PCA Forums

i need to build me personal a new rig in the next 30 days .
my problem is like so many others $$$$$$$$$$$$$ are really tight right now .
i can only spend $300 on it .maybe if i really push it $400 but i need to stay closer to $300 .
i do a have case and power supply and wont need a monitor. but im still running a AMD - XP 2600 system thats all IDE.drives and AGP video card . with little cash to work with

so i needed to upgrade about all of it.
i know i need A new MB ,CPU, HD,RAM,video card ,DVD burner ,and such unless the MB has a IDE onboard .

Most important question is, do you game, and what games?

Another question: what is your current power supply? If you're gaming and it's not at least 40 amps total on the 12 volt rails, and it's not at least dual rails then you don't want it in your new rig. A 4 year old PSU is probably not going to cut it unless it was a very high end PSU back then.

If money's tight, I know a lot of people that have built decent rigs around AMD Phenom X3 CPUs.

$399 Dell deal, that's with a 19" monitor, a 22" was only a $60 upgrade. Basically what I have, for internet , it's excellent.



PROCESSOR Intel® Core™ 2 Duo E7400 (2.8GHz, 3M, L2Cache, 1066FSB) edit
OPERATING SYSTEM Genuine Windows Vista® Home Basic, Service Pack 1 edit
WARRANTY & SERVICE 1 Year Basic Limited Warranty and 1 Year NBD On-Site Service edit
MEMORY 3GB DDR2 SDRAM 800MHZ - 1x2GB 1x1GB edit
PRODUCTIVITY SOFTWARE No Pre-installed Productivity Software edit

Dell Recommends
Microsoft Office Basic Microsoft Word, Excel, and Outlook PREINSTALLED!
Upgrade to Microsoft® Office Basic 2007 (Word, Excel, Outlook) [add $149]
MONITOR Dell 19 inch E198FP Analog Flat Panel Display edit
SECURITY McAfee Total Protection for Small Business 30-day Subscription edit
OPTICAL DRIVE Single Drive: 16X (DVD+/-RW) Burner Drive edit
HARD DRIVE 250GB Serial ATA Hard Drive (7200RPM) w/DataBurst Cache™ edit
VIDEO CARD Integrated Video, Intel® GMA X4500HD edit
MEDIA READER No Media Reader edit
MODEM & WIRELESS No Modem Option edit
SOUND Integrated 5.1 Channel Audio

Yeah, if it's not for gaming those budget Dells are nice for the money. They're practically giving you the LCD for free. If DOES have a PCI-E slot so you could also throw a budget video card in there. The factory PSU will handle a Radeon HD 3650 which Newegg has for $50.

Here's the link to that Dell $399 deal: http://configure.us.dell.com/dellstore/ ... c=topic~us


If you want to build yourself, working within your tight budget and assuming you want to do some serious gaming, I came up with this:

Biostar Tforce TA790GX mobo, $110 ($100 after rebate)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6813138130

AMD Phenom 8650 Toliman 2.3GHz CPU, $88
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6819103253

OCZ Platinum 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 1066 (PC2 8500) $34
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6820227178
*** NOTE: I never trust off the shelf RAM. I would instead recommend you order RAM specifically for this mobo from Crucial.com direct. Also, if you're running WinXP you could get away with 2Gb.

HIS Hightech H465FS512P Radeon HD 4650 512MB $55 ($45 after rebate)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814161262
NOTE: Not a high end card by today's standards but equivalent (according to Tom' Hardware VGA charts) to a Geforce 8800GT which is no slouch. I was using an 8800GT up until 2 months ago and it played everything just fine.

Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 500GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s HDD $60
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6822148395

Rosewill RG530-2 530W 80Plus Bronze Certified PSU $60
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6817182160

TOTAL $387

NOTE: I quoted this with 2Gb or RAM assuming you will install WinXP. If you go with Vista I would recommend 4Gb. RAM is pretty darn cheap anyway.

the power supply i have is a ultra x3 600 watt.

A classic example of why wattage ratings for PSUs are meaningless. All that matters is the amperage of the 12 volt rails.

The Ultra x3 600 watt has a single 12volt rail rated for 36 amps. You COULD run a Radeon HD 4650 or Geforce 8800GT off that - it barely meets the minimum amperage. So yeah, you could use it if money is really tight, but it's less than ideal since it's a single 12v rail.

Modern gaming PSUs use 2 or more 12 volt rails to isolate the vid card from the mobo. The vid card current draw varies wildly which will cause the 12 volt supply to the mobo to fluctuate in voltage on a single rail PSU. With 2 rails you isolate them from each other. Some PSUs even have 3 or 4 rails for high end vid cards with two power connectors and for SLI rigs.

So bottom line is yeah, you could probably get away using that PSU as long as it's a card that doesn't draw more than 30 amps (Geforce 8800 GT class) but you might also get BSODs or lockups when gaming because there's poor isolation between the mobo and vid card.

Here's a Core2Duo Setup:

Intel DG43NB Motherboard CPU Bundle - Intel Pentium Dual Core E5200 Processor Retail $174.99

4GB kit (2GBx2), 240-pin DIMM, DDR2 PC2-6400 memory module $51.99

Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 ST3500418AS 500GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM $59.99

EVGA 01G-P3-N959-TR GeForce 9500 GT 1GB 128-bit GDDR2 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Supported Video Card - Retail $64.99 $54.99 after rebate.

Grand Total minus shipping: $351.96

The Core2Duo is retail boxed so it comes with a fan. Your burner should continue to work because most motherboards still have at least one IDE port.

Good Luck on the build. Let us know how it goes.

will do be at least 1-2 weeks before i do anything .got to bring in some cash ! but im glad i have a job right now and a small one when i finsh this one at the end of the week .

Yeah, that E5200 is a heck of a deal if you O/C it.

I actually own that power supply & it ran a pair of 8800gs just fine for me. Though, I won't knock what FP is saying because you can't trust every manufacturer & especially Ultra & OCZ, because they outsource from just about anyone (some are crap & some area suprisingly well built). This one, however, seems to be real well built.

Also, unless you're just strapped for space or your IDE drive is painfully slow, there's no shame in using it for the time being. The longer you wait, the more drive you can get.

So, just grab a Motherboard, processor, RAM, & video card. Get things assemeled & you can upgrade from there. I recommend to try for at least an Nvidia 8800 series or ATI/AMD 4800 series if you are serious about games (it's totally worth the extra $40-60). Then you shouldn't have to worry about playing anything for the time being.

That's a nice package Err put together. You'll get far more performance out of Intel than AMD, although if high end gaming isn't important then you can probably save a little going AMD.

thanks again guys i let you all know what i buy in the next 2-3 weeks .

Intel Core 2 Duo E6300 Conroe 1.86GHz 2M shared L2 Cache LGA 775 65W Dual-Core Processor - Retail-$60

Intel DQ963FX Intel Q963 Express Socket 775 ATX MB w/VID SND -$53

2 sticks -CT25664AA800 2GB, 240-pin DIMM Upgrade for a Intel DQ963FX System - $54

Cooler Master Socket 775 Aluminum Heat Sink & Fan for Core 2 Duo -DI5-9HDSL-0L-GP - $8

for a cheap build what you think ?
i have out of pocket cost for all the stuff above and still use my old case ,hd's ,dvd burner,power supply

what you think of this as a cheap upgrade

Pretty low power CPU. I'd get something faster unless money is REALLY tight.

that be next on the list thanks FP

I don't imagine the CPU is that big of a deal since it won't be doing much gaming without a 8-16x PCIe slot.