Net Build for Grandmother

[charre]

Building a small ~300$ PC as a little gift for my grandmother being so awesome. She just surfs the web, watches videos and looks at pictures. Only requirement is that it runs XP. She does pretty well for her age on computers, but the change to Win 7 is just a bit too much for her.

Proposed Specs:

Intel G530
4 GB of G.Skill Memory (2x2)
WD Caviar Blue 250GB SATA II
BIOSTAR H61MGC
LG 22x DVD Burner
IN WIN BK644.BN300TBL - Comes with 300w PSU

Will all this play nice with XP? I am fairly certain it will. My only concern is about the integrated video working correctly.

Also, the only component I could salvage from the old PC is the PSU, it's just a little Hipro PSU that came with the a dell. It has run for 7 years in her very dusty home. I would like to maybe buy a dirt cheap pc case and re use the PSU (maybe upgrade to the G620 with the savings). Should I take the gamble?

 

[Blain]

Reusing an old cheapie PSU is false economy.

 

[Zap]

Why wouldn't integrated graphics work correctly? That's what probably 95% of the non-gamers and non-engineers/graphics artists use in the whole world. The Celeron G530 should work fine.

I would rather use the In Win PSU than a 7 year old PSU from a Dell.

Personally I would upgrade her to Windows 7 and use a small SSD. Win7 can be made to look like XP, but I haven't found that necessary with anyone so far no matter what their age was (even if they complained at first). The SSD will allow for smaller form factors such as ITX (some ITX cases only takes 2.5" drives). While gamers and enthusiasts often like large computers, most either don't care or would like a smaller computer.

Is optical drive even necessary after the initial Windows install? If not, just borrow one from another system for the install, and save yourself a few bucks.

 

[T_Yamamoto]

Get a dell?

 

[BoomerD]

Dell outlet.

For the same $300, you can get a computer that will do much more than her needs seem to dictate, comes with a full 1-year warranty, and no headaches.

 

[charre]

Yea, I have considered the dell computers, but I have had such terrible luck with them and dealing with dell support that I sort of refuse to buy from them or from any of the other big manufacturers. I will basically insure the computer out of pocket for her and take care of the maintenance. Also, she lives in an hold house that is very dusty, I feel she needs something that can run almost fan-less.

 

[mfenn]

New hardware doesn't always get XP drivers these days. That's be big gotcha I can see. Honestly, for what a "normal" person does with a computer, XP an 7 aren't that different. The Start Menu is still in the same place, desktop icons still work the same, you can go back to the XP-style taskbar if you want, etc.

 

[charre]

Well I have a legacy install of xp through my university. So I have that pretty much for free. Also, my grandmother is quite old, and it may be difficult for many of us here to understand the difficulty of going from XP to 7. I just want to get her set up with something simple and nearly impossible to break.

 

[charre]

Why wouldn't integrated graphics work correctly? That's what probably 95% of the non-gamers and non-engineers/graphics artists use in the whole world. The Celeron G530 should work fine.

I would rather use the In Win PSU than a 7 year old PSU from a Dell.

Personally I would upgrade her to Windows 7 and use a small SSD. Win7 can be made to look like XP, but I haven't found that necessary with anyone so far no matter what their age was (even if they complained at first). The SSD will allow for smaller form factors such as ITX (some ITX cases only takes 2.5" drives). While gamers and enthusiasts often like large computers, most either don't care or would like a smaller computer.

Is optical drive even necessary after the initial Windows install? If not, just borrow one from another system for the install, and save yourself a few bucks.

I would consider the optical drive necessary. My grandmother likes to burn DVDs of pictures for other family members. She even figured out how to copy blockbuster DVDs. And yea xp is necessary, I have a free copy, she is most comfortable with it, its a reliable OS even in this day and age and it has some legacy support according to what I have read. She needs a hard drive for storing pictures. Yea I get a lot of this seems pretty backwards, but I am trying to set her up with something that she is comfortable with. Again, I want to build a really robust little machine that can stand up to alot of dust and will be nearly impossible to break. I will still need to tackle the security issues. I still cant get her to stop downloading those damn IE search bar add ons.

 

[jpeyton]

XP isn't necessary. Windows 7 is more reliable, more user (read: grandmother) friendly, while retaining the same basic Windows interface that XP has. I think your grandmother is smarter than the realizes, and will quickly adapt to the minor (but intuitive) changes that Windows 7 has made to improve the desktop experience.

Worst case scenario: you can Jitterbug-ify the Windows 7 interface so that it's stupidly simple to use and closely imitates Windows XP.

As for your hardware components:

Intel G530 - Good
4 GB of G.Skill Memory (2x2) - Get the cheapest DDR3 1333 you can buy.
WD Caviar Blue 250GB SATA II - Ditch this for a reliable 120GB SSD.
BIOSTAR H61MGC - Try this instead: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813186211
LG 22x DVD Burner - Good
IN WIN BK644.BN300TBL - Comes with 300w PSU - Try this instead: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811129068

If you want a robust machine, start eliminating the components most likely to cause problems. Replace the mechanical hard drive with an SSD, replace the noisy inefficient PSU with a tiny high-efficiency fanless Pico-PSU with a power-brick. The only source of noise will be the single fan on the CPU heatsink. Fewer fans means less dust being sucked into the case.

 

[charre]

XP isn't necessary. Windows 7 is more reliable, more user (read: grandmother) friendly, while retaining the same basic Windows interface that XP has. I think your grandmother is smarter than the realizes, and will quickly adapt to the minor (but intuitive) changes that Windows 7 has made to improve the desktop experience.

Worst case scenario: you can Jitterbug-ify the Windows 7 interface so that it's stupidly simple to use and closely imitates Windows XP.

As for your hardware components:

Intel G530 - Good
4 GB of G.Skill Memory (2x2) - Get the cheapest DDR3 1333 you can buy.
WD Caviar Blue 250GB SATA II - Ditch this for a reliable 120GB SSD.
BIOSTAR H61MGC - Try this instead: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813186211
LG 22x DVD Burner - Good
IN WIN BK644.BN300TBL - Comes with 300w PSU - Try this instead: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811129068

Yea I looked at that case. The mini-itx boards are alot more expensive and if I go xp, I can always add an SSD and win 7 in the future if she changes her mind. She is pretty adamant about going back to XP.

 

[jpeyton]

The mini-itx boards are alot more expensive

$5-$10 more

and if I go xp, I can always add an SSD and win 7 in the future if she changes her mind. She is pretty adamant about going back to XP.

She won't change her mind, but you can install Windows 7 and encourage her to try it out first before she makes a decision.

Besides the aforementioned reasons Windows 7 is superior to XP, you have to remember that Microsoft ended XP support as well. That means security exploits and bug fixes come to Windows 7 first, and XP later (if ever). Windows 7 is also a much more secure operating system, and for a spyware/malware prone grandmother who will probably be targeted heavily by phishers worldwide, she would be much better off using Windows 7.

Enable remote desktop so you can drop in every few weeks and spend 10 minutes cleaning up things. I do the same for my parents and uncle as well, running spyware/malware scans on their computers remotely. Like you mentioned, newphiles have a way of getting garbage (like search toolbars) installed on their computer all the time.

 

[charre]

Well I ordered parts, and they are about the same as above except for a bigger hard drive I got on sale and a slightly different model case from IN WIN. She has really given Windows 7 a good shot and she is struggling with it. It's just that XP still has legacy support and its just easier for her. Also I do like the idea of setting up a remote desktop so I can maintenance from it. I do the same thing using my A200 to do maintenance on my home PC and since I usually go to work at night I can set things up for her computer to do while she is asleep. So thanks jpeyton for that idea, I had completely forgotten about that.