Is this ATX?

modding the case? Not a good idea

Look, I'd say to buy a complete new PC, case, your P4 S478
 
you can put together a decent P4 machine with all new parts for $500-$600. Case in point, using some of the refurbished items on newegg.com, I recently built for a friend, a P4 Prescott 3.2E ghz, 1gig DDR PC 3200 memory, nvidia FX5500 (low end) vid card, ASUS P4800SE mobo, 160 gb Hitachi SATA drive, NEC 16x DVD burner & some $60 case with lights and clear window side ... total = $552 even. It can be done ... save your money.
 
thats a good idea cross... but can i use the parts from the computer i bought for now, then upgrade along the way? if so, what shud i buy first? I was thinking that i should buy a new eide hard drive first since the computer supports eide (btw, please fill me in on whether eide is compatible with ide) and since most new motherboards support ide,eide,ata from 1 cable. am i rite, or talking garbage?

edit: Omg this really sux newegg only ships to places within usa and puerto rico
 
tigerdirect I think ships outside of U.S.

well ... in order to seriously upgrade your pc situation, the only things you might be able to salvage from your old pc is possibly the hard drive. How large of a drive is it? If it's under 20gb, you'll want to go with a new one ... probably find a 120-160gb drive for $80-$90. Of course, keyboard, mouse and monitor can still be used. The RAM in your current computer is outdated (SDRAM is old ... DDR is current), motherboard & processor (forget about it), case (we all know thats out). So it's beginning to look like you might need to consider starting from scratch. You can still use your current pc as a DMZ machine ... something to connect to the internet and if it gets virus-ridden or whatever, who cares?

The $500 I quoted was for the box & contents only.

Where you located?
 
ok, i can use newegg bcuz i kno sum1 in the states who will ship out the items i order to me if i get it sent to him. i live in canadia btw. ive heard of tigerdirect, but im planning to go reallly low on price, hopefully within 800 canadian. now, im prolly gonna buy refurbished items... should i tho, its kind of a risk and im not gonna get all the parts at the same time so how would i test the parts out? and no way im gonna use that uber old 3.2 gig hdd that came with the computer i got. im gonna post the parts in a lil bit, please tell me if theyre all compatible, they fit in my budget :D
 
one thing you got to be careful with is missing parts ... i.e. if you get a refurbished motherboard it may or may not come with all the cables, faceplate, whatever stuff normally comes with a brand new boxed motherboard. I have extra parts, so missing parts aren't a big concern to me. When it comes to hard drives and processors ... it may arrive still not working, but you can RMA it ... meaning you can send it to the manufacturer of the product and get a replacement. For example, I got a refurbished Samsung sata drive that refused to work for me, so I RMA'd it to Samsung and they sent me another one.

Word of advice ... unless you have a resource to get cabling and such, I'd purchase a new mobo. You may get lucky getting all the stuff that normally comes with a new mobo, as I did one time, but probably not. I got greedy and tried to buy another refurbished mobo and it didnt come with the custom faceplate. Makes it look kind of goofy on the back of my pc, I dont really care though ... no one sees it.

But cd-rom's, hard drives, floppy ... etc ... there really isnt anything extra that comes with them that you would lose. With the processor ... make sure it's a "retail" refurbished ... not a "OEM". Retail means it will come with a heatsink.
 
iight, all questions answered, thanks cross, computergen, lhuser. i think i'll order from tigerdirects, they got sum good deals rite now, found a prescott supported mobo 4 like 40 bucks and its new (woop woop) btw 40 canadian. :D l8z
 
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