Cheapish PC

Amp34

Amp34

Amp34

Caporegime
Joined
25 Jul 2005
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I am finally getting round to possbly building a PC for my sister, as cheap as possible. She just wants a bog standard PC for uni (word, net...).

I have been out of the game for a little while and some of the things are a little confusing now. When I originally specced the PC at christmas I specced an Intel E6300, now Intel seem to have brought out about a dozen other processors. Can someone give me a quick jist of how to work out which one to get. :o

I was also looking at the Asrock Conroe945G-DVI MB, but that doesn't seem to exist any more, any suggestions on what board to get instead. It needs to be m-atx and have onboard graphics (hopefully somehow supporting HD video).

The rest of the PC will be something along the lines of:

Corsair 1GB DDR2 Value Select PC4200 Dual Channel Kit (2x512MB)

Hitachi Deskstar T7K500 NCQ 250GB SATA-II 8MB Cache - OEM (would the slightly more expensive Samsung be a better bet?)

Antec NSK1300 ATX Cube Case - 300W PSU (how quiet is the PSU in this?)

Samsung SH-S203BEBN 20x20 DVD±RW Dual Layer Serial ATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM

A 17" monitor, vista, mouse, keyboard and speakers.

Last question, am I missing anything? :o

Thanks
 
The PC won't be overclocked at all. :)

Which CPU now will be the equivilant of the E6300? Or at least the best value for money speed wise out of the 2's, 4's and 6320?

Thanks :)
 
Ah ok thanks, I was erring towards that but wasn't completely sure. As for the E6320 being overkill, I have a £600 budget and for the budget at the moment that is probably the best CPU (IMO) to get. I would probably go AMD if I were to get something of the power of the E2140 TBH.

As for 2GB of ram, that is still a possibility, but at the moment I will probably leave it at 1GB, it is a lot easier (and cheaper) to stick another couple of sticks of ram in later on than change the CPU for a more powerful one.
 
TBH she doesn't need two GB of ram at the moment. But on a similar note (remembering I will not be OCing the PC AT ALL) would a single 1GB stick be better than two 512mb sticks?

At the moment she has a £600 budget so there is plenty of room at the moment to play with.
 
Ok, I didn't realise it was that bad with less than 2GB, having said that at the moment the spec is coming way under £600 so I think I can be a bit extravogant with the ram. :p
 
I think I have finally decided on what components to get:

Intel Core 2 Duo E6320 "LGA775 Conroe" 1.86GHz (1066FSB) - Retail
Corsair 2GB DDR2 Value Select PC4200 Dual Channel Kit (2x1GB)
Hitachi Deskstar T7K500 NCQ 250GB SATA-II 8MB Cache - OEM
Antec NSK1300 ATX Cube Case - 300W PSU
Samsung SH-S203BEBN 20x20 DVD±RW Dual Layer Serial ATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM
Abit Fatal1ty F-I90HD ATI Micro ATX (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard
Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium 64-Bit Edition DVD - OEM - 1Pk

And either the
OcUK Value AH191DPB 19" Widescreen LCD Monitor - Black/Silver
or the OcUK Value Hanns-G HW191D 19" Widescreen LCD Monitor - Silver monitor

Anything I am missing (other than mouse and keyboard)?

Thanks
 
Bug One said:
So all she wants the computer for is work (word, excel etc) and browsing the net, plus she's at uni. If so I think £600 is way too big a budget, and a desktop would be impractical.

I'd be looking at spending around £350 on a laptop.
Click to expand...

I suggested a laptop (and even a mac) and she doesn't want one. It is either I make one for around £600 or she buys a desktop from the purple shirt brigade. :)
 
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