Need to build comp on 600 dollar budget

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Gskill memory 2x 1gig sticks
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231098
$65.99 free shipping

amd 64 x2 5600 2.8ghz
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103771
$139.99 free shipping

asrock aliven mobo
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157108
$49.99 + $6.33

western digital hard drive 160 gig 7200rpm
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136075
$49.99 + $6.14

thermaltake purepower 500watt
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817153052
59.99 + free shipping

cooler master case 2 fans
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811119068
$49.99 + $15.99

radeon x1950 pro 512mb
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102094
$128.99 + $5.84

subtotal= $544.93
shipping=$11.28
total=$556.21

there's my current setup. as you can see, i switched out the coolermaster for the thermaltake purepower 500 watt. more reliable and roughly the same price. and somehow, the price came out lower now than before. i'm just curious....if i had a 700 dollar budget, what video card could i get instead of the x1950?

would i be able to find a 2900 hd for it? without the x1950, the price ends up being 424.88 or so. and with 700 bucks, thats a 275 dollar budget for the video card. suggestions?
 
well, i thought i might as well inform you of all the updates that have happened with my build. i've done so on a few other threads meanwhile so i could get some important questions out of the way. but it looks like i have a well and truly solid, and stable design.

it may disappoint a few of you, but i've switched to an intel design. as much of an AMD fan i am, the proc i've chosen simply has more performance and kick to it. and it's better quality which earns my dollar. just about everything except maybe the memory has changed.

Intel E6750 2.66ghz
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115029
$189.99 + free shipping

Gigabyte GA-N650SLI-DS4 LGA 775 nForce 650i SLI ATX intel board
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128044
$134.99 + free shipping

antec earthwatts 500 watt
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817371007
$78.99 + free shipping

Gskill memory 2x 1gig sticks
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231098
$49.99 + free shipping

arctic silver 5 compound
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835100007
$5.99 + $4.99

Cooler Master RC 690 KKN1-GP ATX mid tower 3x 120mm fans installed
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811119137
$69.99 + free shipping

i've in the end decided to hold off on buying a new hard drive and graphics card until later. it simply means i can get 90% of my new computer much sooner, and i desperately want to see how it performs. then with an upgraded graphics chip, RAM, and hard drive, i can explode.

the grand total of this new beast? $534.93 shipping included. thoughts?
 
A nice build. You might also want to change the fans to the Scythe S-Flex SFF21F or the Yate Loon D12SM-12 fans. That is, if you're going to have a card and HDD setup that puts out a lot of heat.
 
at the current point in time, i won't be buying a gpu or an hdd. i plan on reusing my current PCI card to carry me for a while up until my birthday or so. which is the 15th of march. by then i'll have sufficient funds for a gpu, more ram, and maybe a hard drive if should so choose.

and as a matter of fact...when i was looking into another case and needed extra fans, i actually looked at the exact same Scythe fan! i'm impressed with myself! i picked a good fan! ^^. woot. yeah. if the 3 fans in that case aren't good enough, i'm more than definitely switching them out with 3 scythe fans. ...if i've got the money, i'll do so for the hell of it.

but until then, i'll be buying these parts only. i wanted to buy it all in one go. but i'm growing impatient. and it'll be better if i first trouble shoot these parts to see if something goes wrong when i still have the money to RMA and replace a part.
 
the thing is, i've done a lot of my shopping on newegg. and even though i might find 1 part cheaper, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense. i'd have to pay twice the shipping when ordering from two different sites. on newegg, i'm ending up paying 5 bucks. if i go to another site, that may skyrocket in comparison to what i'm paying now.

so for now i'll stick with newegg. if in future i'm buying 1 part or two maybe, i'll look to cyberpower. for example with the video card. if they offer the GT for a lower price, shipping included than on newegg, i'm going with them for certain.

so it all depends.
 
i have an important decision to make...a lot of the reviews for the Gigabyte nforce 650i sli motherboard have been pretty negative. a lot of DOA, a lot of installation problems, and all kinds of other stuff.

should i really go with that board?

there's 1 main reason i went with it in the first place. i was hoping i could save money by not getting a new hard drive. and that meant that i needed to have 2 ide/pata connections on the motherboard. the only one that offered those connections was the nforce 650i.

now that i'm not so sure i want it, it means that if i want to go with a cheaper, more reliable board, i will need to buy another hard drive that has sata 3.0gig/s connections. and that makes it more expensive.

it's already getting fairly pricey as it is.

does anyone have any suggestions of what to do?
 
ummm hay i wonder if it would be cheaper or even possible to scavenge some junk yards and and get lots and lots of older electronics cheep and than assemble them into a massive pc that has the same capability as a smaller one but costs less or would this jest not work completely. if it wont than could you still get some parts from junkyards or do you think that you could only find old stuff there.
 
there are a few things wrong with that statement.

one is that...well...you find JUNK in a junk yard. hence the name. very rarely do you find something usable that's worth keeping that's of high enough quality.

another one of them is...i live in the city of tampa. there's no such thing as a junkyard nearby or a yardsale where i could find parts. there are only pawn shops really..and their crap is...well...crap, and over priced.

the next one is...i want this computer to be as up to date as possible. practically everything is very very recent technology because that's what i wanted. some top of the line stuff.

you're not going to find an 8800gt, or a core 2 duo e6750 lying around. know what i'm saying?

anything else i COULD find, i already have. and if i already have it, i don't need to find it now, do i?

don't take this the wrong way. it might sound more malicious than it actually is....i'm just explaining the logic behind it.

so...junkyard is a no-go. what i need is some stuff that i can get on newegg that will offer me the slots i need, with high quality without having to add on extra price.

i was HOPING that i could find a board that had a few of the following. i'll label them as necessary, desired, or wanted. wanted meaning i really want it unless an alternative is presented that saves money anyway. desired meaning i'd like to have it, but if it doesn't have it, whatever:

1.) at least 2 ide/pata ports (wanted. if you find a sata hard drive, and a high quality intel core 2 duo board, full atx for cheap, then i'll take that.)

2) at least 2 sata 3.0 gb/s ports. (if the alternative method mentioned above is cheaper, necessary. if not, desired.)

3)1 or 2 pci-e 16x and at least 1 PCI (necessary)

4) LGA 775 socket (necessary)

5) onboard video (desired)

6) high quality, lower price (necessary)

7) at least 4x 240 pin ddr2 800 (pc2 6400) ram
 
o sorry

o sorry i jest live in North Idaho and there is an abundance of cheep stuff from flee markets and pawn shops that is all very cheep and there are lots of rich people with summer homes here so they throw out decent stuff here so i gess its jest a little different here.
 
nah don't worry about it. like i said, it sounds more malicious than it actually is. no need to apologize.

see, if i were in new york, i'd stand a better chance. that's where i'm from originally. i lived in this backwoods kind of area where all the rich people lived. i was middle class. i wasn't rich, but i wasn't dirt poor either.

if there were a yardsale up there, i might find some decent computer stuff. but it'd be rare. those people are more focused on cars, ipods, guitars, and cameras than they are on computers. times change, but i only just left NY to come down here a year ago. so....i don't think times have changed enough for that.

consider yourself lucky. you get to steal all the nice stuff. i have to settle for finding and working with the money i get. i'll fiddle with the parts until i get a design that's cheap, but still top notch and keep it inside the budget.

that design i had used to be about 530 dollars. but for some reason, probably due to christmas and the lack of supplies, a bunch of my parts had a huge price increase. not like...a dollar or two for each item. about 10 if not more for 3 or 4 parts. it's now hovering at about 570 dollars.
 
but i don't want to have it built FOR me. i want to do it myself, therefore i won't be using that. i already have a fantastic list put together from newegg for UNDER 600 dollars. hell i've put together a list for under 500 before.

the whole point is for me to get a pile of parts and put it together and get it working. not to just order something off a website and have them ship it to me ready made. if i wanted that, i wouldn't have bothered putting this much effort into it.
 
OK guys! it's come down to the wire. i have in my possession my projected budget. i have a sum total of 635 dollars in my hand, and i fully intend to use it.

i'm going to buy the following. if you have any final words of advice, speak now or forever hold your pieces:

intel e6750 core 2 duo 2.66ghz conroe
evga 122-ck-nf66 nforce 650i
gskill 2x 1 gig sticks ddr2 800mhz ram
antec neo power 500watt psu
Cooler Master RC 690 KKN1-GP mid tower atx case 3 fans installed
arctic silver 5 thermal paste
16x dvd combo burner drive thing
160gig hard drive western digital 7200rpm
 
Why the eVGA motherboard? IMO, this one is much better owing to its newer chipset supporting Penryn CPUs, as well as support for DDR2 and DDR3 RAM. Everything else looks great.
 
i picked the evga board for the price. i did a power search and couldn't find much else that was ok.

i actually almost forgot that i could go with the p35 chipset.

as a side note...i may or may not buy the hard drive. thats optional. i figured i might as well buy a new dvd drive, so i only need 1 pata port, which means i still have room for my old hard drives which is good. but we'll see.

looks like i'm set. as soon as the 26th rolls around, i'll try to order the parts.
 
link590o said:
i'm going to buy the following. if you have any final words of advice, speak now or forever hold your pieces:

intel e6750 core 2 duo 2.66ghz conroe
evga 122-ck-nf66 nforce 650i
gskill 2x 1 gig sticks ddr2 800mhz ram
antec neo power 500watt psu
Cooler Master RC 690 KKN1-GP mid tower atx case 3 fans installed
arctic silver 5 thermal paste
16x dvd combo burner drive thing
160gig hard drive western digital 7200rpm
A graphics card could be useful, too.
 
i don't really feel like waiting any longer to have the bulk of it. the 9250 i'm using will tide me over for a few more months up till my birthday when i can get s'more cash and get a new one, namely that 512mb GT. or if i feel like it (though probably not) the 512 gts. i wanna buy some games around then too and that will down at least 90 bucks right off the bat. i want to get the orange box and bioshock.

so total, i need about 370 dollars, not including shipping charges for that stuff. and i don't feel like holding off on the rest of the computer because i don't have the cash for those 3 things. right now the stuff i mentioned is the most important to me.

can't wait until tomorrow...bank will be open, and i can cash my check and then go and order the stuff. so excited ^^
 
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