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Hardware 2.0

Adrian Kingsley-Hughes

Quad-core barebones PC ... for under $400!

By | May 7, 2010, 10:14am PDT

Wanna put together a barebones PC package featuring a quad-core processor for under $400? Read on!

Note: This is a barebones system, so there’s chassis, OS or peripherals included.

Let’s see what goes into this package:

Processor

We’re working to a tight budget here, so we can’t pick the fastest or the best CPU going (that would set us out $1,000 right from the start) but that doesn’t mean that we can’t get a really good CPU.

For this build I’ve gone for AMD’s Athlon II X4 620 Propus 2.6GHz part. This is a quad-core part that fits into a Socket AM3 motherboard. It offers plenty of power spread across four cores at a decent price.

Price: $98

Motherboard

We need a cheap and cheerful motherboard for this build. I’ve chosen the Foxconn M61PMP-K AM3 board, not only because it’s cheap, but because I’ve have good success with this board myself.

This motherboard doesn’t offer much in the way of overclocking capability or advanced BIOS features, but for the price it’s a cracking board. It’s a solid, reliable board that it easy to set up and should offer years of reliable service.

Price: $44

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Adrian Kingsley-Hughes is an internationally published technology author who has devoted over a decade to helping users get the most from technology.

Disclosure

Adrian Kingsley-Hughes

All opinions expressed on Hardware 2.0 are those of Adrian Kingsley-Hughes. Every effort is made to ensure that the information posted is accurate. If you have any comments, queries or corrections, please contact Adrian via the email link here. Any possible conflicts of interest will be posted below. [Updated: February 23, 2010] - Adrian Kingsley-Hughes has no business relationships, affiliations, investments, or other actual/potential conflicts of interest relating to the content posted so far on this blog.

Biography

Adrian Kingsley-Hughes

Adrian Kingsley-Hughes is an internationally published technology author who has devoted over a decade to helping users get the most from technology -- whether that be by learning to program, building a PC from a pile of parts, or helping them get the most from their new MP3 player or digital camera.

Adrian has authored/co-authored technical books on a variety of topics, ranging from programming to building and maintaining PCs. His most recent books include "Build the Ultimate Custom PC", "Beginning Programming" and "The PC Doctor's Fix It Yourself Guide". He has also written training manuals that have been used by a number of Fortune 500 companies.

Adrian also runs a popular blog under the name The PC Doctor, where he covers a range of computer-related topics -- from security to repairing and upgrading.

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RE: Quad-core barebones PC ... for under $400!
DT2 17th May 2010
@drjose@... Even if one has an OS, keyboard, mouse, and monitor laying around (I do) there is still the issue of a case. System's not much good without one. I guess one could just connect and scatter the components all over a shelf...
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Note: This is a barebones system, so there??????s chassis, OS or peripherals included.

Don't you mean "NOT" included?
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@drjose@...

true, but OSes can be free(as in beer) if you go Linux/Unix, and most people if building a bare bones system will have a spare keyboard and mouse sitting around. The expensive part of what is not included is a monitor. Unless you use the system as a remote into only system, its virtually useless without one and that's going to add a few schillings to the cost too.
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@AzuMao

Just because you have a monitor doesn't mean you have a spare for a second system....
I was replying to Cyrorm's reply, not myself, but it displays out of order... sad
  • Flagged
@drjose@... Even if one has an OS, keyboard, mouse, and monitor laying around (I do) there is still the issue of a case. System's not much good without one. I guess one could just connect and scatter the components all over a shelf...
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RE: There in lies the dilemma for many
John Zern Updated - 7th May 2010
In the past I've built my own systems, not really for gaming but other day to day uses, a nice middle of the road system. I recently took the easy way out this time and just bought from Dell:
Refurbished: Core 2 Quad, 4 Meg RAM, 500 G HD, case, keyboard, mouse, 5.1 Sound, HDMI and Windows 7 Home Premium. 429.00

42 dollars gets you a DVD, Software, Case, and OS. Plus for gaming just add that 50.00 video card of your and it would probally work OK for that.
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Tempting, but...
Earthling2 7th May 2010
It is tempting, and there are advantages in doing this for building an additional PC. However, usually you end up with a case and possibly a power supply that are not compatible with standard ATX or uATX motherboards. So each time it has to be a full new purchace of another old and refurbished. If the case is standard, you can do an upgrade to the leading edge for the same price.
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@Earthling2
Most of the dells you get an ATX, there were some that were useing the BTX. And some of the way older systems used a custom PS. Lately though I think they are pretty standard. S Have you worked with Dell lately?
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In the past I would say you're dead on
AllKnowingAllSeeing 7th May 2010
because you're right, they had custom everything, down to the PS. Today I find alot of these systems are using standard size P/S, the CPU are no longer BGA, (though still limited in terms of CPU choices) use standard memory, and plenty of slots for add in cards, though the motherboards are still custom, but replaceable thru Dell.
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How the case?
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Why not spend a little more on a motherboard with a built on card, like the 790 and now the 890? Should ofset the costs of a seperate graphics card, but cheaper than buying them seperately. Of course anything cheap would be an AMD system. Because Intel just likes to roll that way.
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Didn't say where he got these parts, one would assume either newegg or tigerdirect. But living in Tennessee, I also have to pay taxes for orders from newegg, so don't forget to add that in. (Only if they have warehouse or ordercenter in your state.)
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RE: How about getting a free motherboard...
djchandler Updated - 10th May 2010
If you buy an Athlon II X4 630 for $99.99, you can get a Biostar A760G M2 motherboard thrown in at no extra cost from a chain retailer near where I am in the Kansas City area. Then you have $300 to play with for the rest of the system. BTW, this retailer also does internet orders, and it's not Newegg, although Newegg is a decent source.

Add Ubuntu 10.04 LTS for the OS.

For the parts that most of you mention as missing, any semi-experienced system builder worth his salt has spares sitting around or access to cheap but still very good second hand parts, perhaps with the exception of an LCD monitor. We have a very good electronics recycling center here in the Kansas City area.
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I went with a barebones for my new system and ended up at $836 from one of our local firms (enuinc.com)
4 Gigs memory, ASUS M478T-E MB AM3 socket, AMD Phoneom II X4 945 (dual core, but the ASUS board has it built in to unlock the other two cores, so now I have a quadcore chip), 1 TB WD SATA HD - 1/3 of any HD will be used just to install software - plus you need room to store the ISO images of anything you install so you can get to them as needed, Antec 902 case and 650 watt power supply. I already had an PCIE 9800GT card and a good monitor to use. This way you have room to grow into another 2 to 3 HDs, CD trays etc and can go up in CPU if desired later on. Cheaper in the long run than going low.
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RE: Quad-core barebones PC ... for under $400!
ryanstrassburg 10th May 2010
@TAPhilo
That sounds funny... You say "...dual core, but the ASUS board has it built in to unlock the other two cores..." yet descibed it as an X4 which means quad-core. I find it odd to use the term "unlock the other cores" as I never heard of needing to unlock the other cores, that is like selling a car wit ha V8 and disabling 4 of the cylinders and needing spceial software to "unlock" the other cylinders.
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RE: RE: Quad-core barebones PC ... for under $400!
TAPhilo Updated - 10th May 2010
@ryanstrassburg My mistake, it was the x2 that I got but I found out that it was a "binned" quad-core sold as a dual core and thus the ASUS MB allowed me to unlock the other two.
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@TAPhilo Just remember some of the dual or tri cores are sold that way because the other core or cores are defective so sometimes this works but you take your chances,
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RE: Quad-core barebones PC ... for under $400!
stanrogers@... 10th May 2010
It seems to me a better route is just to upgrade your current system with the motherboard/processor combo for about $150. I would want to add a new chassis with front ports, since mine is from 1998.
$400-500 could buy a decent refurb Dell like Mr. Zern above. Or for $100 more a decent laptop. I stopped wasting my time building my own systems 10 years ago when it simply wasn't cost effective.

When you're done in 3-4 years with your home made PC, see if it's worth anything on ebay...probably not. A 3-4 year old Dell with a decent chip is still worth at least $100. If it's a hobby you're wanting to do...go for it. If you think you're saving money, forget about it.
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@bobavery Not so much saving money as the satisfaction of building it myself, understanding the relationship of the parts to each other and feeling that the quality is a little better. I spend extra on my case to get better cooling and therefore longer component life. So no money savings but I feel a better computer for a comparable price.
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You forgot the pc case. What good is a barebones system without the case?
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Didn't you forget something?
chplanet@... 10th May 2010
Hi,
You did forget the case.
Besides that you could also do with the on board graphic card and build your own NAS with a Debian or other Linux distribution. It could be used as a file server to store all your movies, photos, music at home or your professional files at work. Overall it should cost you something like 400 euros including 2 hard drives with a little less memory - 2GB is fair enough.
Cheers,
JC
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save some money on memory
pikeman666 10th May 2010
I bought that RAM too but the 790 memory controller won't run any faster than 1300 (or is it 1333?).
So you could probably save a few bucks there.
Great find on the MB!
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To make this example useful you should include a chassis in the breakdown. Otherwise I can only assume that your replacing the innards of an existing box which means you likely wouldn't need the power supply either either...
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Seems like you stopped the article right in the middle. But we got the jist of what you meant. Wonder if they'll stop at quad cores? What's next, octo cores?
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RE: Quad-core barebones PC ... for under $400!
I Hate Malware 10th May 2010
Why bother with the Foxconn MB and Powercolor GPU when there are reasonably priced MB's available with the capability of HD playback and decent game rates.
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Buy vs. build?
Buy the cheapest machine and you'll get it. In all meanings of the word.
But, if cost is your major hurdle, it's the way to go sometimes.

You can ALWAYS get a free crt monitor, and smaller LCD's are under #100.

But, in any major college town, you can find a functioning systems curbside when the students leave--though the down economy may cut the number.

And free is the best price of them all.

If you turly NEED a quad machine, building beats buying a similar quality machine.
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Price is not the essence here
Herrie 11th May 2010
As I put together a similar system just 3 months ago, I can only agree with Adrian's choices. However for most I don't think price is the essence but the satisfaction you get from putting together a working system with the ingredients you like the most.
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Geez, god forbid Dell parts should end up in another machine/build! If your willing to go garbage picking (or social networking to see who's throwing away systems pre-trash pickup), there are a number of 8-10 year old computers being thrown away-- some of which might have slavageable parts including the computer case. This may start out as a $150 amd chip & M/B but I dunno if you'd be happy with buying the rest of the parts on the cheap for $250 still talking about a video card,ram,hd and PSU (of which many validly argue is not worth risking your components on a faulty/old/under powered part). Of these remaining parts you're most likely to have a spare HD... if you've been building/upgrading your system faster (5 years vs 8-10 for non-enthusiasts).
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Bare bones is one thing but no case? Keyboard video and mouse can be shared and excluded, but I don't think cases can be shared as of yet happy

Many cases come with a PSU, so why not buy a case with PSU for a few bucks more?

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