Nettop for parents

[Fox5]

Hey all,

Currently my parents are running a full size desktop with an original Phenom and an SSD, but they want something that takes up less space. I've got them looking at nettops since they're fairly cheap but they want a few things:
A dvd drive/burner
And it probably needs to run some variant of Windows.

And I figured a core i3 is worthwhile just to make sure it's an upgrade in speed.

So far I've settled on a Core i3 Intel NUC and a USB DVD drive, but I'm not sure if there's better options out there. Total cost looks like it'll sit in at $300 since I can reuse DDR3 memory from a laptop, and some of the NUCs will accept the 2.5" SSD that's in the desktop.

Are there any better options?

 

[NTMBK]

Do you really need to replace the whole PC? Why not just drop it into a smaller case? If it's a uATX board, just put it in a half-width case with a half height GPU (something like a 6450) and a small form factor PSU.

 

[Fox5]

It's a full size ATX board. And even mini-itx is substantially larger than the nettops, they basically want the computer to disappear. They were originally looking at All in Ones, but since small computers can be mounted onto the VESA brackets of a monitor (or easily tucked away) they seem like a cheaper option.

I've actually switched from the NUC to a Brix with a core i3 since the model that supports 2.5" drives is a little cheaper.