Another Ars Ultimate Budget Box 321
Some nice Friday afternoon reading for you; Ars Technica has another go at the Ultimate Budget Box, a cheap no-frills PC for minimum cash output. From the article: "Look around inside most corporate offices, where most computers need to handle a few Office documents and light Internet use. They don't need to be able to burn CDs or handle 3D-intensive games, but they do need to be reliable and affordable. Lots of consumers out there probably want a similar box--an appliance that lets them get onto the Internet, take care of e-mail, and create a few documents. For them, being able to burn a CD-RW would probably be nice, but anything beyond that is an extra. Low-cost, reliability, and quality are key. That is what the Ultimate Budget Box is about: not skimping on components, but not loading it up with features either." The final price? US$525.46
final specs (Score:4, Informative)
80 gig SATA HD
DVD+-RW
520 megs DDR
Sempron 2800
Onboard GeForce 6100
15" LCD
+case+speakers+keyboard+mouse
Comment removed (Score:4, Informative)
Sempron + MB w/ Video -- Drives Too... (Score:3, Informative)
The Deskstar 80 is nice, but 250 Deskstars have been as low as $49 after rebate, and there are currently 200 gig drives that are free after some rebate-price-matching -- See places like Fatwallet.com.
Cough (Score:3, Informative)
2.53Ghz Celeron, 533 FSB
512MB RAM
XP Home
80 GB Drive
CD-RW drive
15" Flat Panel LCD
The price? $399. Why, again, would I pay $525 for this "ultimate" budget box?
dell... (Score:2, Informative)
celeron D 325 / intel extreme graphics 2
however one huge and lame problem would be only 3x PCI slots (no agp or PCI express slot for video upgrades)
but if you didn't need a gaming pc.. this thing is like $437.94 shipped (free shipping right now) when it comes to low end pc's
that said if the computer was for my personal use... i would build it rather than get the dell.
Same specs for cheaper buying a "bundle" (Score:3, Informative)
I recently purchased an HP CTO bundle through CompUSA. After rebates (yeah, I know, rebates suck) it was $300 + $89 (shipping/handling) + tax. The specs are very close to the Ars system (faster CPU, no DVD burner, 40G drive). It would have cost an extra $30-40 to upgrade the optical drive and hard drive, but the ones I got are all I needed for the "appliance" tasks I an using the machine for.
Plus, I didn't have assemble anything (not like that's difficult, though).
Re:You mean the Mac Mini, right? (Score:3, Informative)
Not to nitpick, but XP Home actually isn't included in Ars' price. It's only mentioned after the $525 total. So with XP Home, the total comes to $606. You're right though, it does include the LCD.
Defintely overpriced, I can do better (Score:4, Informative)
I can get a Dell Dimension 3100 through Dell Small Business for $500 (+ $24 shipping) with the following:
Processor: P4 Processor 521 w/HT Technology (2.8GHz,800FSB)
OS: Genuine Windows® XP Home Edition
Memory: 512MB DDR2 SDRAM at 400MHz -1 DIMM
Dell Service & Support Plans: 90 Day On-site Economy Plan
Keyboard: Dell USB Keyboard
Mouse: Dell® 2-button USB mouse
Hard Drive: 80GB Serial ATA Hard Drive (7200RPM)
Single Drive: 16X CD/DVD burner (DVD+/-RW) w/double layer write capability
Monitor: 17 inch E176FP Analog Flat Panel
Video Card: Intel® Graphics Media Accelerator 900
Sound: Integrated 2.0 Channel High Definition Audio
Network Interface: Integrated 10/100 Ethernet
-Nick
Gaming PC for about this much (Score:3, Informative)
The low-end graphics cards at my local store, Central Computer, have 256MB of video RAM and very capable cores, and now cost well under $80. Here's an OEM Radeon 9250 for $70
http://centralcomputer.com/itemdetail.asp?item=VG
Games need decent video cards, but do not need much else. I'm running an old AMD Athlon XP 2500 and it doesn't break a sweat on BF2. The closest I can find to this dinosaur, the Sempron 2600, is $72 retail from NewEgg.
--Pat