Building a computer for my roomate...suggestions?

[dolphin512]

My roommate has 700 to a 1000 dollars to spend and wants me to build him the best comp i can for that price...the price should include keyboard, monitor, etc. not just the computer. I am currently working up some specs for it but i was curious as to what suggestions you guys had. I was thinking newegg for the parts.

 

[Duvie]

Definitely go newegg...

Some tips...

1)Get minumum of 20gig harddrive at first and bump as money is left to afford it...

2)get minimum athlon xp (no point with tbirds anymore) then bump up as needed...
or get duron of 1ghz or greater to insure it is on the morgan core...cpu before HDD though

3)Look at liteon lt163 dvd-rom...It is as fast as the best cd-roms plus give you top 5 dae ripping speed and play a dvd or two...

4)I recommend the GF3 ti200 as the sweet spot for vid cards right now at newegg...

 

[dolphin512]

thanks for the tips...anyone else have suggestions?

 

[bigshooter]

All from newegg and estimated prices based on what I just got (except memory from crucial)

Athlon XP 1600+ retail - $142
Epox 8KHA+ - $98
Enermax FS710b with 330w ps - $99
Maxtor 40gig D740x - $83
SB Audigy oem - $62
256meg pc 2100 ddr - $67 (search for Anandtech 15% discount in hot deals)
Linksys NIC -$10 - $20 (already had one)
Lite-on Black 24x cdrw - $80
Lite-on 16x DVD -$60
Any geforce3 ti200 - $160
Natural Keyboard - $18
Intellimouse optical -$24

This comes out to almost $1000 without monitor if you add in shipping. Based on what he wants or needs you can adjust from there. Instead of a geforce 3 get a geforce 2 ti for $50 less. Keep the hard drive, that's a great deal. If he doesn't need a cdrw drop that. You can get a fast duron and a good motherboard and shave another $50 off the processor price. You could get a lesser case and save another $20. It's all up to what he needs. You should put those requirements in. If he's not going to burn cd's you'll have another $80 right there.

You could also try

Athlon XP 1600+ retail $142
MSI K7N420Pro $152
512 megs Crucial pc 2100 (2x256) $135
Maxtor D740x 40gig $83
Antec SX830 300w Antec ps $79
Liteon 16x DVD $60
Natural Keyboard and Intellimouse optical $42

That's about $700 or $740 shipped, maybe less. With this he can deal with geforce2 mx video onboard the nforce until he gets more money and can upgrade to a geforce 4 or whtaever is out. I don't know what kind of monitor to get, but again you could get a lower end case and shave off $20, drop down to a tbird processor or duron for up to $50 or $60 less, get 256 megs of pc2100 (2x128) instead and shave $75 off. It's all up to your friend. You also didn't say how big of a monitor he wants.