I built myself a mid-range gaming computer about a year ago and my parents would like to upgrade from their dated Dell tower so I said I'd have a go at building them one. Budget: £700-800 Main uses of intended build: web browsing, office/email, photo-shopping, converting audio tapes into digital files for burning to CD Parts required: no peripherals required (already have a decent monitor and keyboard/mouse) Monitor resolution: don't know but it's about 20" HD probably 1080p Storage requirements: two separate hard drives 1TB each Will you be overclocking: no Extra information about desired system: Needs to have the correct sockets to plug in an audio tape machine. Mum tells me this is a breakout box but I have no idea about this kind of thing. I'd imagine some kind of decent sound card is required. Thanks in advance
Doesn't sound to me like you're going to need to spend anywhere near your budget for their needs. The affordable all rounder from the July builders guide would form the basis of a very good build for them http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/buyers-guide/2011/07/11/pc-hardware-buyer-s-guide-july-2011/2 Unless it's required to perform anything graphically intensive the IGP on the i3 2100 should be fine so you can drop the discrete graphics card. Also no real need to get the aftermarket cooler, and get 2 1tb hdds instead. As for the sound file converting, I wouldn't really know myself but if you could find out what software they use and what inputs the tape machine has I'm sure someone else can point you in the right direction
Maybe look at the new llanlo CPUs by amd as they have a better IGPU than intel. The boards are also cheaper but I'm not sure on that
Agreed with Sketchee, you can build a machine for them for under £400 and it would still be overkill. Find out what connection the tape-to-digital drive uses. If its ancient (guessing so) and internal its likely IDE. Its its from the last 4 years it'll probably be SATA. If its prehistoric then let the poor guy rest in piece, because you wont find a motherboard to support the connection and you can just get a USB version most likely. CPU: i3-2100 (£90) Board: Asus P8H61-M (£60) RAM: Might as well for 8GB of whatever brand name has a special offer on today. Its so cheap that 8GB seems like the minimum unless you are on a super tight budget. (£50-55) GPU: IGP (£0) HDD: 2x 1TB Western digital Black (£45 x 2) Case: Whatever mATX looks nice. Get one without PSU. (anything from £20-40) PSU: Corsair 430CX (£35) Sound Card: If they need one, Asus Xonar DG (£25) Total: Around £400 depending on case and sound card choices. Will be very quick, future proof and reliable.
This apart from forget the 8 Gig of RAM as it really is overkill, despite being cheap, and don't bother with a sound card. Regarding the audio tape machine, it is extremely difficult to tell you what is needed without knowing exactly what it is. However, if it is just a normal tape player then the Line In on the motherboards integrated sound chip would work, but you may need a Red and White RCA to 3.5mm jack adapter.
Thanks for the replies. If it's as simple as using a line in port then I can try to use their current computer for doing the tape conversion (I even have a spare white/red rca to jack if needed). As far as graphics I have a feeling they will still want a dedicated GPU. I assume the IGP will be able to handle HD resoultion and any amount of photo editing they require but then I always thought it was mostly about processor speed and RAM with photo editing. How future proof would you rate what you have recommended? 3-4 years? more? They sort of want it to be a long time but I have pointed out that if they spend just £400 they could upgrade in half the time and get a brand spanking new pc instead of struggling on trying to get by on a slow pc in the latter 4 years.
as for the sound card, presuming the tape player has a 3.5mm jack output (otherwise known as a headphones socket) then you would just want this: http://www.gak.co.uk/en/behringer-uca202-u-control-usb-audio-interface/944 and a 3.5mm jack to stereo phono cable http://www.amazon.co.uk/3-5mm-Jack-...LSWM/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1310847521&sr=8-1 then just install ASIO4ALL and you'd be good to go. As for recording, Audacity would do you fine, and even better, it's free!
They wont need a dedicated GPU. It might gain some time in photoshop (if they have the latest version) but to be honest the money + extra power used isnt worth the shorter time for what is most likely not overly complex photoshopping. Unless you are applying very strenuous filters to very large files GPU acceleration isnt going to be worth the price of a GPU. I strongly suggest you say to them that they spend the £400 now and if they arent happy in a few years upgrade again. Hell you could probably find that LGA1155 chips then will be stupidly fast for around £100 mark (that the 2100 is in now). Jaybles, i agree that 8GB is overkill but its about £25 more than buying 4GB and to be honest, at that price (about 7% of system cost) you might as well take advantage of it. Like i said, unless you are on a very strict budget you might as well spend the bit extra here now that RAM prices are cheap as Lidl baked beans. Also, if they have the extra money you can work on quietening the system if that is an issue (working with audio, and pleasent noise in general is a bonus). Wont cost much, aftermarket CPU cooler for £30, quiet case fan or 2 and your system will be whisper quiet.
Depends on th software they use to edit the GPU doesn't have alot of input in photoeditting unless your putting up massive res images and event hen you can use fairly low end one memory just get the 8GB you can never have too much ram with photo editting(ok some people here proved that wrong but still thats at like 24gb lol). The cpu if you want to spend the money upgrade them to a i5 2500(I'd assume miss the k series as they won't overclock?) and the cheapest board you can get. if it's photoshop and some heavy editting go i5 and 8gb and if they care about how quiet it is throw in a scythe shiruken rather than stock that can be a bit loud. if it;s like microsoft photoeditor or just light stuff go with the i3 and 8gb and put the extra £300 in a saving account and rebuild in 3 years The convertions will benefit from the extra ram
Hope the OP doesn't mind me butting in with a question, but I'm in a similar situation, and hopefully it'll move the conversation forward. The latest? or previous CPC magazine suggested a fast quad-core Phenom for its £400 "future proof" PC...I was wondering whether that was worth considering over the i3? Just a thought.
Thats 50% of the cost of the RAM though. Now if it were more like a 25% different then I wouldn't be so hesitant.
The i5 has very nice built in graphics, I would say only get a GPU if its really nesessary, and I would probably get 4gb of ram, I think the important thing when defining a computers specificaton is trying to make it upgradable and therefore somewhat futureproof, thats what will save you money in the long run.
I built a PC for my parents in January - cost £430 including the copy of Windows 7. Specs: Intel Core i3 540 1.5TB Ssung HD154UI HDD 450W POWERCOOL MODULAR PSU Asus P7H55-M SI 8GB RAM Coolermaster Elite 342 Icy Box IB-864-B card reader I built it on the basis it would last 4-5 years. Obviously if I was building it today, I'd use Sandy Bridge - I'd probably go with the i3 2100T low power CPU as it's had some good reviews (especially as it's only used for web browsing and Google Earth). There's some core i5 CPUs that also have a lower TDP that eould be more than powerful enough. I'd definitely go with 8GB RAM - I have doubts that 4GB will suffice in 3 years time. GPU - the IGP in the processor should suffice. the i540 is more than good enough for light photo editing & 1080p video decoding.
I'm looking to build a similar system, web browsing, photoshop, flash, web design. I have never played any games on a computer, apart from what comes with windows. The question I was wondering is: up to what point can you use the on board graphics? and at what point do you need a separate graphics card for stuff? Thanks. Extra question: if I am not planning to OC do I need an extra cooler or would the stock item supplied with the cpu do?
The i3 2100 would be what I would go for too. 4GB RAM is plenty for the tasks you mentioned and should continue to be for some time. The i3 should fly through the audio encoding and can even compete with the Phenom II 955 in all but the most heavily multi-threaded applications. Also, it will run cooler and is more efficient, saving on the bills which should swing your old man round to your way of thinking! I don't think you should skimp on the case. IMO the Fractal Design R3 would appeal to the more 'mature' audience with it's minimalist, profressional looks. They would also likely enjoy the noise dampening characteristics. All in all this is what I would be going for (all prices from Scan.co.uk) Intel i3 2100 £90 Asus P8H67-M-LE £77 4GB Corsair XMS3 Classic DDR3 1600 MHz 1.50v £30 Corsair CX430v2 £35 1TB Samsung Spinpoint F3 £39 Fractal Design Define R3 £79 (black, but also available in white or titanium grey) Samung DVDRW Dual Layer SATA II £15 Total: £365 Factor in a couple of extra fans etc. that you may wish to add and you can have a very very nice build for about £400. Onboard graphics will do you fine for web browsing and even playing some basic games. Again, not having a dedicated card will keep the energy footprint down again. To camelCase, with the performance of modern on board graphics solutions you only really need a dedicated graphics card for gaming or other GPU demanding tasks such as maybe 3D work, high end video editing etc. For the vast majority of average PC users, an onboard solution would be more than adequate. Modern IGPs can easily output video in full 1080p and will even play some games albeit at very low settings. In particular, with the advent of AMD's APUs, there aren't an awful lot of reasons to opt for a low end dedicated GPU over an onboard solution. Really, the only situation where a dedicated card may be required over onboard is where a multi-monitor setup is being used. I've even heard that Photoshop benefits more from having for CPU grunt and more RAM than it does from having a dedicated GPU. Hope this helps!
I've found that while they might not understand what makes things fast or not, even my parents think waiting for anything to load is too slow, and they get a bit confused is they click on something and nothing seems to be happening (even if only for 1/2 sec). So if an ssd makes things more responsive (I've not had the chance to try one out myself yet, but from what I've read here and elsewhere they help a lot) then it could be worth it.
I built this for my mum at Christamas 2010. (Copied and pasted from an Excel sheet). Coolermaster Elite 330 Case With Coolermaster eXtreme Power 500W PSU £59.99 Ebuyer 220863 Asrock N68C-S UCC GeForce 7025 Socket AM2+ VGA Out 6 Channel Audio MATX Motherboard £31.10 Ebuyer 221178 Samsung HD103SJ Spinpoint F3 1TB Hard Drive SATAII 7200rpm 32MB Cache £39.59 Ebuyer 173804 LiteOn IHAS124-19 24x DVD±RW DL & RAM SATA Optical Drive - OEM Black with Nero Essentials £11.98 Ebuyer 126226 Windows 7 £105.74 Scan LN28324 4GB (2x2GB) Corsair XMS3 Classic, DDR3 PC3-10666 (1333) Non-ECC Unbuffered, CAS 9-9-9-24, 1.50V £54.17 Scan LN27738 AMD Athlon II X3 445, Rana, Triple Core, S AM3, 3.1GHz, 1.5MB Total Cache, HT 2000MHz, 95W, Retail £54.57 Scan LN33527 Firewire Card £7.00 Ebuyer 78455 £364.14 Those prices were at Xmas 2010. Mum uses it for the same as your build and for encoding from old video cassettes. The mobo unlocked the fourth core on the cpu. I would only change the RAM, I would add more at current prices as it is literally half the price, but you would need 2x$GB on that board. If I had more money I would use an SSD as boot drive.
