Spec Me ... a cheap as chips PC!

[marcus_667]

my old setup was a skt 754 sempron and i had that clocked at 2.66 ghz and it was blisteringly fast for the price i paid at the time used to own my mates p4 3 ghz all day long on most things so id like to see what the am2 cpus are going to be like might tell my mum she needs an upgrade over her old pc

 

[pmdelany]

No modern or even old processor is going to be stretched by a bit of word processing, I really doubt you'll notice any difference between a sempron 2600 and an FX62, except in the amount of money left in your wallet.

For the type of system you say the need you could easily go for something like:

"Primo Plus" AMD Sempron 64 2800 1.6GHz DDR System (FS-006-AS)
A compact PC system that packs a mighty punch, the Primo Plus AMD Sempron 64 2800 1.6GHz is built around the popular Asus Vintage-AE1 DDR Desktop Barebones System. Providing more performance than most people will ever need the Primo is ideal for home or office use. Whilst the price is low the Primo uses only the very best hardware.

- AMD Sempron 64 2800 1.6GHz Retail CPU with 256KB L2 Cache
- AMD Sempron Approved Heatsink
- 512MB OcUK PC3200 DDR Memory
- Western Digital 80GB 8MB Cache Serial ATA Hard Drive
- Sony DVD-ROM Drive
- 3 1/2 Inch Floppy Drive
- On-Board 2D/3D Graphics
- On-Board AC''97 Audio
- Integrated 10/100Mbps LAN
- 250W PSU

The Primo can be supplied assembled with or without your choice of installed operating system but is supplied without keyboard, mouse, speakers or monitor (all of which are available elsewhere in this on-line store). The operating system prices listed below are in addition to the system price.


Price: £194.95 (£229.07 Including VAT at 17.5%)

 

[A.N.Other]

@ hp7909 & pmdelany
I did say that it didn't need to be amazing, and I am indeed aware that a sempron would be easily adequate for word processing etc . However, I don't want it to be that bad - and I'm going to be using it when I don't have me PC with me .

Anyway, about the future-proofing thing. It may be AM2, but in a year or so, when Vista becomes main-stream, I'll probably stick that on it. I don't particularly want it to be donkey-slow when I do.

 

[Mikey1280]

The specs are good but why bother spending £50 on the gfx card? A 6200 with turbocache would be adequate, is passively cooled and £30 cheaper.

However onboard graphics would still be the better choice

 

[m3csl2004]

wow - i think am2 will be more popular than people, i mean, 50 quid smeprons on top of the range boards will perform very similar to athlons, and with board readily available for 50 quid, thats a hell of a lot cheap the any conroe

am2 4tw if your budget it like mine

 

[Rick_Barnes]

Is there a particular reason why you've not considered mATX? which is more important, size or upgrade-ability?

If they're not very tech savvy and your worried about them having problems with the computer, perhaps a pre-configured system that they could easily return might be better, especially as they're very quiet and come with a recovery disk already set up.

 

[marcus_667]

i agree with m3csl am2 sempron i think would be better and if they did wanna upgrade or something they could always slam another cpu in at some point mebbe a 65nm athlon in a year and a bits time, im thinking im ordering an am2 sempron and a mobo just to play with and compare with my skt 754 and then when im bored give it to my sister lol