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The "Ultimate Budget Rig" build thread


Angry_Games
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Budget to me means, integrated audio and video, the lowest, cheapest (but still modern architecture) mobo / CPU and 2x512MB value RAM, the only thing that I won't go budget on is a PSU.

 

I'll come up with a rig that I would sell to my 50 year old neighbor as a web/office machine after work and post it up.

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Case: Cooler Master Elite RC-330

 

PSU: PCP&C Silencer 470watt

 

Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-MA69VM-S2

 

CPU: AMD Athlon 64 X2 4000+

 

Memory: Corsair ValueSelect 2 x 1GB

 

Hard Drive: Hitachi Deskstar 7k160

 

DVD Burner: ASUS 18x w/ Lightscribe

 

Total: $349.93 before shipping

 

Video Card: EVGA GeForce 8600GT 256mb

 

Total w/ Video Card: $439.92 after $20 MIR on video card

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Budget Computer

Do-It-Yourself style! :)

 

Today I'm going to show you how I would build a computer on a Budget. The first thing we need to do to build a computer on a budget is to, well, set a budget. lol. I going to give myself a budget of $600.00 for the whole computer. The next thing we need to do is know what part we need for this computer. For this build it will only be the computer, there will be no monitor, keyboard, mouse, or OS (operating system). What we will be buying are CPU, motherboard, ram, hard drive, optical drive, case, and power supply. Now before I get to far into things I think we need to know what this budget computer is going to be for. Well it will be for a family that would like to have a computer but don't have a lot of money, but want something to go on the web with, type up a paper for school, use your new I-pod, or watch a movie. We are going to keep gaming out of this build, as you will want to spend more money on a video card that you can play the games on and that can take up a lot of money that we need to keep us on are budget.

 

So now we know what are budget is, what parts that are needed to build this computer, and what its for. It's now time for shopping. I like to do all my computer shopping at newegg, they have all the parts that we will need and I have always had good luck shopping with them.

 

 

In this day I don't see any reason why a dual core cpu cant be in a budget computer. To prove it I when with and AMD Athlon 64 X2 4000+. Its a 2.1ghz chip with 1mb of L2 cache and is made at the 65nm process, so its going to run cool while still having performance. It cost $61.99.

 

 

I'm going with a motherboard that has integrated graphics, that way we don't have to buy a video card and save some money. I'm going with a Gigabyte motherboard it has an nvidia Geforce 6100 chipset. It will take up to 8gb of memory has one 16x pci-e so in the future we could upgrade the graphics, 2 sata port for hard drives, 1 pata for old hard drive or an old dvd burner. It's cost $46.99

 

Are total so far is $108.98. We still have $491.02 left of the $600.00 budget.

 

 

Ram is cheap these days, so we are going to go with 2gigs of ram. I am a big fan of OCZ, they have a great customer support and lifetime warranty. I went with ocz gold 2gb kit, its 2x 1gig ddr2 800. its cost $69.99 but there is a bounce, a $30.00 mail-in-rebate. That makes the cost $39.99. :) I love rebates! Lol

 

 

I went with seagate barracuda hard drive. I've always had good luck with seagate. It is 120gb, 7200rpm, 8mb chache on a sata 3.0gb interface. The drive cost $47.99.

 

Are total so far is $226.96. We still have $373.04 left of the $600.00 budget.

 

 

I say DVD burners are the only optical drive that you will need. You can burn, and play all your media. DVD burners have also come way down in price. So lets take a look at the drive I piked out for this build. I went with a lite-on drive. I never had a problem with lite-on before. This drive is a 20x dvd+r, 8x dvd+rw, 8x, dvd+r dl and has a sats interface. The cost is $37.99.

 

 

When you buy a power supply pick one that is a known name. I am going with a Thermaltake purepower 500w. It has 2 12 volt rails, 14amp on rail one, and 15amps on rail two. This power supply has all the power we will need for this computer. The cost of this is $59.99 but there is a bounce, rebate! $25.00 mail-in-rebate, witch brings the cost to $34.99

 

 

When picking a case, make sure you pick one that fits your motherboard form factor, in are case it's micro atx. So Im going to go for a smaller case. To me that more room on my desk for papers, book, or beer cans. Lol The case Im going with is a cooler master centurion. Its a mini tower that looks to have cool. The cost $69.99 but theres a bounce $10.00 mail-in-rebate, witch brings the cost to $59.99.

 

So now lets take a look at what we have.

 

CPU – cost $61.99

Motherboard – cost $46.99

Ram – cost $69.99 with $30.00 mail-in-rebate for a total of $39.99

Hard drive- cost $47.99

Optical Drive – cost $37.99

Power Supply – cost $59.99 with $25.00 mail-in-rebate for a total of $34.99

Case – cost $69.99 with a $10.00 mail-in-rebate for a total of $59.99

 

Total cost of the computer $388.93 with $65.00 worth of mail-in-rebate witch will give use a cost of $323.93.

 

Now you can see that I cam in well below my budget of $600.00 and thats a good thing. You can use that money to buy an OS, a keyboard and mouse, or get a video card that you can game with. As you can see you can get a nice computer on a budget.

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