How difficult would it be to build my own computer?

[andymorton]

Hi,

I've been thinking about doing this for a while now but the problem is I've got no previous experience of putting a system together. I've obviously got a lot to learn about how to do it and how the components actually work but I'm relishing the challenge.
Any advice would be gratefully received
Cheers
andy :)

[juancarlospaco]

Buy a BareBone PC kit, its kinda DIY thing...

[rollin]

Shouldn't be that hard IMO! Also you'll learn a lot from the experience. If you decide to use a Silverstone case or components I can vouch they give excellent support. Tell them everything what you want in the box and they will do their best emailing you advice for the PSU wattage etc. Even ask for basic advice like I want "x cpu" and "x mobo" etc with "x case"...
Check them out here: http://www.silverstonetek.com/index.php?area=

[blur xc]

I was just like you about a year ago when I built my pc- but it turned out to be pretty easy.

The hardest part is researching what components to buy, balancing cost and performance, and trying ot make sure you are getting good quality parts.

Overall, it was great experience, and I'm not afraid to tear into my pc when I need to fix something, or install additional hardware anymore. It was a very positive learning experience, even with a few hiccups along the way, and I really encourage you to give it a whirl.

Building my own pc is pretty much what drove me to Ubuntu in the first place. It didn't sit well with me, to build my own pc, taking so much care and consideration in choosign every component, just ot hand it over the controls to MS and be a slave to anti virus, and anti spyware scans and update forever.

BM

[juancarlospaco]

Touch the Floor! :D
because of static electricity

[bowens44]

It's not difficult. I've built dozens of them over the last decade for myself, friends and family. Just do a little reading and pay attention to what you're doing and you'll be fine.

[andymorton]

Hi,

Thanks for the replies and advice everyone. It's reassuring that it's not as difficult as I imagined. I'm going to do some serious research!!

Thanks again
andy:D

[NMFTM]

I spent probably a month researching my computer and had an adult friend who has been working in the IT field for over a decade helping me. I basically was learning all about hardware for the first time.

Despite that, I managed to spend $150 on a high end motherboard that had multiple PCIE x16 slots that were spaced far enough apart that they could support even the most massive GPU's with huge heat sinks. And $200 on a high end GPU. Thinking that I would actually be saving money in the long run by just getting another Nvidia card and SLIing them together instead of having to get another motherboard and GPU years down the road.

What both of us managed to overlook was that SLI isn't just dependent on the GPU. But must also be supported by the motherboard. And I got an AMD/ATI motherboard and Nvidia GPU. But AMD/ATI motherboards only support Crossfire, not SLI.

So, either:
1) I'm very stupid and managed to overlook something that should have been obvious.
-or-
2) Even if you do a ton of research you could still end up making costly mistakes.
-or-
3) Both #1 and #2.

[handy]

Do some research & buy the components that suit you best. When it comes down to it, most motherboards these days have everything built in even GPUs unless you choose one that doesn't have a GPU built in. If you do get one with a GPU built in, you can turn it off in the BIOS if/when you install a graphic card that sits in a slot.

As far as HDD & optical drives go, get a HDD as large as you require (they are so cheap now) I always buy Pioneer when it comes to optical drives as I consider them to be the best quality, buying Pioneer should cost you no more than $20- more than buying the cheapest no name brand.

If you stick a fancy graphics card in, make sure that you have a power supply unit (PSU) that is capable of supporting the current draw, which is not hard to do, so long as you decide which graphic card you are going to buy before you buy the PSU. :)

Putting it all together is really easy & good fun. It makes working with operating systems seem like such a chore by comparison.

After you have built your first machine you will think that was so easy I should go into business.

I did. :)

Have fun... :)

P.S. We don't need SLI/Crossfire these days, most especially when running Linux. Just buy a powerful enough graphics card now & upgrade in the future when you need to.

& don't be concerned about static electricity, it really is not a problem.

[rollin]

I spent probably a month researching my computer and had an adult friend who has been working in the IT field for over a decade helping me. I basically was learning all about hardware for the first time.

Despite that, I managed to spend $150 on a high end motherboard that had multiple PCIE x16 slots that were spaced far enough apart that they could support even the most massive GPU's with huge heat sinks. And $200 on a high end GPU. Thinking that I would actually be saving money in the long run by just getting another Nvidia card and SLIing them together instead of having to get another motherboard and GPU years down the road.

What both of us managed to overlook was that SLI isn't just dependent on the GPU. But must also be supported by the motherboard. And I got an AMD/ATI motherboard and Nvidia GPU. But AMD/ATI motherboards only support Crossfire, not SLI.

So, either:
1) I'm very stupid and managed to overlook something that should have been obvious.
-or-
2) Even if you do a ton of research you could still end up making costly mistakes.
-or-
3) Both #1 and #2.

Lol :D I don't think your stupid. I would suggest to anyone building a custom PC for the experience of building a PC to start with something like researching their CPU, then take your a** over to a review site like http://www.overclockersclub.com/ and check out a review on it. Let's take an example of an old review of the i7 http://www.overclockersclub.com/reviews/intel_core_i7/4.htm and you can see they test it, tell you the performance and also the setup they are running. If you want this just get the components. You'll still be learning through the assembly.

[NMFTM]

Not only that, but I also spent $100 on a high end 650w PSU. Thinking that it would be enough to support 2 GTX 260's plus all of my other components. When I realized later that it wouldn't. I'm not sure exactly how I managed to mess even that up.

On another note, I am currently helping a friend build a new computer from a bunch of old parts (he's really poor) and our solution to the fact that his PSU won't be powerful enough to run all of his components is to plug his 300w PSU into the motherboard and then plug all of his other components (hard drives, cd-rom drives, etc) into the a secondary 250w PSU that's from a micro/mini ATX form factor case. So, when it's all said and done his computer is going to be two cases (one standard, the other a mini-ATX form factor) sitting next to each other with the side doors open so he can run the power wires from his other case into his new one. Either that or he'll screw and/or tape the second PSU into the case and maybe have a box fan pointed into the side opening to guarantee good air flow.

I'm really excited about this and hope it actually works. If it ends up looking really ghetto I might just have to post pictures of it. We spent probably an hour on a computer wattage calculator finding ways of getting everything to work without having to upgrade to a better PSU and at the end of the day we finally managed to get all of the main components (minus hard drives and CD-rom drives) to work with 300w of power while the recommended wattage is 302w. But it'll require that he not plug anything into any of the PCI and PCIE slots except his existing graphics card and that he only have a keyboard and mouse plugged into his USB slots. If he wants to plug in a controller (third USB slot) he might be able to get away with it. But he'll probably want to unplug either his keyboard to mouse just to play it safe and avoid putting unnecessary strain on his components.

If it actually works out I'll be really impressed, the mobo should arrive by Friday at the latest. I have a fair amount of money compared to most of my friends and I never realized how hard building a computer could be if you had to reuse a lot of existing parts scraped out of other computers and economize on the parts you did absolutely need to buy new. Instead of just having a bunch of cash to throw at it.

[Paqman]

I'm really excited about this and hope it actually works.

I don't see why it wouldn't. Might be an idea to electrically bond the two chassis to each other, just to be sure. You'll find out at POST, I guess!

[handy]

I've run two PSUs in my full tower case in the past, it is no big deal, it just means you have two mains cords plugged into it instead of one.

Really using two cases PSUs is just a very clumsy & ugly setup that is being used out of financial necessity by these guys.

[rjbl]

@AndyMorton

Dead easy, takes about 20 minutes to mount a motherboard bundle (MB with CPU and memory fitted); attach powerpack and HD. Cost in the UK - about £150 for a straightforward box. Try Novatech for the bits - very good on-line shopping division. Enjoy

rjbl

[JDShu]

The hard part is not damaging your components (especially the motherboard) with the static electricity that your body generates. For a clumsy person like me, it took a couple of tries :/

[handy]

The hard part is not damaging your components (especially the motherboard) with the static electricity that your body generates. For a clumsy person like me, it took a couple of tries :/

I've built machines for myself & others (professionally for 10 years) for about 17 years. I've never had any kind of problem with static. I consider it to be a problem that might possibly exist for people that are playing with nano technology, (robotics?) certainly not for those of us that are just sticking a motherboard in a case & throwing a few (if that many these days) cards in it & connecting up a few data cables between the motherboard & drives, sound, power & USB (perhaps firewire or some other exotic).

It gets very windy around here for a few months of every year. No matter, I have NEVER needed to take any kind of precaution (earthing myself) when working on a computer. As I briefly previously stated, I have done it everyday & night for over a decade.

To anyone who is thinking about building their own computer I say this: just go slowly the first time. Think about what you are doing, it really isn't very difficult at all, when in doubt, stop, think, go to the web if you need some help.

You won't believe how easy it is to build the 2nd one. :)

[LowSky]

Here a quick guide

1. Don't settle on parts. Buy what you need, not what is cheap.

2. Read the reviews for the products. Make sure they will do what you expect.

3. Go with tier one manufacturers for a Motherboard. Companies like Gigabyte, Asus, MSI, Intel. You're buying support not pretty parts. Remember every part will have a warranty. Some manufacturers only warranty for 90 days, some 1 year, so make sure your getting guaranteed parts.

4. The power supply is the most critical part. Don't buy "just enough" buy enough to last at least another upgrade. I wouldn't recommend anything under 450 Watts these days. And nothing under 600 Watts if you want a high-end video card (900+ Watts if you want two video cards). BTW a high end video card costs well over $300. A decent midrange card is $150-250.

5. Buy a case that will last 3-5 years. And by last I mean you like how it looks and its durability. Cases can cost as little as $25 and go over $500. The case is somewhere you can skimp if you are never going to move it or show it off like a piece of art. I highly recommend Lian-Li (all aluminum) and their sub brand Lancool (steel and plastic cases), both are top notch in quality. Other great case makers are Antec, Coolermaster, Thermaltake, and Silverstone. A case can last a few builds if you take care of it.

6. Hard drives are becoming cheaper and larger capacity nearly every day. You can grab a 1TB drive for well under $100 these days. When buying a hard drive make sure its 7200RPM, any slower and it can drag system performance. They do make faster drives, but the capacities are much lower and the prices are much higher. Slower drives should only be used for storage for multimedia. For applications faster is better. A great way to think of it is that the hard Drive is the slowest par of the PC, make sure its as fast as you can afford.

7. With Processors you have two initial choices, Intel or AMD. This will basically effect the rest of the build with things like RAM, motherboard, and graphics card choices. I'm to going to say which to buy, that's your choice. I will bring up that you should make sure that the motherboard is compatible and that the processor should be at least a dual core. These days its very useful. Quad or higher core counts are great if you need to run many processes at once, but so you know a higher clocked dual core will seem faster in day to day work than a quad core chip with a slower clock speed.

8. RAM, get 4GB it is basically today's minimal standard. Getting anymore is kinda wasteful, unless you need to run 100000 processes at once. Make sure you get the correct speed. Most new stuff requires DDR3, which comes in speeds like 1333MHz and higher. You choice in Motherboard will let you know what type of ram you need.

9. buy the right cables. and get zip ties. You don't want to buy the wrong SATA cable or have the inside look like a rat's nest. Buy cables that are the right length, don't try to stretch cables or have them too long. A clean case means better air flow. Better air flow means lower temperatures.

10. If you can reuse media drives, keyboards, monitors, and mice from old computers, it will save you a few dollars. If you have a DVD-RW already or a great keyboard, why waste money buying new ones if you can reuse.

11. Have fun building. Its really easy to put a computer together, if you used Legos or build models as a kid before you can build a PC. And dont worry about static unless you find yourself always shocking yourself day to day on a normal basis. To this day I have never lost apart to static, with over 10 years of putting my bare hands into PC's.

[handy]

@LowSky: Good run down up there.

But this phrase begs the question:

"Buy a case that will last 3-5 years."

How do you wear out a computer case? ;)

I'm using a really old AT tower case that I converted to ATX & I expect that it will last longer than I will. With a few replacement PSUs probably, & whatever other internal upgrades that seem fit at the future time.

A new good or bad (cheap crap from China as opposed to more expensive crap from China) case really has nothing to wear out, you can replace the PSU, you can replace any fans in the case if it happens to have any, the switches & LEDs won't fail, the screws won't fail, but if you do them up too tight you can quite easily strip the threads in the case, (particularly the cheaper cases) which is about the only means of case failure I can think of...

[proggy]

All the advice given is mostly good but you have to know if you are good at working with your hands, as it`s very easy to damage components if you don`t have that special sensitivity.

[grahammechanical]

So you want to build a computer? Can you use a screw driver? Then, off you go. Read some magazines that explain how to do it. Make sure that the case accepts your chosen motherboard design.

I selected all the bits I wanted. Took my time about purchasing. Then, I changed my mind about the motherboard and did not notice that I was buying an ATX size motherboard to go into a case that would only accept a microATX board. I felt such a fool. Thankfully I purchased from a shop and they were good enough to allow an exchange.

Regards

[LowSky]

@LowSky: Good run down up there.

But this phrase begs the question:

"Buy a case that will last 3-5 years."

How do you wear out a computer case? ;)

I'm using a really old AT tower case that I converted to ATX & I expect that it will last longer than I will. With a few replacement PSUs probably, & whatever other internal upgrades that seem fit at the future time.

A new good or bad (cheap crap from China as opposed to more expensive crap from China) case really has nothing to wear out, you can replace the PSU, you can replace any fans in the case if it happens to have any, the switches & LEDs won't fail, the screws won't fail, but if you do them up too tight you can quite easily strip the threads in the case, (particularly the cheaper cases) which is about the only means of case failure I can think of...


Well I thought I explained that :P ... The case is what we all have to look at. Don't buy something you cant look at in 3-5 years time. And cases can go bad. I remember those older HP and Compaq and even some of the custom cases sold on computer websites cases that have mechanical plastic covers for the drive bays and front ports. Once they break and they make for an ugly case. Also poorly built steel cases can dent or buckle if too much weight is put on them, some can even rust because of low standards when built. Those newer cases with the windows can break and then your left trying to find a replacement.

[bunburya]

Hi I'm just wondering, are there major cost savings to be made in building a non-top-of-the-line PC? Like, I know that by building yourself you can often get a really high-spec PC for less money than you would by a ready-made high-spec computer. But is that also the case for mid-spec computers?

[andymorton]

@AndyMorton

Dead easy, takes about 20 minutes to mount a motherboard bundle (MB with CPU and memory fitted); attach powerpack and HD. Cost in the UK - about £150 for a straightforward box. Try Novatech for the bits - very good on-line shopping division. Enjoy

rjbl

Hi, Thanks for the tip about Novatech!!:D

andy

[cprofitt]

Hi,

I've been thinking about doing this for a while now but the problem is I've got no previous experience of putting a system together. I've obviously got a lot to learn about how to do it and how the components actually work but I'm relishing the challenge.
Any advice would be gratefully received
Cheers
andy :)


It is very easy. I use Newegg.com for all my parts and have been building my own PCs for years and years. The biggest thing to do is scour the intertubes or information on the components you are interested in using.

[andymorton]

Here a quick guide

1. Don't settle on parts. Buy what you need, not what is cheap.

2. Read the reviews for the products. Make sure they will do what you expect.

3. Go with tier one manufacturers for a Motherboard. Companies like Gigabyte, Asus, MSI, Intel. You're buying support not pretty parts. Remember every part will have a warranty. Some manufacturers only warranty for 90 days, some 1 year, so make sure your getting guaranteed parts.

4. The power supply is the most critical part. Don't buy "just enough" buy enough to last at least another upgrade. I wouldn't recommend anything under 450 Watts these days. And nothing under 600 Watts if you want a high-end video card (900+ Watts if you want two video cards). BTW a high end video card costs well over $300. A decent midrange card is $150-250.

5. Buy a case that will last 3-5 years. And by last I mean you like how it looks and its durability. Cases can cost as little as $25 and go over $500. The case is somewhere you can skimp if you are never going to move it or show it off like a piece of art. I highly recommend Lian-Li (all aluminum) and their sub brand Lancool (steel and plastic cases), both are top notch in quality. Other great case makers are Antec, Coolermaster, Thermaltake, and Silverstone. A case can last a few builds if you take care of it.

6. Hard drives are becoming cheaper and larger capacity nearly every day. You can grab a 1TB drive for well under $100 these days. When buying a hard drive make sure its 7200RPM, any slower and it can drag system performance. They do make faster drives, but the capacities are much lower and the prices are much higher. Slower drives should only be used for storage for multimedia. For applications faster is better. A great way to think of it is that the hard Drive is the slowest par of the PC, make sure its as fast as you can afford.

7. With Processors you have two initial choices, Intel or AMD. This will basically effect the rest of the build with things like RAM, motherboard, and graphics card choices. I'm to going to say which to buy, that's your choice. I will bring up that you should make sure that the motherboard is compatible and that the processor should be at least a dual core. These days its very useful. Quad or higher core counts are great if you need to run many processes at once, but so you know a higher clocked dual core will seem faster in day to day work than a quad core chip with a slower clock speed.

8. RAM, get 4GB it is basically today's minimal standard. Getting anymore is kinda wasteful, unless you need to run 100000 processes at once. Make sure you get the correct speed. Most new stuff requires DDR3, which comes in speeds like 1333MHz and higher. You choice in Motherboard will let you know what type of ram you need.

9. buy the right cables. and get zip ties. You don't want to buy the wrong SATA cable or have the inside look like a rat's nest. Buy cables that are the right length, don't try to stretch cables or have them too long. A clean case means better air flow. Better air flow means lower temperatures.

10. If you can reuse media drives, keyboards, monitors, and mice from old computers, it will save you a few dollars. If you have a DVD-RW already or a great keyboard, why waste money buying new ones if you can reuse.

11. Have fun building. Its really easy to put a computer together, if you used Legos or build models as a kid before you can build a PC. And dont worry about static unless you find yourself always shocking yourself day to day on a normal basis. To this day I have never lost apart to static, with over 10 years of putting my bare hands into PC's.


Hi Thanks for the advice. I appreciate it!!! :D

[Austin25]

I haven't done it, but it sounds a lot harder than it is. Very good for bragging rights.

[cprofitt]

Hi I'm just wondering, are there major cost savings to be made in building a non-top-of-the-line PC? Like, I know that by building yourself you can often get a really high-spec PC for less money than you would by a ready-made high-spec computer. But is that also the case for mid-spec computers?


Well... major cost savings -- no. There will be some cost savings, but the larger issue is you will get non-crap parts and know what parts you get. Most budget models tend to use very poor components.

You can put together a nice mid-range box for around $250. You can buy one for around $300 (http://www.bestbuy.com/site/eMachines+-+Desktop+/+Intel%26%23174%3B+Celeron%26%23174%3B+Processor+/+2GB+Memory+/+500GB+Hard+Drive/9974267.p?id=1218204533255&skuId=9974267). The parts in the one you build will be much better though.

An Intel Celeron Processor at 2.2Ghz, with a 500GB HD and Intel Graphics will run you $309.

From Newegg I can get:



$42 - AMD Athlon X2 7850 Black Edition Kuma 2.8GHz
$49 - GIGABYTE GA-MA74GM-S2 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128342&Tpk=GA-MA74GM-S2) AM3/AM2+/AM2 AMD 740G Micro ATX AMD Motherboard
$49 Western Digital AV-GP WD5000AVDS 500GB 32MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s
$19 Lite-On DVD Burner
$39 Foxconn 436+ISO400 300W Power Supply
$59 G.SKILL 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 1066 (PC2 8500) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model F2-8500CL5D-2GBPK

Total: $257

[Austin25]

How would one build their own laptop?

[LowSky]

I haven't done it, but it sounds a lot harder than it is. Very good for bragging rights.

Building your own PC from pre-made parts is much like building IKEA furniture.

[LowSky]

How would one build their own laptop?

You can't exactly but you can buy a barebone kit and install your own choice of RAM, Hard drive and processor

http://www.newegg.com/Store/SubCategory.aspx?SubCategory=773&name=Notebook-Barebone-Systems

[msandoy]

If you plan on running Ubuntu on it, something I guess you do since you are asking in here, I'd go for a decent Asus MB with nForce chipset, a medium priced Phenom AMD cpu and a medium priced nVidia GFX card. And make sure you match the RAM to the MB spec. Just don't be cheap on the power supply, A cheap power supply with unstable 5 or 3.3 volts will give you long hours of grief, while you rip your hair out trying to figure out why something is acting up. I have had quite a bit of troubble with ATI chipsets and Linux, that's why I recommend nForce and nVidia.

[LowSky]

If you plan on running Ubuntu on it, something I guess you do since you are asking in here, I'd go for a decent Asus MB with nForce chipset, a medium priced Phenom AMD cpu and a medium priced nVidia GFX card. And make sure you match the RAM to the MB spec. Just don't be cheap on the power supply, A cheap power supply with unstable 5 or 3.3 volts will give you long hours of grief, while you rip your hair out trying to figure out why something is acting up. I have had quite a bit of troubble with ATI chipsets and Linux, that's why I recommend nForce and nVidia.

I can say from my own experience that AMD/ATI chipsets have never caused me a problem running Ubuntu. Neither have Nvidia products.

[Paqman]

I've built machines for myself & others (professionally for 10 years) for about 17 years. I've never had any kind of problem with static.

You have, you just don't realise it. ESD doesn't necessarily cause components to fail immediately, but it does reduce their life.

ESD is real, the electronics industry spends vast amounts of money tackling it. Good handling practice costs you nothing, and some basic equipment like a wrist strap is dirt cheap.

[LowSky]

You have, you just don't realise it. ESD doesn't necessarily cause components to fail immediately, but it does reduce their life.

ESD is real, the electronics industry spends vast amounts of money tackling it. Good handling practice costs you nothing, and some basic equipment like a wrist strap is dirt cheap.

Yeah but wrist straps look dorky. :D

And for my demanding self interest I want to see some proof that handling a PC component without a wrist strap will reduce the life of a component.

I demand your source of information good sir! :popcorn:

[andras artois]

Building it is fairly easy as long as everything you buy actually fits together.

There's plenty of guides on the internetz with plenty of decent advice on building one.

If you want some more specific help I'm sure people on here would be happy to help.

[blur xc]

Yeah but wrist straps look dorky. :D

And for my demanding self interest I want to see some proof that handling a PC component without a wrist strap will reduce the life of a component.

I demand your source of information good sir! :popcorn:

Even if the whole ESD thing is a conspiracy to sell dorky wrist straps, it's stupid idiot simple to just touch something metal and grounded every few minutes while assembling your pc, and to try to NOT shuffle your feet on the carpet before you pick up your brand new ram sticks by the contacts, etc...

Seriously. Why tempt fate?

BM

[sxmaxchine]

fairly easy after you know what you need to do.

these videos are great tutorials (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NNbEBARu6LY)

[JamesHayek]

I have build several units and I have never destroyed a single processor, ram or any other component.

However, it IS good practice to ground yourself and there IS a possibility of shorting something. Wear a dorky strap for safety, they are cheap.

As for building a box, start with the GPU and find a mobo that works, most mobo's are ATX (style/form factor) so getting a case would be easy. If you're running SLI get a case with room for many fans.

Motherboards come with a manual booklet that you can read though to make sure everything is as needed. It is pretty straight forward and a very fun process.

Building computers are the reason I try to use Unix or Linux. You have more control, the community is great, and you actually learn something about how a computer functions.

Happy building!

[Paqman]

And for my demanding self interest I want to see some proof that handling a PC component without a wrist strap will reduce the life of a component.


It's widely documented, but here's a document from Intel (http://www.intel.com/Assets/PDF/pkginfo/ch_06.pdf) about it. ESD is a known factor in reducing the reliability of electronics, ask any reliability engineer.

[goodscoolxh]

I would like to say that building your own computer is very easy , if you don't know how to put the system together , i suggest that you can make other show you how to put the system together , then you can build it by your self .

[handy]

Well I thought I explained that :P ... The case is what we all have to look at. Don't buy something you cant look at in 3-5 years time.

Really!? I never consider the aesthetics of a case, only how well it cools & primarily how easy it is to access the internal components.



And cases can go bad. I remember those older HP and Compaq and even some of the custom cases sold on computer websites cases that have mechanical plastic covers for the drive bays and front ports. Once they break and they make for an ugly case.

Cases shouldn't break, they just spend their time sitting there sucking in dust.



Also poorly built steel cases can dent or buckle if too much weight is put on them, some can even rust because of low standards when built. Those newer cases with the windows can break and then your left trying to find a replacement.

All questionable to my mind.

I say just buy a case that is big enough to hold what you want to put in it now & in the future. Some people like to have USB (even firewire) & sound ports at the front of the case. Though this just comes down to personal taste & desire in the end.

[Fireball533]

I've built my last 2 computers. My most recent one is running Ubuntu Lucid. You won't save that much money, but you know exactly what you're getting and what kinds of upgrades you can do. If you don't mind some problem solving, it will give you great satisfaction to build your own system. There is nothing like the "moment of truth" when you first fire it up!

It's really not very difficult, most of it is time spent researching what you want and what will work together. I use http://www.bit-tech.net for ideas on different systems. They do a monthly buyer's guide for different systems to build with good parts. I also recommend http://www.newegg.com for research and purchasing.

[MooPi]

There have been plenty of posts in this thread about all kinds of PC components and personal builds. I would just like to add that you can spend loads of money if you have it or scrimp and buy used and discount parts and still have a decent PC in the end. My personal addition is all new from NewEgg for under 300$. That's not expensive for a PC and affordable even for those with less money. It is a modest setup with a AMD Sempron dual core, Western digital 250 gig hd, one gig of ram, dvd+rw drive, and the last and simply a luxury item, ATI 512 mb 4350 video card. The video card is a luxury because the motherboard already has onboard graphics. The reason I wanted to add to this thread is due to the admirable performance this rig exhibits. I can encode a full music CD in under 10 minutes, a full rip and encode to .avi from DVD in under 50 minutes. Granted it's not nearly as fast as my latest quad AMD, but I've spent at least 150$ more on that machine. I'd like to add that the standard driver for the ATI 4350 is very impressive (radeon). Linux doesn't require the latest and fastest to perform well and I enjoy on the cheap rigs for there thrifty quality. My father really did teach me something about thrift, if only I could stop buying the cheap computers :-)