First Build - About to Order

[mrhowdeedoo]

Hey Guys,

This is my first build, and it's not for me. One of my friends' computer died, recently, and he'd like me to build a new one. Only the tower is gone, so I don't need to buy any monitor, speakers, etc. I just need the tower. I'd like it to be under 1000, and it doesn't need to be that great.

Here's the parts:

Case:http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16856101002

CPU: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819103622

HDD: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822148103

RAM: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820142007

Pri Optical: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16827131031

FDD: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16821152005

Modem: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16825164001

OS: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16832116056

Extras: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820609192

Is it a good choice to buy a small form factor pc? Or are they not quite reliable yet?

Thanks for the help.
mrhowdeedoo

[freakitchen]

Good start there, but I'd question the use of a small form factor unless your friend specifically has need for one. Shuttle units are top quality, but the nature of size means that cooling isn't very efficient, and the small power supply prevents the use of power-hungry components. For instance, the motherboard in the shuttle has a PCI-Express 16x slot for a dedicated video card, but there are very few that can be powered by 250w.

If your friend doesn't want to play games with this computer, you can stick with a motherboard with onboard video, but I'd get this board:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813131570

...and put it in this case...

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811129012 (still only a mid-tower, so by no means huge)

I'd avoid Viking RAM, and get two sticks of 512MB to utilise Dual Channel operation. Corsair Value Select will do the trick.

I'd also get a Lite-on Burner instead of a Sony (Sony's are re-badged Lite-ons with poorer software).

Go for a SATA Hard drive - IDE is old tech now. Preferably a Seagate 7200.10. Check the storage vs. price carefully - in some cases more storage can be had for not much more cash. 250GB is in the 'sweet spot' right now.

FK

[mrhowdeedoo]

Alright. Here's the updated list:

ASUS A8N-VM CSM Socket 939 NVIDIA GeForce 6150 Micro ATX AMD Motherboard
$77

Antec NSK 4400 Black/Silver 0.8mm cold-rolled steel construction ATX Mini Tower Computer Case 380W Power Supply
$70

LITE-ON 16X DVD±R DVD Burner W/LightScribe and 5X DVD-RAM Write Black ATAPI/E-IDE Model SHM-165H6S
$34

CORSAIR ValueSelect 1GB (2 x 512MB) 184-Pin DDR SDRAM DDR 400 (PC 3200) Dual Channel Kit System Memory Model VS1GBKIT400
$115

Thermaltake CL-P0200 Silent 939 K8 - AMD K8 solution w/ Heatpipe Cooling Tech
$30

NEC Black 1.44MB 3.5" Internal Floppy Drive
$6

Seagate Barracuda 7200.9 ST3808110AS 80GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
$50

Rosewill RC-403 56Kbps PCI Bus (Plug and Play) Conexant Modem
$7

Microsoft Windows XP Home With SP2B 1 Pack - OEM
$89

Antec SmartPower 2.0 SP-500 ATX12V 500W Power Supply
$65

SUPER TALENT 1GB Flash Drive (USB2.0 Portable) Model USB ALUMI-1GB-DH-S
$18

There you go. I added a bigger power supply, is that needed if I'm going with intregrated graphics/sound?

Thanks,
mrhowdeedoo

[newbuilder14]

Looks good, you can drop the heatsink fan if you buy a retail processor, they come with one which happens to be fairly decent.

[Alaron]

You don't need the larger power supply for that build. The 380w will be plenty. If you plan to add to the system later to make it a gamer though, you might want to get the larger one now so you'll be prepared.

I agree that the cooling unit isn't needed.