cheap, ~$40 - $50

The CPU chip is going to be another $90

Graphics card is going to be $75+ , if you pay any less you might as well be pissing money away because its not going to run even 4 year old stuff.

RAM is cheap, 2 gigs you can get for $40ish

Also, do you need a PSU? That would be like another $75

So more like $375 - $450

[Surf314]

Hmm I'm trying to think what can be salvaged from her old dell, it runs - well I wouldn't say "runs."  It walks like a 3 legged dog with arthritis and poor self esteem.  She's getting pretty fed up with it, she only has like 512 megs of RAM so I was going to help her get maybe 2 gigs and she should see a good deal of improvement but I was trying to see if it would make sense for her just to rebuild one.

She only really uses it for the internet though so I'd hate to see her spend too much on a new one.

[CaffeinePowered]

well you could always downgrade to like a cheapo graphics card if you arent going to play any games

[Surf314]

yah like I know its hard to think about but really she needs a desktop eee pc.  I'm still trying to talk her into linux, since she doesn't use it for games or anything you can't do with linux it would run so much faster.  But then I'd have to teach her linux =(

[copulatingduck]

I'm still trying to talk her into linux, since she doesn't use it for games or anything you can't do with linux it would run so much faster.  But then I'd have to teach her linux =(

You forgot about solitaire.


Fuck the graphics card, there's not a damn thing it would be good for if she doesn't play games. Plus, almost any GPU you pick up now-a-days is gonna bump up your power requirement by a good amount, leading to possibly having to replace the PSU. Furthermore, you get a new case, and you're likely going to need a new PSU anyways because Dell likes to use these unfortunate, non-standard form factor PSUs. So either you stick with the case and PSU and forget the card, or be looking to replace all 3.

My suggestion would be to find out what socket the motherboard is, get her a good CPU (if you can still find one for the given socket), throw some more RAM in it, and possibly a hard drive as well. Do a clean install, show her how to defrag it; with machines that are older and struggling, defragging can help out a lot. If you install linux for her, you can set the machine up so that you can remotely control the machine (you can do it with windows as well), that might ease the transition for her.

Do you know what system she has right now? It would be nice to know so we could possibly give more specific instructions.

[Surf314]

I'll check next time she calls.  I think she's got an old old 2.x gigaherz possible dual core.  I know she is almost out of HD space too, but I think she has a lot of junk on it.  I know she should do a defrag for sure.  She gets nervous about doing a clean install though even though I know she doesn't use a lot of the stuff on there.

[Vandamguy]

just a thought on the graphics card thing

spend $0 on it

use onboard.

[rumsfald]

if she is internet only and install / UI-phobic then why have you not migrated her to a mac mini yet?

Otherwise- what VD and CD said:
-anything more than onboard graphics is overkill
-dell usually has whacky psu / case combos that limit upgrading too much

tbh, if she has a 2.0 dual core intel, that is more then plenty enough cpu for any internetting she may do.  It sounds more likely that the hard drive is overfull and way fragmented, probably combined with bloatware, TSRs, and perhaps virii (yes, I know it hurts to think about). So what her computer probably needs most is a good cleaning and defragging.

I'll toss in that many cheaper dell builds use shared memory, so her 512 is also working on the graphics side.  maxing out memory with a HD upgrade probably makes most sense.

[Surf314]

if she is internet only and install / UI-phobic then why have you not migrated her to a mac mini yet?

Otherwise- what VD and CD said:
-anything more than onboard graphics is overkill
-dell usually has whacky psu / case combos that limit upgrading too much

tbh, if she has a 2.0 dual core intel, that is more then plenty enough cpu for any internetting she may do.  It sounds more likely that the hard drive is overfull and way fragmented, probably combined with bloatware, TSRs, and perhaps virii (yes, I know it hurts to think about). So what her computer probably needs most is a good cleaning and defragging.

I'll toss in that many cheaper dell builds use shared memory, so her 512 is also working on the graphics side.  maxing out memory with a HD upgrade probably makes most sense.

Yea thats where I'm leaning too.  I really need to teach my sister this stuff so she can help shove my mom into the modern age.

[Ceceil Felias]

Western Digital has 640GB drives for $85.

So long as the system has SATA, you're all set.

[zaneyard]

check out puppy linux
it has been known to rise dinosaurs from out of their fossil's.

[A. Crow]

I just ordered my cousin a new system off new egg for $550 (before shipping) including a 17 in widescreen LCD.  Granted, he's using onboard video, but he doesn't exactly game, and the shitty onboard video happens to be the radeon 3200 HD chipset. 

Yeah, this doesn't include an OS though... because lets face it...

[cbre88x]

-dell usually has whacky psu / case combos that limit upgrading too much

I bought a C521 that I currently use and thought it'd be a full size ATX..nope..more like a midtower.

I had to cut the side open to fit my videocard. I've been meaning to post pictures, but I'm lazy.

[ToiletDuck]

yah like I know its hard to think about but really she needs a desktop eee pc.  I'm still trying to talk her into linux, since she doesn't use it for games or anything you can't do with linux it would run so much faster.  But then I'd have to teach her linux =(

http://ncix.com/products/index.php?sku=3...cture=ASUS

sounds perfect to me?

[Surf314]

[quote author=Surf314 link=topic=1319.msg35898#msg35898 date=1220408772]
yah like I know its hard to think about but really she needs a desktop eee pc.  I'm still trying to talk her into linux, since she doesn't use it for games or anything you can't do with linux it would run so much faster.  But then I'd have to teach her linux =(

http://ncix.com/products/index.php?sku=3...cture=ASUS

sounds perfect to me?
[/quote]

I was thinking about that exactly but it seems kind of pricey, can't you build a much better PC with the same money?

[ToiletDuck]

[quote author=TDlove link=topic=1319.msg36139#msg36139 date=1220535087]
[quote author=Surf314 link=topic=1319.msg35898#msg35898 date=1220408772]
yah like I know its hard to think about but really she needs a desktop eee pc.  I'm still trying to talk her into linux, since she doesn't use it for games or anything you can't do with linux it would run so much faster.  But then I'd have to teach her linux =(

http://ncix.com/products/index.php?sku=3...cture=ASUS

sounds perfect to me?
[/quote]

I was thinking about that exactly but it seems kind of pricey, can't you build a much better PC with the same money?
[/quote]

i think that's the cheapest you can get next to buying a used PC :-\

[Ceceil Felias]

[quote author=rumsfald link=topic=1319.msg36040#msg36040 date=1220483150]
-dell usually has whacky psu / case combos that limit upgrading too much

I bought a C521 that I currently use and thought it'd be a full size ATX..nope..more like a midtower.

I had to cut the side open to fit my videocard. I've been meaning to post pictures, but I'm lazy.
[/quote]
Well, most standard midtower cases are fully ATX-compliant.

Are you sure you don't mean a minitower? o.o