Help with Budget PC

[spoma]

I have been asked to upgrade a family members PC and they are willing to spend $400. I am trying to find the best group of components. They use the computer for moderate gaming (mainly sports games) and for a lot of music downloading and burning. I have figured that they need 5 main components right now

Motherboard, Processor, Videocard, HardDrive, and RAM

They are willing to spend $400.

What I have come up with is:
motherboard - shuttle ak31a - $60
processor - athlon 1GHZ - $80
video card - Leadtek Geforce3 Ti200 - $139
Hard Drive - Seagate 40GB - $85
RAM - 256MB PC2100 Crucial - $70

These are approx prices and it comes out a little high. Any suggestions on where to cut and maybe what to switch to. Thank in advance.

 

[microAmp]

I don't know about this recommendation, but instead of a 1 GHz Athlon, 133 FSB I assume, I would get a 1.3 GHz Duron at NewEgg for $81.00 Retail, it has the SSE on it, which in some, not a lot of benchmarks, at Tom's Hardware, beats the Athlon 1400 TBird.

AnandTech here, has a 1 GHz Duron vs. a 1 GHz TBird.

But I would at least get a Athlon XP or the newer Durons.

Just saw that NewEgg has an Athlon XP 1500+ 1.33 GHz for $94.00 and a TBird 1.33 GHz $78.00, both OEM's.

 

[piasabird]

I bought
asus TUSL2-C Motherboard $109.00
Intel Boxed 1.2 Gig Celeron $99.00
Visiontek Xstasy Geforce2 GTS-V OEM Only Video Out. $48.00

and used it with 128 Meg of old PC100 RAM from Crucial. It runs Great. The GTS-V chip geforce2 is only made by VisionTek. It is an excellent video card. It may not have TV out or be able to use a second monitor, but I have never needed that anyway. I play Emperor, Battle for Dune which is the sequel to Dune 2000 on it and it never gives me any video problems. The 1.2 Gig Celeron runs really fast. It has the 256k L2 cache and the 0.13 Micron die process. Both the motherboard and processor are selling for less since the 1.3 Gig Celerons came out. The motherboard will run P-III's and can take the PC133 RAM and comes with USB 2.0.

 

[spoma]

motoamd

those are great suggestions but i need to get the cost down. the problem is i have this price restraint and that forces me to get average parts.

 

[spoma]

i am purely an amd guy. but i am considering putting a duron in the pc rather than thunderbird.
will a gefore 2 vdeocard or a geofrce 4 mx420 run the new madden when it comes out. which of these owuld you go with?

 

[DT4K]

What kind of system does the person have right now?

 

[Mavrick007]

Spoma: if you must get a GF4 MX, don't consider anything less than the MX 440/460 cause the 420 is crippled with 166Mhz SDram. I would probably stick with the GF3 TI200 or go with a GF2Pro or a GF2 Ti as a video card, they will be enough for your family's taste for awhile(consequently the GF2Pro would take your price down to under $400 too cause it's around $85 US).

 

[Mavrick007]

 

[Mavrick007]

 

[Zukatah]

Have you considered an N-Force based system? It's slower than a GeForce3 for sure, but it's easy to setup, good overall performance and it's a rock solid board. It's cheap too !

 

[Ben88]

Just get a prebuilt system. For 250 bucks fry's has a great deal on an internet/word processing computer. It comes with linux but that isnt really a problem.

 

[MillhouseOfHorror]

Im in the same boat. My computer illiterate friend needs a 'gaming' PC for less than 500 USD.

I can only seem to get to about 550, and thats without me getting any profit .

That gets him a Ti200 and a 1.33 athlon though...might change that to a 1.33duron...

what would you do for a ~500 USD gaming system (not counting mouse, keyboard, speakers, monitor)?

so far im at:
ECS K7S5A
Duron 1.333
Geforce3Ti200
ANY HDD I CAN FIND!!!
FDD
cheapest case on newegg.com
liteon24x CDRW
256MB generic SDR RAM


that should about do it...

 

[ahsia]

If those 5 components are all you need here are my suggestions:

Ideal AMD System:

$72 SHUTTLE AK31A KT266A MOTHERBOARD
$94 AMD Athlon XP 1500+/266 FSB PROCESSOR
$70 CRUCIAL 256mb DDR PC2100 CL=2.5
$77 Seagate Barracuda IV ST340016A 40gb 7200rpm
$86 ATI OEM RADEON 7500 64MB DDR

$399 before shipping and taxes


Cheaper AMD System:

$52 ECS K7S5A SiS635 MOTHERBOARD
$39 AMD Duron 1GHz PROCESSOR
$70 CRUCIAL 256mb DDR PC2100 CL=2.5
$77 Seagate Barracuda IV ST340016A 40gb 7200rpm
$86 ATI OEM RADEON 7500 64MB DDR

$324 before shipping and taxes

All prices from Newegg, except for the Crucial memory, which is from Crucial themself. With the ideal system, you will be going over $400, but I think the Shuttle is better than the ECS, even though I don't think they will see the difference between the Duron and Athlon XP. I think going with the ATi Radeon 7500 is a better choice because it is $50 cheaper, and it will play most of the games they want with good graphics. Hope this helps!

Good Luck!

 

[DBandit]

convince him to spend $100 dollars more for a kick-ass sytem.

edit: dude, those prices you quoted are kinda high. Newegg is selling an athlon tbird 1.33 ghz for $78
i'll go with that shuttle mobo if it's only $60, or a ecs mobo for $60.

(/reedit) crucial ram good

i'll stick with the geforce 3. He said he wants to play a "new" madden game right. might be pissed if he spent all that money and can only play low-res on a geforce 2.

edit2: after adding up your original figures, i'll say, switch out that athlon 1ghz, for something an newegg, and tell them to suck up that $35 over the limit, and blame it on shipping.

 

[spoma]

thanks guys for the help. i have given him the couple of suggestions and he is going to let me know what he wants to do. thanks again guys.

 

[spoma]

This is what i have decided to go with. Tell me what you think.
WD 40GB EDID Hard Drive model # WD400BB - OEM $77
ECS K7S5a - Retail $52
AMD Duron 1GHZ - OEM $40
VGA Leadtek GeForce 3 Ti200 - Retial $139
Crucial 256MB PC2100 $70

TOTAL $378

 

[ahsia]

<< This is what i have decided to go with. Tell me what you think.
WD 40GB EDID Hard Drive model # WD400BB - OEM $77
ECS K7S5a - Retail $52
AMD Duron 1GHZ - OEM $40
VGA Leadtek GeForce 3 Ti200 - Retial $139
Crucial 256MB PC2100 $70

TOTAL $378 >>



Good choices. I would have save a few more dollars and gone with the Radeon 7500 instead, but the Ti200 is an excellent card. Worth the money.

 

[esc]

how bout this for people with a $500 or less budget:

Intel P4 1.6a RETAIL - $135
MSI 645 ULTRA - $72
Crucial 256MB DDR - $66 (note:avail of discount thru this link.)
Hercules 3D Prophet FDX 8500LE OEM - $133
MAXTOR 40GB 7200RPM - $78
total w/o s&h + tax = $484

i don't know but a rig like that will be killer for the price. i'm thinking of getting this setup too. maybe you can downgrade the video card a bit to save some bucks for the case&psu.

or maybe...

athlon xp1700+ - $103
ecs k7s5a - $52
Visiontek GF2 GTS-V 32MB DDR - $48
Crucial 256MB DDR (use link above to save some) - $66
Maxtor 40GB 7200RPM - $78
total w/o s&h+tax = $347