$500 "Office/General Use" BUILD - limited graphics.

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sparrow1469

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Hello, I wish to build an "Office/General Use/Multi-tasking" computer - CAN SOMEONE PLEASE SUGGEST A CERTAIN "BUILD" or multiple Builds for me? Any links to websites featuring such Builds? So MANY brands out there - recommend top names for MOBOs? Chips? Drives? ...yes, i haven't shopped computers since ZEOS was my favorite...

No Gaming for me...sadly. Will be running: Office, DragonSpeak, several web browsers, music, FileZilla, DC++, IM's...you get the idea...:D

Will purchase NOW. Don't need good graphics card. Looking for an easy "list" to follow cause I am too lazy to reasearch for hours myself. Upgradable for 3 yrs? Are "pre-built" a good option? Brand for $500? Probably need plenty of powerful RAM; please recommend a GOOD CPU and Board - $100-150 each maybe? Recommend also storage Drives? Cooler? Sound Blaster? Have now mouse, keys, monitor, OS, bla, bla...

Just want a reliable machine to rip through my Windows programs effortlessly.
CURRENTLY on an '03 Dimension4500s Pent4 - solid machine, done well for me...but getting moody in old age. Please help! Your expertise will be recognized.
 
Here's a build I put together quickly, since I'm in the UK it's in £s but that £465 is roughly equal to about $450.
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There's about $50 left in there if you want to get more RAM (though you're unlikely to need more than 4GB), a bigger hard drive, a slightly better CPU (though that E8500 would probably be your best choice, unless you want to go Quad which I wouldn't recommend for you, since most programs don't make use of two cores let alone four).

The power supply is a little pricey, you can probably find a cheaper one from a company such as PC Cooling & Power, OCZ and other such companies. I tend to go with Corsair because they have crazy-long 5-year warranties, which justifies the slight price hike for me.
The max. RAM on that board is 8GB, and you're incredibly unlikely to need that even in 3 years but it's there if you need it.
The graphics card there will be good enough for 5-year-old games and pretty much anything else you need, if you plan on playing newer games you might want to jump up to the 46xx cards.
Normally I wouldn't throw in a CPU cooler, but I have that one and it works pretty good, and on that site it just happened to be cheaper to get a retail CPU and aftermarket cooler than getting the CPU retail (i.e. with stock cooler).

Anyway, that should give you a rough idea of what you should probably look at.

As far buying a pre-built, it's entirely up to you though I'd recommend building, you'll end up with better (faster+higher quality) parts than a pre-built.
 
He's probably not from the UK.

Then read my post more carefully :)
Here's a build I put together quickly, since I'm in the UK it's in £s but that £465 is roughly equal to about $450.
There's about $50 left in there if you want to get more RAM

Also he said he already has OS etc.
Have now mouse, keys, monitor, OS, bla, bla...

And I'm gonna throw in another quote just for blarg of it :p
Yo ho ho and a bottle of kittens.
 
^^Mate, 465 pounds is not 450 bucks. It's more like 665 bucks. Google is your friend.
You have to remember tax here is pretty expensive, so take 15% off the $665, and factor in that most electronics are just generally cheaper in the US than the UK. I do recognise that my estimate was wrong though, I should've gone up from £465 not down :p
 
Well, you could have just factored out the VAT and then converted, to take shipping out of the picture in general.

Either way, the AMD build is a lot better for the cost, no need to buy a video card with good onbaord, and a triple core processor for the win.
 
THANK YOU Gentlemen. Yamikotai, thank you for your expert thoughts. Evolv and HakariCloud, I purchased the Build you suggested, can't wait to get it! Thank you for taking the time to help. I was wondering too, will I need anything special once the components arrive? wires, cables, bottle of Rum, etc? I'll check the forum threads about assembly, so it's no big deal....i hope.
Again, thanks for helping me build my computer. Good Day.:D
 
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