Suggestions for cheap build ~$300

[Knuit]

Hey all, I'll be pricing out a cheap build for one of my little sister's friends this weekend and was curious if anyone had any suggestions as I haven't shopped the low end for a while.

1) What will you be doing with this PC?
Basic web browsing, youtube, word processing

2) What's your budget? Are tax and shipping included?
~$300. The cheaper the better. Yes

3) Where do you live?
Michigan, US

4) What exact parts do you need for that budget? CPU, RAM, case, etc. "Everything" is not a valid answer. Please list out all the parts you'll need.
Case/PSU
RAM
CPU
MOBO
HDD
DVD drive
Integrated video should be good enough.

5) If reusing any parts, what parts will you be reusing? Please be especially specific about the power supply. List make and model.
I have an old CRT they'll be getting and they already have a keyboard/mouse

6) Will you be overclocking?
Nope

7) What size monitor do you have and/or plan to have?
N/A

8) When do you plan on building/buying the PC?
Within the next 1-1.5 months

9) What features do you need in a motherboard? RAID? Firewire? Crossfire or SLI support? USB 3.0? SATA 6Gb/s? etc.
Nothing in particular.

10) Do you already have a legit and reusable/transferable OS key/license? If yes, what OS? 32bit or 64bit?
Will probably just slap an old XP 32bit I have on it.

 

[E4g1e]

In this case, a pre-built or a netbook would be a better choice. This is because a minimally acceptable PSU by itself (to handle anything modern) would cost $60 or more by itself. This would leave no more than $240 for the rest of the build. And given the cost of a decent CPU/motherboard combo being about $140, that leaves only $100 for the case, RAM, HDD and DVD drive combined. And I would not trust Windows XP 32-bit these days on modern systems not only because they cannot use more than about 3GB of RAM, but because even Service Pack 2 is now no longer supported by Microsoft (besides what had already been archived). This means that if you continue to use XP, you will have to update to the still-buggy Service Pack 3 in order to receive any further security hotfixes at all. And if that old copy of Windows XP is still of the original 2002 release (pre-Service Pack 1), you cannot format more than the first 137GB of your system's hard drive on Setup. As such, within the $100 to $120 budget on the case, RAM, HDD and DVD combined, there is no room at all whatsoever for more than 1GB of single-channel RAM (after accounting for the case, HDD and DVD), which would not cut it at all for any modern, up-to-date program.

In other words, $300 is barely enough for a really shitty PC unless you're going for a pre-built, nettop or netbook. You'll have to up your budget to more than $400 for us to configure even a minimally acceptable custom (BYOPC) build.

 

[Dangman]

Considering that you're not planning on building/buying this PC until a month to 1.5 months from now, I recommend coming back when you're only two weeks away from building/buying this PC. Whatever parts we recommend now may not be the same parts we recommend in a month to 1.5 months from now to due to parts becoming outdated, outperformed, or out of stock.

EDIT: I do have to disagree with E4g1e's statement somewhat:
$115 - AMD Athlon II X2 260 CPU + Biostar TA785G3HD AMD 785G mATX Motherboard
$35 - Patriot PSD32G13332 2GB DDR3 1333 RAM
$46 - Western Digital WD5000AAKS 500GB 7200RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
$17 - LG GH22NS50 DVD Burner
$50 - Antec NEO ECO 400C 400W PSU
$30 - Rosewill R102-P-BK 120mm Fan MicroATX Mid Tower Computer Case
---
Total: $293 shipped.

Note that the combo deals and prices for the above parts are only good for another week or two. Though I agree about the Windows XP