A new pc for ~1000 dollars

[sram]

I'm building a new box for a friend. It will of course be core2 based. Probably the E6600.

The idea is to build a fast pc that will live for some years to come. The price can go little higher.

I want to hear your opinions

An idea of what is in my mind

Core2 E6600 300 $

GA-965P-DQ6 240 $

Some good brand 1 GB DDR2 memory 130 $(512 x2)

HITACHI Deskstar T7K500 hard drive 150 $

decent pci-e with 256 MB video card 50 $

Good brand power supply with at least 500 W ( Antec, thermaltake, coolermaster....etc) 50 $

 

[Papabravo]

You're wasting your time. HP laptops are going for $570.00 at CompUSA. How can you even come close to that?

 

[Dr.EM]

I seriously doubt that. All computers arn't made the same, i'm betting the laptops have nothing like the spec he's after?

I presume your making this for running modern games. It looks like a good spec but unfortunately i'm used to UK prices and retailors so can't help much otherwise. If I changed this computer, I would definately assemble it myself from components. Not only is it cheaper but you get exactly what you want (not to mention nothing you don't want).

 

[Papabravo]

The $570 Compaq Presario laptops have AMD 64 bit processors and they sure knock the socks off my most recent desktop. Maybe UK boxes are just inherently slower.

In any case he can't build a motherboard cheaper than he can buy one even if he had the design skills. The far eastern production skill is just too great to overcome. Even if he has the motherboard and the box and the power supply, his time has to be worth nothing. Then to build a machine that is not obsolete the moment you power it up for the first time is nearly impossible let alone for several years thereafter.

If he just wants to build a computer for the fun and experience of it, then fan-damn-tastic, go for it. Just forget the notion that it will be anything special in terms of performance.

 

[Nigel Goodwin]

The $570 Compaq Presario laptops have AMD 64 bit processors and they sure knock the socks off my most recent desktop.

I've never seen any laptop which approaches anything similar in speed to a decent desktop, even when the processor speed of the laptop is supposedly considerably faster. The conflicting requirements of laptops (aimed at low power, long battery life etc.) seem to take their toll.

For the same $570 dollars you should be able to build a much faster desktop machine.

Certainly if you want a game playing machine, you don't get a laptop!.

Maybe UK boxes are just inherently slower.

I don't think there's any such thing as a 'UK machine', they are all Chinese machines, Korean machines, and Japanese machines - just like the ones you have in the USA (and actually are the ones you have in the USA I suppose?).

 

[Dr.EM]

In any case he can't build a motherboard cheaper than he can buy one even if he had the design skills. The far eastern production skill is just too great to overcome.

Mabye this is where were getting confused. I'm not, and i'm pretty sure he's not; thinking of etching his own motherboard or making his own RAM or anything, he means just buy the "components", and by that he means a motherboard, PSU, processor, RAM, Hard disk, optical drive etc. To build a computer like this takes an afternoon, my brothers high speed machine was taken from parts to a full machine running Windows in about 6 hours.

 

[Nigel Goodwin]

Mabye this is where were getting confused. I'm not, and i'm pretty sure he's not; thinking of etching his own motherboard or making his own RAM or anything, he means just buy the "components", and by that he means a motherboard, PSU, processor, RAM, Hard disk, optical drive etc. To build a computer like this takes an afternoon, my brothers high speed machine was taken from parts to a full machine running Windows in about 6 hours.

Most of that taken up installing the software! - actually assembling the computer probably takes half an hour or so?.

 

[Dr.EM]

Probably getting on for one and a half for a modern machine, though a tool-less case will speed things up. Yeah, software can take a long time to install, faster machines will do it faster, mostly comes down to hard disk speed I think.

 

[Nigel Goodwin]

Probably getting on for one and a half for a modern machine, though a tool-less case will speed things up. Yeah, software can take a long time to install, faster machines will do it faster, mostly comes down to hard disk speed I think.

Don't know?, I would suspect CD-ROM speed more than the HDD.

 

[Dr.EM]

Yeah, that too but most machines now will probably have DVD/RW drives anyway which are all a certain (and very fast) speed.

 

[Nigel Goodwin]

Yeah, that too but most machines now will probably have DVD/RW drives anyway which are all a certain (and very fast) speed.

But still many times slower than a hard drive!.

 

[justDIY]

if you want to play the games on todays shelves ... 1000 is not going to get you there. CPU is the least of your concerns actually ... expect to pay 400-600 on video alone (geforce 7950 in SLI configuration), at least 250 on ram (2gb min with fast timings), a motherboard that supports SLI and has a good onboard psu (another 200-250), at least 2 hard-drives in a raid0 configuration so you're not waiting forever for the next scene to load

your specs aren't that bad, except for the video and power supply

$50 is not going to get you a "Good" power supply, try $150... nor is $50 going to get you a "Decent" video card, try $250 for starters. The $50 psu are crap on the inside, regardless of the power rating and brand. The $50 video cards are nothing but a ramdac and an interface for a software renderer, meaning your cpu does all the work.

Building versus buying is a very old argument... buying is the cheaper route when it comes to 90% of the market ... people that need a system to read email, do office work, play online blackjack, collect pron, etc... those folks are better off buying the $299 walmart desktop or the $499 walmart laptop. as for the few that use their PCs instead of buying an xbox or playstation for gaming are better to build than buy. Since there is no mass-market for "gaming pcs", the pre-fab price is very high. A similar situation exists for people that use their PCs for graphics / math intensive applications, but they usually have the huge budget of some sponsor to buy them $8000 workstations.

 

[Papabravo]

I don't think there's any such thing as a 'UK machine', they are all Chinese machines, Korean machines, and Japanese machines - just like the ones you have in the USA (and actually are the ones you have in the USA I suppose?).

Of course they are all from the far east, I believe I refered to their manufacturing prowess in a previous post. A "UK machine" is one that is available in the UK. We all know where they are made unless we've been living under a PIC ...er rock for the last decade.

 

[hjames]

If I had to build a PC for someone, first thing I'd ask is what they plan on using it for. As it is, you've got a slightly odd combo. The processor/motherboard that you've specified is very fast, cutting edge stuff - the remainder of the system is hum-ho mediocre. If the person is planning on doing computational programming, has a big archive of digital media they like to encode, then this configuration is pretty reasonable.

If this were my machine, I'd probably take the processor and MB specs and downgrade them a bit - or at least wait a bit - the Intel proc's and MB's are still extremely expensive. I really don't like paying $250 for a motherboard.

It's not going to be terribly good for games unless you can upgrade the videocard to something in the $100 - $150 range. [$250 is 7900GT class and *massive* overkill unless you have a 1600x1200 or higher monitor]

My personal power supply preference happens to be "Seasonic", but it's very important to check the wattage of the 12V line. Some of the "500W" powersupplies have excessive 5V ratings, but not enough on the 12V line. For this computer configuration, you'll probably only need ~100W on the 12V line, and you can probably use anything down to a *very* good 300W power supply.

Personally I make sure to check forums at "silentPCReview" and "2cpu" before committing any money. I also have a bit of a silent streak, so I specifically look for motherboards without north-bridge fans (the whiny failure-prone ones), passively cooled video cards, and cases with good airflow and placement of 120mm fans.

Oh, that and budget something on the display - a good quality 19" is pretty cheap, and if they're going to be spending a lot of time in front of it, a display upgrade is the most visible and friendly place to spend the money.

 

[sram]

I'm sorry, the 50 in the video card was a typo, I actually meant 150.

Anyways, my friend won't do gaming. He wants a machine that will live for a while. For the processor, one of the core2 cpus need to be selected...no need to explain why! Go read the reviews.

And that's right, the mobo might be bit expensive but a good alternative that support quad-core can be considered.

And I know, I shouldn't invest money on a power supply.

 

[justDIY]

core and core2 mobos are expensive you wont likely find something much cheaper, without going into an old chipset, and whats the point

the core2 chips are impressive in reviews, but the problem is, the rest of the system needs to be on par. problem with the core and core2 chips are they're very inexpensive for the performance you get ($200 core2 beating a $800 athlon x2 for example) but the rest of the performance parts are still expensive.

Keep in mind, Intel had to fire 10% of its workforce to bring use these low-priced core chips.

 

[hjames]

Well core2 duo (geez they fired their marketing guys too late...) is the current tech leader, but it still has a large price premium attached. And initial Intel quadcore stuff is going to double the power consumption of the processor - which may make it incompatible with some of the motherboards currently out there...