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Okay I was up at one of my friends last week and I had been nagging him to get a computer. So we started talking about it the one night and started checking prices. I went over a basic build in my head and gave him the price around $600-$800 to build his own. We did look at Circuit City and Best buy most of those were running on AMD's and the core2duo's were overloaded with junk and overpriced. So he said come up with a build and i'm going to put it together for him. Now for his needs.
Must be Intel based. A lower end model is fine he won't be doing much gaming if any just mainly recording TV and downloading music, browsing the web etc.
The reason I want Intel is after we build it I think he may get into the whole building thing and want to do some upgrades later. Basically I think the best way to future proof would be a 775 socket with 1066 and 1333fsb support.
So that brings me to the board and case. He won't need SLI so a standard PCI-E slot is fine. It must have room for a TV tuner card and probally a soundcard. I'd like to find a board that has decent intergrated sound to keep the budget down. If he feels like upgrading to a dedicated card I want him to have the expandability for that. I was thinking of a micro atx board but I guess a mid tower is fine as well. Maybe a minor overclock just to get a bit more out of what were buying. So a highly overclockable board isn't a must. So i'm thinking the stock HSF shoud be fine for a minor system overclock I just can't see spending on a aftermarket HSF when he isn't really going to need it.
If you guys could maybe provide some insight on a micro atx case/board and a mid tower case/board that would be helpful.
The build is going to have 2 gigs of Ram since will be running Vista Home Premium. Have a disc already not needed in the build.
No monitor needed either since its hooked up to his TV.
Also suggestions on a TV tuner card would be helpful. I want something that can record HD quality in 1080I. I believe his cable is through road runner now if that matters.
HD's, I was thinking 2 would be better. One little 80gig dedicated for his OS then a 500gig drive to target his documents folder to and save all his recorded TV. Whats a estimate on how much TV he can record in HD with a 500gig drive?
He will want to burn movies so he will need a single DVD-RW drive. Floppy really isn't important.
PSU you can see the GPU used below roughly so i'm thinking a decent 550W that way if he decides to upgrade GPU's down the road he will have that option.
And finally graphics card I was thinking of a baseline 8600GT. Since were going Vista I want him to have a DX10 card but nothing special. Just basic gaming so it doesn't have to be anything special.
Then finally a good wireless keyboard/mouse combo to finish it out. Like I said he has surround sound so I may need some conversion cables or something to get his surround sound to work on the PC.
Okay I think thats everything of the top of my head if I think of some other stuff he will need i'll edit in.
Edit In first build Idea. Build subject to change everything look compatible? Didn't put in a TV tuner yet needs to be Vista compatable.
Thermaltake Bach Media Lab $136.10 Shipped
Thermaltake Purepower 500watt $59.99 -$25 rebate
EVGA 650I Ultra $106.32 - $20 Rebate
Core 2 Duo E6320 $176.99
G.SKILL 2X1GB $104.98
EVGA 8600GT $120.83
Asus DVD 18x dvd-rw $33.83
WD 80GIG OS harddrive $48.28
WD 500GIG media storage $114.99
Total with shipping at $902.31 then $45 in rebates so I'm at $857.31 built right now.
Must be Intel based. A lower end model is fine he won't be doing much gaming if any just mainly recording TV and downloading music, browsing the web etc.
The reason I want Intel is after we build it I think he may get into the whole building thing and want to do some upgrades later. Basically I think the best way to future proof would be a 775 socket with 1066 and 1333fsb support.
So that brings me to the board and case. He won't need SLI so a standard PCI-E slot is fine. It must have room for a TV tuner card and probally a soundcard. I'd like to find a board that has decent intergrated sound to keep the budget down. If he feels like upgrading to a dedicated card I want him to have the expandability for that. I was thinking of a micro atx board but I guess a mid tower is fine as well. Maybe a minor overclock just to get a bit more out of what were buying. So a highly overclockable board isn't a must. So i'm thinking the stock HSF shoud be fine for a minor system overclock I just can't see spending on a aftermarket HSF when he isn't really going to need it.
If you guys could maybe provide some insight on a micro atx case/board and a mid tower case/board that would be helpful.
The build is going to have 2 gigs of Ram since will be running Vista Home Premium. Have a disc already not needed in the build.
No monitor needed either since its hooked up to his TV.
Also suggestions on a TV tuner card would be helpful. I want something that can record HD quality in 1080I. I believe his cable is through road runner now if that matters.
HD's, I was thinking 2 would be better. One little 80gig dedicated for his OS then a 500gig drive to target his documents folder to and save all his recorded TV. Whats a estimate on how much TV he can record in HD with a 500gig drive?
He will want to burn movies so he will need a single DVD-RW drive. Floppy really isn't important.
PSU you can see the GPU used below roughly so i'm thinking a decent 550W that way if he decides to upgrade GPU's down the road he will have that option.
And finally graphics card I was thinking of a baseline 8600GT. Since were going Vista I want him to have a DX10 card but nothing special. Just basic gaming so it doesn't have to be anything special.
Then finally a good wireless keyboard/mouse combo to finish it out. Like I said he has surround sound so I may need some conversion cables or something to get his surround sound to work on the PC.
Okay I think thats everything of the top of my head if I think of some other stuff he will need i'll edit in.
Edit In first build Idea. Build subject to change everything look compatible? Didn't put in a TV tuner yet needs to be Vista compatable.
Thermaltake Bach Media Lab $136.10 Shipped
Thermaltake Purepower 500watt $59.99 -$25 rebate
EVGA 650I Ultra $106.32 - $20 Rebate
Core 2 Duo E6320 $176.99
G.SKILL 2X1GB $104.98
EVGA 8600GT $120.83
Asus DVD 18x dvd-rw $33.83
WD 80GIG OS harddrive $48.28
WD 500GIG media storage $114.99
Total with shipping at $902.31 then $45 in rebates so I'm at $857.31 built right now.
