Building computers for my friends. need advice.

M

Max-Powers

Gawd
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Jan 9, 2005
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Whenever I look at upgrading my computer, I always look for the best of the best. I have a couple friends that want me to build them a computer. An inexpensive non gaming computer, but still decent. (internet, movies, music, pictures, work,.. porn...) What are some parts you recommend? I have never researched lower end hardware and don’t know where to start. What mobo would you recommend? Would be easiest for it to have onboard sound and lan. What CPU would be cheap but still handle whatever they may decide to do? Would want to go with AMD but not a 64. I would love any advice you could give me. This will be the first time building computers for other people. How much is a good price to charge to put it together?
Is shuttle good? I know they will think its so cool. is installing parts easy for them? they seem to come with everything. onboard video, sound, and lan.


Found out my 64 3000 was bad after I ordered another one and tested it out on my new computer. So I RMAed the bad one so now I just have one laying around. What should I do with it. (939)
 
Well if your friends don't wanna spend too much, but still have a decent system I'd probably start off with a Moblie AthlonXP 2500 ~$90, comboed with an Asus A7N8X ~ $70-90 (depending on specific model) motherboard, and of course 512 megs-o-ram. This setup will allow them to overclock if they decide to do so. As far as video cards go thats probably gonna have to be more taylored to the individual. I think the gefore 6600GT cards are a pretty good deal, $150-200ish depending. But if they aren't that big of a gamer you could go pretty cheap, hell I'm still using my ATI 8500le (don't worry my geforce 6800 is on its way:) and that card runs HL2 decently. Hard drive size, dvd burners, cd burners again all depend on the indivual and what they want. IF they don't have a monitor and windows XP, I'd tell them to seriously just look at Dell. That way they can call them if/when they have problems and not you.
 
GooG said:
for everday use intel > amd i think..
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That was the case in the past but not anymore imo. Now more than ever with AMD being so affordable and if you care to game at all AMD is the better choice. Just my opinion thrown in there
 
I will never build or recommend an AthlonXP again. Go for a Venice 3000+ and the Chaintech board if you need as cheap as possible.
 
Although i have an AMD64, in this case i would recommend a p4 with hyperthreading as it will suit their needs. I think they would appreciate HT as opposed to a regular AMD XP series...
 
my friends are computer illiterate, so them overclocking is impossible. they will look at my dual moniters and ask why I have 2 computers. my first sergeant inspected my room, saw 1 computer and an empty case and said "I see you have two CPUs"
I dont want to recomend a dell, because I want to make some money and get experiance. How much is a good price to charge to put together a computer?
 
dandragonrage said:
I will never build or recommend an AthlonXP again
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Why not?

For Internet, music, videos and porn... a 600Mhz celery stick with 512mb of ram would do them fine.
 
Max-Powers said:
I dont want to recomend a dell, because I want to make some money and get experiance. How much is a good price to charge to put together a computer?
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If they are money-illiterate, you can charge them as much as you could stand to sleep at night knowing about.

Seriously, dell now has the 300-something $ computer now, monitor included... I usually do stuff for free for people, but its all up to you.
 
If they are true friends you would do this for free.....You'll at some point in life realize that doing things for the people that you care about/hang out with for free, will get you farther with them, and when you need some help with something they wont think twice about helpin you out.
 
To get an idea of components for systems at multiple price points, you could look at guides from the like of ArsTechnica and Anandtech among others. In regard to pricing your service, you aren't going to be able to compete with Dell on assembly or single point of contact warranty (and don't scrimp with cheap PSUs or pirated software to achieve their pricing levels), so charge an hourly rate for assembly and try to sell yourself on flexibility and quality. I don't know how you would want to work with warranty, whether the onus is on the customer (who don't sound like they could deal with individual component warranty), or whether you'd take the risk and charge a little extra on the initial purchase in case the situation crops up, or just charge for your time if a problem does occur (which probably isn't the best for customer relations).
 
bhouse said:
If they are true friends you would do this for free.....You'll at some point in life realize that doing things for the people that you care about/hang out with for free, will get you farther with them, and when you need some help with something they wont think twice about helpin you out.
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Very good point by bhouse, and what you have to remember, if you charge anything, and something goes wrong, either next week or next year, you are the one they will call and bother to fix it. Plus it's not cool to try and make a quick buck off of your friend, aquaintances sure, but friends no. Chances are friends will throw in a six pack, or buy you dinner just for doing it for free.
 
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