Need help buying a comp 700-800 budget

[Jpeg[LOD]]

ello i am planning on buying a new pc , i dont have the technical knowledge to build one myself and the only guy i know who can make em doesnt build em no more. and tbh last one he made for me was great but once he got his money if i had any problems he didnt help.

anyways i have a budget of 700-800 BRITISH pounds. and tbh i dont want to get ripped off or buy potential junk from tiny.com or ebay .

so does anybody know of any really good computer shops online (or ebay) where sum1 is selling a really good comp for roughly above price ? i have seen a cple i like on ebay but cos of my lack of tech inteligence . i aint sure wether to bid or not and i cant afford to waste such a large amount f money.

thnx in advance for all replys etc ./ will post links to ones i have found so feedback on them and wether they area bargain or not would be much welcome

here the ones i found that seem ok to me

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=52475&item=5146675728&rd=1&ssPageName=WDVW (i think but not sure . but i dont think its got a OS with it.)



http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=52475&item=5146721755&rd=1


http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=52475&item=5147393397&rd=1

 

[Carrera]

Build one yourself imo. When i built my computer I didn;t really have any idea on what to do, but there are plenty of guides on the internet. Make sure you do some research on what components to go for aswell. Try www.overclockers.co.uk. Good service and they have very active forums for asking any questions / queries you might have.

 

[Boomeruk]

aye, build it yourself

go to a carboot and buy a p100 for like, £10 and practice with it, essentially its all the same, everyone who builds pcs for themselves / other people learnt by doing it them selves at one point...

its easier than a jigsaw rly, firstly, the motherboard book will have a detailed diagram of where everything goes, all the inner cables are designed to only be plugged in a certain way, its really a lot easier than you think.

its a matter of buying decent, branded bits, and throwing it all together, DDR ram only has 1 notch in it, and all you need to do is look at the motherboard, and you'll know where it goes and it can only be clicked in 1 way, you cant do it wrong.... same goes for ide / sata cables, power cables for each device, infact, i bet you could do it without practising on a old p100 lol, my little sister is 15, i showed her how to change build a pc last year, she now builds and upgrades them for her mates families.... a monkey could probably do it.

and dont worry about breaking things, as long as your carefull its almost impossible to do it wrong or damage stuff in any way, take your time, read the mobo manual, the case diagram, and you're away

hell, if you get stuck, i'll pull apart one of my bot pcs and take you through it on my webcam!

 

[Boomeruk]

forgot to mention...

it will save you a LOT of money in the long run, self build is the way to go with any new pc, buying components is cheap as chips as theres so much competition for you're business.... shop around, you get stuff cheaper from certain places...

also, when you know how to do it, think of how easy it will be if you decide to upgrade? no more ringing mates, dragin ur pc around in the car and having strangers poke around in it, just buy the kit and do it yourself!

think i was 14 when i first upgraded my pc, bought 16mb of edo ram, when it came to installing it, i shit myself, thought i would electricute myself or something rofl, but one upgrade led to another, a few months later i was building them for friends and family.

 

[Fana]

Building pc's is easy and pretty fun Like people say, as long as you take your time and do some research before you buy stuff you wont have any problems.

#Case
#Power supply unit (350w+ for new comps, preferably 400w)
#Motherboard (for amd or pentium)
#Processor (amd or pentium - pentiums are slightly easier to fit on motherboards)
#Ram memory (check if the motherboard you chose has issues with any particular brand of memroy, my latest one did so i had to change ram)
#Harddrive
#Cd or dvd drive (or burner)
#Graphics card (radeon or nvidia both work no matter what you chose for motherboard/processor)
#Fans for the case if there arent any included

Most motherboards today have built in soundcard and network card and they usually work very well.

 

[Jpeg[LOD]]

i aint confident enough tech wise to build one myself... i guess i'll have to go surfing ebay some more

 

[Boomeruk]

i aint confident enough tech wise to build one myself... i guess i'll have to go surfing ebay some more

you don't have to be confident mate.. or technical in the slightest

its like one of those kids puzzles with 4 shapes, a traingle, square, cirle and star shapes... you cannot possibly put the wrong cable into the wrong connector, it's just not possible (well maybe the cp / case fan, but even they are clearly labled on the motherboard, and wont do any dmg if you put them on the wrong one)

i'll try and draw you a pic

 

[Boomeruk]

ok, as you can see from my very technical drawing, (which is also printed on the motherboard manual) its pretty difficult to go wrong

the only technical thing you'de have to worry about is the spec of which stuff to buy to ensure its compatability, but 190291 on FH can list appropriate parts for you here, and u'd just need to buy them

as for tools you'de need? a philips screwdriver and some long nosed pliars come in handy.

I wasent joking when i said a monkey can do this, i bet £100 there is a monkey that can build, or at least assemble a pc somewhere in the world xD

 

[Gotrag]

ok, as you can see from my very technical drawing, (which is also printed on the motherboard manual) its pretty difficult to go wrong

the only technical thing you'de have to worry about is the spec of which stuff to buy to ensure its compatability, but 190291 on FH can list appropriate parts for you here, and u'd just need to buy them

as for tools you'de need? a philips screwdriver and some long nosed pliars come in handy.

I wasent joking when i said a monkey can do this, i bet £100 there is a monkey that can build, or at least assemble a pc somewhere in the world xD

This guy knows what he is talking about.... i'll be over in a week ish and you can fix my pc for me ok bro?

 

[Bahumat]

the building side is a piece of cake

its the software that can cause problems, if all goes to plan your laughing but its when you get a nice

"ERROR jibba jabba laa dee fdaaa windows is being gaybar for fun"

message that causes problems.

also dont bother with ebay it will be hard to tell if the item works

 

[Teslacoil]

if you plan on buying yourself a new comp.

get yourself one with the new graphicscard PCI-Express they so rock!

have atm my own comp i bought ( with a sony 17" tft 16ms ) for 13.000k in swedish crowns ( ~1000 quid ) with PCI express and i'll tell you this i don't experience lag in any game at all ( except in daoc for opentransit....ARGH! )

 

[Jpeg[LOD]]

ok make me a list of EVERYTHING i will need and will be good enough to run WOW and DAOC please prefer its from this shop (cos its local)

budget ideally 700 quid .... might go to 800 if REALLY needed but prefer 700 quid mark so i can have extra for christmas presents for family etc etc

http://www.vfm-computers.co.uk/vfmprice.PDF


thnx in advance

 

[Jpeg[LOD]]

p.s i aint to bothered about scanner/printer cos i can buy one later date. i DONT need a top of range monitor either cheapo one would be fine

pps would also like a DVD re-writer ( i download a lot of movies/music)

 

[Jpeg[LOD]]

also bear in mind when u try figure it oput has to include cables/keyboard/mouse etc etc
thnx in advance

phoned the shop from website they charge 30 pound on top of all the bits for building it. and give 12 month returns/repairs thing on cpu and 3yr on monitor .

 

[oblimov]

couldnt see the pdf u put but heres basically what you want

Aim for a Motherboard that supports the following
DDR 400
RAID
AGP x8
Built In Ethernet
USB 2.0 (Preferably x6 slots)

Then get a decent PSU around 500W

Memory-wise you should aim for at least a GB, if you can get a 1 stick GB DDR400 as this will leave you at least one spare slot for cheaper upgrades in the future

Hard Drive
Straight Forward this just buy something between 120-200GB SATA (Actually if like me you dload constantly each day then go for 2 x 200GB drives)

GFX
This is where a good chunk of your cash should go really if you want it to perform
Ideally put aside about 200 quid for this and that way u can get one of the newer directx9 cards, the Geforce 6800 s a good sound bet for decent gfx.

CPU
Aim for Athlon as it saves you money and the difference is non-existent really tbh, buy the fastest chip you can afford as it will last longer


CD Drives
Pioneer make some of the best budget dvd burners that you can get, buy one of em and remember you dont need to get a CD burner now as your dvd burner will do cds also so just buuy a standard cd drive for #2 (Also get dual layer to improve the lifespan of your dvd drive)

Monitor
You can pick up 17" monitors now for about £100

Sound Card
Just get whatever you can afford at this time, im not one of these people who belives this makes much difference, sound blasters are nice and the OEM ones are cheap


Think thats about it, just make sure that your case fits your board, most boards are ATX and most cases support this so you should be fine

Also try and plan ahead with the cables and buy tie backs so you keep things nice and tidy inside the case, this just makes it easier

from lookin at my local cheap pc dude http://www.pless.co.uk which im guessin is roughly as cheap as yours i was able to make a

Athlon 3000xp
1GB memory
400GB HD
NDIVIA 8600
17" Monitor
DVD Burner
CD Drive
and SB


FOr about 800 quid

 

[Jpeg[LOD]]

couldnt see the pdf u put but heres basically what you want

if u cant see the pdf here is the original site so u can click the link to it from there

http://www.vfm-computers.co.uk/

 

[oblimov]

cpu Athlon 2800 £85
Heatsink+Fan SPEEZE £10
mobo Asus A7N8X-X £49
gfx 128MB GEFORCE 6800 £220
hard drive 200GB £85
memory 1gb DD400 (1 stick) £133
monitor 17" digital monitor £75
case blue ARX 400W £32
sound Creative SBLIVE £18
misc (mice+keyboard+speakers etc) £30
Cd Drive 56x £10
Dvd Drive 16x Pioneer £69
Build Fee £30

£846

This is slightly over but its actually a nice peice of kit to start with and with the gfx card will run decent games for a good few years

 

[Jpeg[LOD]]

cpu Athlon 2800 £85
Heatsink+Fan SPEEZE £10
mobo Asus A7N8X-X £49
gfx 128MB GEFORCE 6800 £220
hard drive 200GB £85
memory 1gb DD400 (1 stick) £133
monitor 17" digital monitor £75
case blue ARX 400W £32
sound Creative SBLIVE £18
misc (mice+keyboard+speakers etc) £30
Cd Drive 56x £10
Dvd Drive 16x Pioneer £69
Build Fee £30

£846

This is slightly over but its actually a nice peice of kit to start with and with the gfx card will run decent games for a good few years

aye will be a bit to exspensive for me . also your list didnt include Operating system.. i use Win98 SE atm and i would like new comp to have WIN XP

thnx for trying tho

p.s i'll hve to get me calculator out and do some math to find out exactly what i can afford

 

[Boomeruk]

sod the monitor, i'll sell you a dell 17" (flat screen, not tft) digital monitor for £20 if you can collect, its a bit yellow (i smoke alot) but can be cleaned up nicley and works a treat

or you can have any one of my aoc 17" bevled monitors for free, think i got like, 7 lying around the house lol

for parts, id go:

asus nf7 mobo
xp 3200 barton core (nice and cheap, dont need 64's yet)
1gb crossair ddr 400 ram
200gb segate barracuda hd
decent case, one on the cheaper end of thermaltakes list
grx can be anything, hell, im using a ti4200 and it still runs nf, toa, d3, hl2 at decent resolutions with most settings up, invest about £120-£150 in this and upgrade it when you can afford to, £150 will still buy a very very nice card
logitech mouse/kb
creative speakers
400w psu

comes in around £600-650 mark i rekon inc delivery..

 

[oblimov]

just get a copy of operating systems from someone, you must know one person with this lol

 

[Sycho]

From www.overclockers.co.uk

Shame i couldn't quite get the 6600GT in this set up since you will want a socket 939 board for future upgrading:


DESCRIPTION QUANTITY PRICE COST REMOVE
AMD Athlon 64 3000+ Winchester 90nm (Socket 939) - Retail (CP-096-AM) (CP-096-AM)
£99.95 £99.95
GeIL 1GB (2x512MB) PC3200 Value Dual Channel Kit CAS2.5 (GE1GB3200BHDC) (MY-005-GL)
£87.50 £87.50
Creative Sound Blaster Audigy 2 ZS 7.1 THX Sound Card - OEM (SC-023-CL)
£44.90 £44.90
IIyama Vision Master 1403 17" CRT Monitor Grey (MO-019-IY)
£74.50 £74.50
Logitech Media Keyboard - Retail (KB-036-LG)
£13.50 £13.50
Logitech MX310 Optical Mouse - Retail (KB-023-LG)
£20.80 £20.80
Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition - OEM (OS-001-MS)
£48.95 £48.95
Western Digital Caviar Special Edition 120GB 1200JD SATA 8MB Cache - OEM (HD-009-WD)
£46.95 £46.95
Creative 5.1 SBS 560 Speakers - Retail (SP-042-CL)
£35.20 £35.20
OcUK ATI Radeon 9700 Pro 128MB DDR TV-Out/DVI (AGP) - OEM (GX-010-AT)
£79.95 £79.95
Abit AV8 (Socket 939) Motherboard (MB-052-AB)
£65.95 £65.95
Antec Plus 1080AMG Metallic Gray File Server Case - 430W TruePower PSU (CA-001-AT)
£76.81 £76.81
Subtotal £694.96
VAT £121.62
Total £816.58

PC doesn't seem that hard to build, i never have built one yet but judging by just actually looking inside at the connections they aren't as hard as you think since there isn't many actually, if someone can fit a 6600GT and find a better case+psu on above price list then go for it, but radeon 9700 pro still a nice card!

 

[Sycho]

Or this, which is even better, changed the board to a Neo 2 Platinum that has onboard 7.1 sound and a 6600GT in this which is the best valued card out at the moment and very good at playing games:

DESCRIPTION QUANTITY PRICE COST REMOVE
AMD Athlon 64 3000+ Winchester 90nm (Socket 939) - Retail (CP-096-AM) (CP-096-AM)
£99.95 £99.95
GeIL 1GB (2x512MB) PC3200 Value Dual Channel Kit CAS2.5 (GE1GB3200BHDC) (MY-005-GL)
£87.50 £87.50
IIyama Vision Master 1403 17" CRT Monitor Grey (MO-019-IY)
£74.50 £74.50
Logitech Media Keyboard - Retail (KB-036-LG)
£13.50 £13.50
Logitech MX310 Optical Mouse - Retail (KB-023-LG)
£20.80 £20.80
Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition - OEM (OS-001-MS)
£48.95 £48.95
Western Digital Caviar Special Edition 120GB 1200JD SATA 8MB Cache - OEM (HD-009-WD)
£46.95 £46.95
Creative 5.1 SBS 560 Speakers - Retail (SP-042-CL)
£35.20 £35.20
OcUK GeForce 6600 GT 128MB DDR3 TV-Out/DVI (AGP) - Retail (GX-005-C3)
£124.95 £124.95
MSI K8N Neo2 Platinum (Socket 939) Motherboard (MB-027-MS)
£76.95 £76.95
Antec Sonata Piano Black Quiet Case - 380W TruePower Silent PSU (CA-003-AT)
£72.50 £72.50
Subtotal £701.75
VAT £122.81
Total £824.56

The only problem is i am not sure how many fans that case comes with.(just realised i forgot dvd drive which is around £20 or so, so add that onto it)

 

[Xeanor]

AMD Athlon 64 3000+ Winchester 90nm (Socket 939) - Retail
£99.95
MSI K8N Neo2 Platinum (Socket 939) Motherboard
£76.95
GeIL 1GB (2x512MB) PC3200 Value Dual Channel Kit CAS2.5
£87.50
Leadtek WinFast A400LE-TDH GeForce 6800 LE 128MB DDR TV-Out/DVI (AGP) - Retail
£157.50
NEC ND3500 16x DVD±RW Dual Layer ReWriter (Black) - OEM
£38.70
Logitech MX310 Optical Mouse - Retail
£20.80
Logitech Internet Keyboard (Black) - OEM
£6.40
Seagate Barracuda 7200.7 NCQ 120GB SATA 8MB Cache - OEM
£51.95
Antec Plus 1080AMG Metallic Gray File Server Case - 430W TruePower PSU
£76.81
IIyama Vision Master 1403 17" CRT Monitor Grey
£74.50
Creative Inspire 5.1 P580 Speakers - Retail
£36.00

Subtotal £727.06
VAT £127.24
Total £854.30

 

[Elvodus]

Operating system....i use Win98 SE....

You swede Jpeg?

 

[Jpeg[LOD]]

You swede Jpeg?

no win98 SE (SE) stands for second edition

im WELSH .

p.s no sheep jokes ive heard em all

 

[Keres]

Sheep walks into a baa....

<gets his coat>

 

[Vireb]

tbh wouldnt buy a pc of ebay , will be cheapest crappest motherboards going and pc is built just to look good and sell for max profit , so not necesarily going to be a great performer, and yes just build oner yourself its like a kids play box , you just put triangles in triangle slot, circles in circle slot etc, its very simple and you cant put anything in wrong place, , and for £700 - £800 you could build v v nice pc especially if you dont need moniter etc

 

[Vireb]

AMD Athlon 64 3500 Retail / Asus A8V Deluxe / 1GB Corsair PC3200 XLPT Dual Channel Kit - Bundle (BU-015-OK) 1
Corsair 1GB DDR XMS3200XL Platinum TwinX (2x512MB) CAS2 (MY-049-CS) 1
Asus A8V Deluxe (Socket 939) Wireless Edition Motherboard (MB-063-AS) 1
AMD Athlon 64 3500 (Socket 939) - Retail (CP-086-AM) £377.85

OcUK GeForce 6600 GT 128MB DDR3 TV-Out/DVI (AGP) - Retail (GX-005-C3) £ 129.95

Antec SLK1650 Beige Quiet Mini Tower Case - 350W SmartPower PSU (CA-024-AN) £39.71

Western Digital Caviar Special Edition 120GB 1200JD SATA 8MB Cache - OEM (HD-009-WD) £46.95

IIyama Vision Master 1403 17" CRT Monitor Grey (MO-019-IY) £74.50

Creative Desktop 6000 - Retail (KB-003-CL) £22.40

LG GDR-8163BB 16x DVD-Drive - OEM (CD-015-LG) £13.20
Subtotal £704.56
Shipping (Amtrak Next Day (Mon-Fri) - UK Mainland) £20.25
VAT £126.85
Total £851.66

a little over budget no speakers and no os, but tbh both can be obtained easy enough but tbh that will be one sick system the a64 3500 bundle is huge value for money ram is excellent with low latency will be incredibly fast. but something like that is what i would do now, or maybe wait until new nforce 4 boards ship early january and get a pci express system

 

[Carrera]

I'm still sceptical about cases that come with PSU's.. better to get them seperately for gaming machines imo. Also as others have said surely you can get a copy of XP from someone you know? Would be a shame to waste some of your budget like that.

 

[Vireb]

I'm still sceptical about cases that come with PSU's.. better to get them seperately for gaming machines imo. Also as others have said surely you can get a copy of XP from someone you know? Would be a shame to waste some of your budget like that.

Antec psus are well known for being very good quality