psst building pc,s is so darn easy

[Neg2LED]

i the latest versiond of windoze for free - my dad's company buys licenses by the thousand, and dad gets one copy of each OS. we have dos 3-6, win 1.0-3.11, win95, 98, nt, nt2, nt3, nt4, all nt service paks, win2000, all 2000 service paks, server 2000, server nt, xp, xpsp1 xpsp2, win2003 server all editions etc.....

neg

 

[greenLED]

For the longest time I built my own PC's. Now I simply don't have the time anymore. 'twas fun while it lasted, though.

 

[geepondy]

Joe, for a thousand dollars, at least look and see what Dell offers. I think you're in the ballpark to include a 17" LCD monitor

 

[PlayboyJoeShmoe]

I saw a Compaq AMD Semprom 3000+ 512MB 120GB with a flat screen tube mon and speakers for $599 at Sams Club.

I looked at the back, and there are 4 slots (3 useable) showing, and it has onboard video for sure.

I also saw a Compaq AMD Ahlon 3200+ 512MB 160GB with an LCD 17" for $899.

I looked at the back of a pricier HP and saw if not exactly the same mobo and setup, it was DAMN close.

If those slots are all PCI, and if I found the video not up to snuff, would I have any options?

I'll go surf Anandtech right now.

EDIT> It APPEARS that PCI Video cards are out there aplenty so far.... <edit

 

[eluminator]

[ QUOTE ]
PlayboyJoeShmoe said:
Fry's has an HP with a 2.6 or 2.8 Celeron, 512M Ram 80G drive, 64M shared video for $447.

I think I read that HPs are almost all non proprietary these days.

Would it be a good starting point to my dilema?

[/ QUOTE ]

One concern I have is that it probably has an OEM version of XP. I don't really know how that works, even though I have bought an OEM version myself. Supposedly it is only good for that PC. Obviously you could move the computer innards to a larger case when the noise of that small cooling fan gets on your nerves. But can you replace the motherboard with a more modern one without buying another XP license? I don't know.

From looking at the HP site, I'm guessing that has a micro ATX board with the Intel 845 chipset. That will probably limit you to a 400 MHz FSB, and it may not have an AGP slot. On the other hand it appears to have the Intel Extreme Graphics hardware. Although it's not that extreme, it should be fine. You may have firewire too.

You probably won't have SATA, but that may or may not suit you.

If you could upgrade the mobo someday, I don't think you could go too far wrong. But if you have to buy another XP, that would be somewhat painful.

 

[idleprocess]

Microsoft is amazingly forgiving about product activation.

I'm not sure I'd even try any internal upgrades on an OEM computer anymore - the hardware is changing too fast nowadays and the system is typically maxed out anyway.

 

[PlayboyJoeShmoe]

Saw a smoking Compag at OfficeMax.

Athlon 3400+ 512MB 200GB 128MB Nvidia AGP card etc.

$1049 with $200 mail in rebate. A little pricey.

But they just want me to make a decision!

I refuse until I've visited Frys!

 

[markdi]

my mom's boyfriend has a computer 2.2 ghz p4.

I think it is a gateway

it has the cheapest smallest power supply I have ever seen.

every time he see's me he goes on and on about how I think his computer is a piece of junk.

are lcd monitors catching up with trinitron monitors
what I mean is would a gamer want a lcd monitor.

I know that there are spendy higher preforming lcd's out there.

I love my sony trinitron monitor.

 

[PlayboyJoeShmoe]

Was gonna do a Frys trip last night, but...

Preparations are being made for the Garage Sale from HE77!

Next week I'll go Frying.

I'm also leaning towards begging for an LCD mon. CRTs are space hogs BIG TIME!

 

[mapson]

Playboy, why don't you consider this Dell.

Dimension 8400 Pentium® 4
Processor 540 with HT Technology (3.20GHz, <font color="red">800</font> FSB)
Operating System Microsoft® Windows® XP Home Edition
Memory 512MB Dual Channel <font color="red">DDR2</font> SDRAM at 400MHz (2x256M)
Keyboard Dell Quietkey® Keyboard
Monitor 17 in E173FP <font color="red">Flat Panel </font>Display
Video Card 128MB <font color="red">PCI Express™ </font> x16 (DVI/VGA/TV-out) ATI Radeon™ X300 SE
Hard Drive 80GB Serial ATA Hard Drive (7200RPM)
3.5 in Floppy Drive
Mouse Dell 2-button scroll mouse
Network Interface Integrated Gigabit Ethernet
CD ROM/DVD ROM Single Drive: 48x CD-RW Drive
Sound Card Integrated 5.1 Channel Audio

Tower contains...
2 internal 3.5" bays
2 external 3.5" bays
2 external 5.25" bays
3 PCI slots
1 PCIe x1 slot
1 PCIe x16 slot
350 Watt Power Supply

$839+tax with free shipping, plus an additional $100 rebate. You would be getting a 925x or 925xe motherboard, DDR2 ram, 17" LCD monitor, PCIe video adapter. Granted it's a general card but it'll do the job except for those select few hardcore gamers. If you feel the need for a Gig of DDR ram, it's only $100 more.

 

[geepondy]

A plus on adding more memory. I just added 512 meg to give a total of 1 gig and then disabled the windows swap file. Now multitasking runs much smoother. I can run Nero (dvd recording) while still browsing the web with no slow downs. Other things as well. As a bonus the recommended default values for Half life 2 all increased. It's the best $85 I've spent on a pc component in quite some time.

 

[PlayboyJoeShmoe]

Dell isn't too "proprietary"?

It sounds good, except online buying is mostly out...

I am freaking worn out from preparing for the Garage Sale from Hades!

And we start again at 5AM.

Frys is next week and nothing happens before then anyhow!

 

[PlayboyJoeShmoe]

The garage sale from Hades has born fruit!

It has gone better than planned, and I gotta go through some "Keep" stuff so we will have some interesting Saturday stuff.

I might get to build what I want afterall!

 

[raggie33]

if ya need any more linux tell me what ya want and ill send playboy

 

[PlayboyJoeShmoe]

It's the morning after the two days of Heck.

We have lawn chairs and a folding table in the living room to get us through approx. 3 weeks.

A Frys trip seems VERY likely today! It appears I will be cleared to spend up to $800-850.

I figure to come home with something.

Raggie, you were very generous to send Puppy, Suse, Knopix and Basic. One of them SHOULD get me going. And of course I still have what I believe to be a good Simply Mepis CD...

Wish me good luck at Frys! I'm pretty sure I know what I want to end up with. It's GETTING there that might be a pain!

 

[PlayboyJoeShmoe]

Well, I ended up with an HP Pavillion a720n.

I talked to a real nice lady salesperson who likes to build her own. But in pre-builts she believes in HP.

She showed me an a724n first which had a pentium 530, 512Ram 533mhz FSB etc.

But they were out. I noted the specs, then went to see about rolling my own. It would have been near $900 to come close.

So we looked at the 720n. Athlon XP 3200+, 512Mb PC2700 DDR SDRAM 200GB 7200rpm UDMA, DVD+RW/CD-RW drive, 48x CD drive, Integrated Graphics with 64mb shared (but an open AGP 8X slot!), and a 9 in 1 Memory Card reader. Win XP SP2 and a BUNCH of bloatware.

The big bottleneck at this point is dialup!

Yeah, I would have REALLY liked to build. But I'd have had to settle for Celeron or Sempron and smaller HD at least.

Also she agreed that HP is very close to non proprietary as I had already understood.

She is supposed to call my cell later so I can give her the info to contact our realtor. She liked what I told her about our upcoming move!

So anyway, this is being typed on a foriegn (to me) keyboard. Now I'm gonna play with this thing a bit!

 

[raggie33]

cool enjoy ya new rig playboy.sounds like a very cool pc

 

[tvodrd]

I tell everybody that there are only two tools required to build a PC- a phillips screwdriver, and a credit card. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif
I'm overdue to replace this one. My question is will I be able to get ZoneAlarm pro, AdAwareSE, all the other software I have purchased on line, and Uncle Bill's latest patches onto viable install cd's prior to connecting first time. I'll nurse this one as long as I can. (Water pump has gotten noisy lately.)

Larry

 

[Sub_Umbra]

PBS,
Cool, congrats!

 

[PlayboyJoeShmoe]

So far, I watched a lot of Grosse Pointe Blank, and looked at a picture CDR I made.

So far, I like it a lot!

Now I gotta go to sleep and get my a$$ ready for the work week!