imported_blind boy grunt
12-02-2004, 05:52 PM
I'm sure there's a lot of people out there who have considered building their own PC. Dell might be cheap, but could you do it yourself for less? Especially if you have a monitor and a few other bits and pieces lying around you could re-use.
After toying with the idea for a while I decided to go for it ...
One deciding factor was a site a friend recommended - www.komplett.ieThey're actually a Norwegian company with an Irish site and address, and most importantly they sell PC components and Peripherals really cheaply. So I put the order through for the following bits and pieces (prices include VAT):
Spire CPU-Fan WhisperRock IV Socket A (EUR11)
AMD Athlon XP2500+ 1.833 GHz OEM (EUR86)
Asus A7N8X-X mainboard for Socket A (EUR81)
DDR-DIMM PC3200 512MB DDR CL2.5 (EUR90)
Maxtor DiamondMax Plus 9 120GB 8MB(EUR96)
NET Modem 56k V90/92 Internal PCI UK(EUR14)
Sapphire Radeon 7000 64MB DDR(EUR38)
I didn't order a case or power supply as I was getting the order delivered to work and they might be a little bulky for reception (no point in pushing things!), so I popped into town and got a case and power supply in Peats (www.peats.ie). They were selling a Kotech midi-tower case with 2 case fans and a 400W power supply for EUR99 euros so that did the trick. As an added bonus the case had a tinted perspex side window.
I already had a 19" Monitor and brand new CD-R/RW so I used those again. For pricing purposes I suppose they would cost about EUR335 between them.
I'd definitely recommend all the parts I bought. The spire heatsink is particularily well made (and UV reactive if you're interested). The motherboard is very well layed out and the hard-drive is excellent and very quiet (I can't hear it over the noisy PSU fan). If you're buying stuff from Komplett tho, expect their no-frills approach to mean exactly that. If its not retail boxed, its got the bare minimum - no instructions or accessories. The memory arrived in a padded envelope, and the hard-drive was in an anti-static bag (not so much as a cable or a screw included). Thankfully the motherboard was supplied with instructions (and hard-drive and floppy cables). Also the whole order was well neatly packed into one box.
I paid extra for DHL overnight delivery, which is generally a good idea I think, if you're spending that much theres no point in going for a cheap delivery option. This was EUR20. I ordered at 11.45 am Thursday and received the order 8.40 am Friday, which was impressive as they actually ship the parts from Amsterdam.
The case from Peats was excellent. It was better constructed than I expected given the price, no sharp edges or flimsy contruction. I hadn't planned on doing anything to improve the appearance of the PC but since I had the side window I decided to slap in a Ultra-Voilet Cold Cathode light and UV-reactive rear case fan and Hard-drive cable. Pointless really - but it kept me out of the pub on a rainy Saturday. (Cold Cathode EUR15, Fan EUR15, Cable EUR11).
One thing to point out tho, is that building your own PC is not for everyone. If you're a bit of a PC hobbiest and are prepared to invest a little time and effort on the web doing some research, go for it, but if not bear in mind that things can go wrong or need a bit of tweaking to work together properly. An good example is that when I put everything together I noticed the processor was running at 1.1 Ghz - not 1.8 Ghz as it should be. A careful reading of the motherboard manual and some double checking via Google fixed this. This involved changing the External CPU Frequency in the bios, from 133Mhz to 166Mhz. Not brain surgery - but probably more techie hassle than a lot of PC users would be happy with.
Another thing is the lack of software. I already had a copy of Windows 2000 which I used but if you don't Windows XP will set you back at least EUR100. You'll also miss the inevitable copy of Word/Works you always seem to get with a new PC. However Microsoft Office is generally more than you need and most people will be happy with a package like OpenOffice (free to download from www.openoffice.org) which handles most major file formats and can save files as PDF's. If you don't like Outlook express for your email try Thunderbird (free to download from www.mozilla.org).
So there you have it, a reasonably well-speced PC for about EUR500. And loads of DIY satisfaction for good measure.
After toying with the idea for a while I decided to go for it ...
One deciding factor was a site a friend recommended - www.komplett.ieThey're actually a Norwegian company with an Irish site and address, and most importantly they sell PC components and Peripherals really cheaply. So I put the order through for the following bits and pieces (prices include VAT):
Spire CPU-Fan WhisperRock IV Socket A (EUR11)
AMD Athlon XP2500+ 1.833 GHz OEM (EUR86)
Asus A7N8X-X mainboard for Socket A (EUR81)
DDR-DIMM PC3200 512MB DDR CL2.5 (EUR90)
Maxtor DiamondMax Plus 9 120GB 8MB(EUR96)
NET Modem 56k V90/92 Internal PCI UK(EUR14)
Sapphire Radeon 7000 64MB DDR(EUR38)
I didn't order a case or power supply as I was getting the order delivered to work and they might be a little bulky for reception (no point in pushing things!), so I popped into town and got a case and power supply in Peats (www.peats.ie). They were selling a Kotech midi-tower case with 2 case fans and a 400W power supply for EUR99 euros so that did the trick. As an added bonus the case had a tinted perspex side window.
I already had a 19" Monitor and brand new CD-R/RW so I used those again. For pricing purposes I suppose they would cost about EUR335 between them.
I'd definitely recommend all the parts I bought. The spire heatsink is particularily well made (and UV reactive if you're interested). The motherboard is very well layed out and the hard-drive is excellent and very quiet (I can't hear it over the noisy PSU fan). If you're buying stuff from Komplett tho, expect their no-frills approach to mean exactly that. If its not retail boxed, its got the bare minimum - no instructions or accessories. The memory arrived in a padded envelope, and the hard-drive was in an anti-static bag (not so much as a cable or a screw included). Thankfully the motherboard was supplied with instructions (and hard-drive and floppy cables). Also the whole order was well neatly packed into one box.
I paid extra for DHL overnight delivery, which is generally a good idea I think, if you're spending that much theres no point in going for a cheap delivery option. This was EUR20. I ordered at 11.45 am Thursday and received the order 8.40 am Friday, which was impressive as they actually ship the parts from Amsterdam.
The case from Peats was excellent. It was better constructed than I expected given the price, no sharp edges or flimsy contruction. I hadn't planned on doing anything to improve the appearance of the PC but since I had the side window I decided to slap in a Ultra-Voilet Cold Cathode light and UV-reactive rear case fan and Hard-drive cable. Pointless really - but it kept me out of the pub on a rainy Saturday. (Cold Cathode EUR15, Fan EUR15, Cable EUR11).
One thing to point out tho, is that building your own PC is not for everyone. If you're a bit of a PC hobbiest and are prepared to invest a little time and effort on the web doing some research, go for it, but if not bear in mind that things can go wrong or need a bit of tweaking to work together properly. An good example is that when I put everything together I noticed the processor was running at 1.1 Ghz - not 1.8 Ghz as it should be. A careful reading of the motherboard manual and some double checking via Google fixed this. This involved changing the External CPU Frequency in the bios, from 133Mhz to 166Mhz. Not brain surgery - but probably more techie hassle than a lot of PC users would be happy with.
Another thing is the lack of software. I already had a copy of Windows 2000 which I used but if you don't Windows XP will set you back at least EUR100. You'll also miss the inevitable copy of Word/Works you always seem to get with a new PC. However Microsoft Office is generally more than you need and most people will be happy with a package like OpenOffice (free to download from www.openoffice.org) which handles most major file formats and can save files as PDF's. If you don't like Outlook express for your email try Thunderbird (free to download from www.mozilla.org).
So there you have it, a reasonably well-speced PC for about EUR500. And loads of DIY satisfaction for good measure.