Building a college computer

[Carp1812]

I'm building a computer for a friend's daughter to take to college. She won't be doing much heavy computing, but they want something that will last a few years. Most of her needs will be typical college stuff- music, papers, e-mail, internet, with possibly a bit of gaming (but unlikely). Any critiques would be greatly appreciated.

XP2500 Barton $92.00 New Egg
Epox 8rda+ $83.00 New Egg
Corsair 512 3200 $95.00 New Egg
WD 40 7200 8 $67.00 New Egg
radeon 7500 64 dvi $45.00 New Egg
lite-on 52x24x52 $45.00 New Egg
Samsung 26x48 $37.00 New Egg
Altec Lansing avs300w $30.00 New Egg
m$ 114 keyboard $16.00 New Egg
m$ optical wheel usb $16.00 New Egg
Enlight EN-72500AZB 300W $70.00 New Egg
WinXP Pro $100.00 Abysstek
Samsung 171B $400.00 Legend Micro
Total= $1,029.00

Thanks.

 

[Carp1812]

bump

 

[lewisniven]

looks okay, you could upgrade her to an 8500 for little extra cost, then downgrade the cpu to like a 2100+ pali to balance the whole spec out a little more. just a thought.

 

[Vinny N]

-aim for quiet (so that probably means appropriate heatsink+80mm fan)
-go for a bigger hard drive (especially if it means one with a 3 year warranty)

Have you thought about possibly going for one of those shuttle cubes instead of a tower case? It would be smaller and easier to carry.

 

[Carp1812]

Vinny - Can you give me a link to a Shuttle cube? Do they support standard motherboards or will I need something else?

 

[Vinny N]

newegg link

Newegg has a bunch, I didn't have a particular one in mind or a platform recommendation, they come with a motherboard that has lots of basics built in (sound, video, NIC). They only seem to allow one 5.25" drive though so you'd probably have to go for a combo drive. The Toshiba SD-R1312 drive is nice, 32x cd-r 10x cd-rw, 40x cd, 12x dvd. But it's not in stock at the moment (but it's priced at fairly reasonable $70)

 

[Mavrick007]

If you're going with an enlight case, why not get the beige model and save some money (free shipping) versus the black case with $15 shipping.
Or better yet, get an antec slk2600amb with a real antec psu for about the same price as you have listed ($71 instead of 70 with shipping).

You can get the Microsoft Multimedia Keyboard & Wheel Mouse Optical Value Pack - OEM for $29 + 6 shipping and save a few bucks there too if you want optical and get a better keyboard,
or get the regular ps2 ball mouse with kbd for alot less at $23 + 6 shipping.

The corsair is the value ram right?

The samsung is a dvd-rom (16x48x)? Why not just get the Liteon combo drive that gives 48x24x48x cdrw, and 16x dvd? It would save you alot of money there.
For $58, you can have the Liteon Combo, whereas if you bought the Liteon and the Samsung, it would cost you $82, which is a $24 premium.

If she doesn't need an 8meg cache drive, she could get a WD 80gig 7200rpm Cavier drive for $8 more.

For a vid card, you could get a better card, such as a radeon 8500Le with 64/128megs ram or possibly a Ti4200 with 64megs of ram with the above savings and have a faster machine,
that looks better and has more space.

 

[Ionizer86]

Try to get the Maxtor 120 Ultra from Staples for $60; check Hot Deals.

The processor is a good choice; even for day to day tasks, people say the extra 256 L2 helps a lot. I wouldn't downgrade to 2100+.

Noise is a factor too. Maybe you can get a passively cooled R9000 if the 7500 isn't passive. Go for an SLK-800 (or even 900 if possible) and then use a 80mm or 92mm panaflo.

Optical drives are usually cheaper locally through rebates etc. You may be able to find a Liteon in a Cendyne box, for example.

You do need to buy some hardware from Abysstek for that price on the OS right? I'm assuming the XP is OEM because of the cost.

 

[newParadigm]

Shuttle AN35N nForce 2 Ultra MOBO is a better choice in my opinion, fully supports DDR 400, it's cheaper ($63 shipped from mWave).

The Chaintech gForce FX 5200 is only a bout $70 from Newegg.com -- much faster vid than Radeon 7500 and Fully Supports DirectX 9

Also I would consider the Foxconn/Allied 400W Power Supply from Newegg for $30, less than half the price of Enlight 300W and 100 watts more power.

Just some thoughts,

newParadime

 

[bluemax]

Physical space can be a real premium in a college dorm. I'd recommend a microATX desktop case and a 15" LCD monitor to plop down on top of it. No tower on the floor to kick, small and attractive on the desktop where it's easily accessible, 1AGP 3PCI should be PLENTY of expansion capability - much better than a Shuttle cube, and quieter than a Shuttle as well.

For the motherboard, check out the Biostar M7NCG or the Shuttle MN31N. Both are uATX and have proper nForce2 Soundstorm IPC-T audio. Shuttle even offers 2x VGA.

For the case, check out:
Directron A100 Micro ATX Desktop & Tower Case
Chenbro PC 80569


They're not expensive either. That's my two bits....

 

[Carp1812]

Mavrick- The corsair is indeed value ram, I'm getting 2 optical drives so she can copy CDs without swapping, and the 8mb cache drive is simply so she has a 3 year warranty. Great suggestions otherwise though.

Ionizer- A co-worker just bought the O/S from Abysstek without buying hardware. It's only a COA- no disk, etc.

Thanks everyone for your comments- keep them coming!

 

[lchyi]

From experience:

1) Make sure you get that LCD!
2) I like to have the best stuff out there, but really, you don't get to use half of it in college.
3) Shuttle XPCs are a great investment, it will really clean up desperately needed space.
4) Save space!
5) You want something light too because moving in and out is a pain with a Chieftec case.
6) Save space!!
7-10) Save space!!!

Hehe, just being stupid . Anyway, that's a nice setup. $1000 with the monitor is pretty sweet, I don't know what college she goes to but UCSD's dorms are among the biggest in the state and I still felt cramped sometimes so that's why I emphasized the space saving. Plus, since she'll be spending a lot of time in her dorm, the XPC isn't a particularly ugly solution either.

 

[Lyfer]

You should get her a dell, who will she ask for help when she has probs?

 

[Carp1812]

She was looking for a Dell, but I quoted better hardware and $500 cheaper than Dell. I go to the same school, so I'll beat Dell's standard 1 year warranty myself.

 

[capricorn]

Just went through this same exercise for my daughter. Basically, I asked myself what's likely to break, and how to construct this system to keep from getting a frantic "Dad! My computer just beeps and has one line that says 'OS NOT FOUND. DISK @ IDE0,0 NOT RESPONDING' over and over! I have a 25-page paper on there that's due tomorrow! HELP!!!" call. No amount of "Honey, that's why the tell you to print your work out a day or two ahead." is going to fix that.In her system, I opted for a LeadTek TV2000 XP deluxe TV/FM card in order to forgo a TV, stereo, and DVD player. You may want to consider the same as these dorm rooms are incredibly small. Also, since she's going to be sleeping, eating, living and perhaps even studying just feet away from this thing, overall noise was a consideration.

In my experience, the top things that fail are fans (CPU, case, and power supply), optical drives, and hard drives - more or less in that order. I didn't see any additional fans in your list, but I would consider adding the rear 80 mm fan, plus buying a spare. I would consider getting two quiet fans and using the one that comes with the case as the spare. A spare CPU cooling fan is a good idea too. I've had a number of those fail - and you really, really don't want those to be down long. (I'll mention Motherboard Monitor here as a good thing to have to watch those fan speeds.)

I've had a few optical drives fail for different reasons such as they just stopped reading anything (laser died or something) and in one case, the tray loading mechanism permanently jammed in the open position. For my daughter, I bought a pair of matching combination DVD-ROM/CD-RW drives at NewEgg for about $70 each. Either drive could fail and she could still read DVDs and read/write CD-Rs and CD-RWs. What you have specified is probably just fine though.

For disk "protection," I'm using a motherboard with on-board RAID support and using RAID-1 (mirroring) with two identical drives so that each drive is a copy of the other. It can still run with one drive if one fails, which gives me some time to pick up another drive and get it shipped.

I also bought a pair of DDR modules so that one could fail and she could get by for a while on just the other. I've only once had memory fail after it's been working for a while. I've gotten a couple of sticks that were DOA on arrival or died shortly thereafter though. I got this system ahead of time to have a decent burn-in period.

I went single point of failure on the motherboard (What choice is there really?), CPU, floppy (not even sure she needs one), TV card, power supply and video card. (The LAN and sound are built-in.) I briefly considered a dual-CPU motherboard, but I've yet to loose a processor, even when the CPU fan quits. Those fans tend to get pretty noisy before they fail, so I've always had enough time to get a new one before it totally fails. My thinking on the other parts are the following: If the motherboard fails, she's out of luck, but I couldn't see buying a spare. I've never lost a motherboard yet in any of the dozen or so computers I've had over the 18 years. I bought a quality motherboard and have faith in it. If the CPU fails, she's toast, but I've never had that happen. It does happen though. The disk drives on the Sonata are easily removable, so she could get to the data using someone else's computer in a crunch in the case of a motherboard or CPU failure. If the floppy fails, I'm not sure she'd notice and the CD-RWs will still be there. TV card fails: "Tough luck honey. We'll get you one during your next break. Study more." Power supply: I really did think about picking up another one. I've only lost one power supply, but I've replace the fans in several. The 380W Antec power supply comes from a company with a good reputation, and I've had great experiences with them. I've no experience with Enlight's power supplies. If it's not Enermax or Antec, I'd be a bit hesitant. That power supply's seems bit light on the all three rails for a 300W p/s, but it's probably OK for what you're assembling.

If you are thinking of getting a quiet system, I highly recommend the Antec case. It's roomy and very, very quiet. Even with the second (stealth) 120 mm fan, I can barely hear it. I got the Antec Sonata case and put a second PC Toys Stealth 120 mm fan in in plus bought a spare. (I got those and the round IDE and floppy cables from coolerguys.com. NewEgg's shipping is steep on those items.) Cooling is a concern because most of the dorm rooms are not air conditioned and they are "warm" in the early fall and late spring. The round cables help not block off the airflow. In this particular case, they are also easier to route around.

I got her an 17" LCD monitor. 1280x1024 at 14 lbs. My 19" monitor has the same resolution at 60 lbs. What would you like to lug up and down the stairs?

If the girl your building this for has her college ID, she can get the upgrade version of Windows XP from NewEgg for $88 if you have something to upgrade from. I'm not sure how (or even if) NewEgg verifies she's a student.

-cap

 

[lchyi]

That's like the longest non-FAQ, non-Rant post I've ever seen haha.

 

[sniperruff]

Originally posted by: Carp1812
I'm building a computer for a friend's daughter to take to college. She won't be doing much heavy computing, but they want something that will last a few years. Most of her needs will be typical college stuff- music, papers, e-mail, internet, with possibly a bit of gaming (but unlikely). Any critiques would be greatly appreciated.



Thanks.

ok afte rreading the first sentence here are the following suggestions:
XP2500 Barton $92.00 New Egg--- a 2500 is an overkill. get a 1700 OEM with a cheap top rated HSF on newegg and save $50. i mean i have a 1700 palomino and i play games and i think that is enough...

Epox 8rda+ $83.00 New Egg--- i really don't like the 8RDA+. i mean i asked why so many people
recommend it what with the slightly high rate of DOA but nobody told me. go get the soltek nforce2 board... $6 more

***OR get the asus nforce1 mobo with integrated graphics everything. makes assembly easier and costs around $60 on newegg. refurbs are also nice on newegg. since this is a non-gaming system the GF2 integrated graphics would be great! save about $60 since this board is cheaper and shaves off the graphics card!

Corsair 512 3200 $95.00 New Egg--- 2 sticks of 256mb to get the system faster, becasue mobo has DUAL CHANNEL DDR

WD 40 7200 8 $67.00 New Egg--- get a biggie, looking at the hotdeals forum. if you don't want to hassle with rebates i suggest the WD1200JB on newegg for $110 or something

radeon 7500 64 dvi $45.00 New Egg--- this is a decent video card but it's aged. i suggest a radeon 9000 for similar prices

lite-on 52x24x52 $45.00 New Egg--- it's fine. can be cheaper if you are willing to deal with rebates, at your local office stores. look at staples, officedepot, circuitcity... whatever store and buy online

Samsung 26x48 $37.00 New Egg--- you mean 16X48...

Altec Lansing avs300w $30.00 New Egg--- decent set of speakers. too bad that you don't live in NYC because i have a set im not using and i can let it go for $10 or so.... oh well

m$ 114 keyboard $16.00 New Egg--- nice choice. maybe get the logitech multimedia KB

m$ optical wheel usb $16.00 New Egg--- personal pref

Enlight EN-72500AZB 300W $70.00 New Egg--- i suggest the antec 3700AMB or something. price is similar and you get an antec PSU

WinXP Pro $100.00 Abysstek--- nice choice again

Samsung 171B $400.00 Legend Micro--- maybe add like $50 or so will get you a dell 18inch! look in hotdeals forum!

hope i helped

 

[BG4533]

Depending on what school she is going to and what her major is she may be able to get free or very cheap OSs or software. Through my CIS dept at Ohio State I can get any Windows OS for free and anyone here can get a bundle of an OS, Office and some other stuff got $100.

 

[capricorn]

Originally posted by: BG4533
Depending on what school she is going to and what her major is she may be able to get free or very cheap OSs or software. Through my CIS dept at Ohio State I can get any Windows OS for free and anyone here can get a bundle of an OS, Office and some other stuff got $100.

Dang! They didn't offer that when I went there.

Oh wait, there were no PCs when I went there. I had a friend who had an Apple IIe with a whole 64K. Does that count? I'll bet you've never even had an exciting night waiting for your printouts at 2AM because the mainframe's output queue went down have you? Or had to wait for a terminal to free up? Or had to wait for a punch card machine when you realized there was never going to be a terminal free?

I'm old and I'll go away now.

-cap

 

[BG4533]

Originally posted by: capricorn

Originally posted by: BG4533
Depending on what school she is going to and what her major is she may be able to get free or very cheap OSs or software. Through my CIS dept at Ohio State I can get any Windows OS for free and anyone here can get a bundle of an OS, Office and some other stuff got $100.

Dang! They didn't offer that when I went there.

Oh wait, there were no PCs when I went there. I had a friend who had an Apple IIe with a whole 64K. Does that count? I'll bet you've never even had an exciting night waiting for your printouts at 2AM because the mainframe's output queue went down have you? Or had to wait for a terminal to free up? Or had to wait for a punch card machine when you realized there was never going to be a terminal free?

I'm old and I'll go away now.

-cap

Nah...We get it easy now. When did you graduate?