Considering he's buying budget, you'd save a fair bit buying monitors from ebay.

He doesn't want anything used. I don't know why he's willing to spend so much on a desktop, seeing as how he's the cheapest man I know.

You can buy brand new monitors from ebay, there's an option somewhere to only show brand new items.

Is it just me or does newegg have a pretty small choice of monitors?

buying monitors used IMO is not smart. CRTs are okay because they are already so old and are very dependable. LCDs however seem to last ~5 years then die.

Get a laptop and connect a monitor to it. There was an i3 at best buy for like $420 a little while ago. There's no point in getting a desktop with your dad because he's not going to open it or upgrade it ever, since that voids the warranty, and you should really open it yearly to clean it.

I meant a brand new monitor from ebay, newegg seems to have a pretty small amount of monitors listed.

Laptops typically die more than desktops, although that's probably because they're actually used as laptops; using one as a desktop and never moving it probably wouldn't stress it much. Than again, they aren't very powerful for the $ and tend to be pretty hot (reducing life). Also if he went with a laptop there'd be no way to upgrade it to extend the life, or really play games on it.

As for opening it up to blow the dust out - you may, or may not need to do that every year depending on how dusty your environment is, and whether the case is set up as positive or negative pressure (all name-brand ones are highly likely to be positive pressure for this reason). But he can probably open it up and blow the dust out any way, I doubt his dad would notice.

Well, the cd/dvd drive that ex recommended me is sold out. Are there any other ones that could work?

EDIT: How about this one?

Also, would I need to buy any cables with the build that ex gave me? I'll probably end of using that (that is, if my dad stops being stupid and buys from newegg).

EDIT 2: Okay, so I'm really close to convincing my dad to get this. He just wants someone's opinion on building computers, so I'll just ask my uncle who's good with that kind of stuff. Is there anything else that I'll need (like the cables and stuff as listed above)? I need a keyboard/mouse, and maybe speakers, but I can just buy those from a local store.

Post has been edited 4 time(s), last time on Dec 30 2010, 7:44 pm by Dem0nS1ayer.

DVD drives are commodity items now, which means anything you buy will generally do the job. The only real difference between different models are looks and price - they all have the same features. Having said that, though, cheaper drives tend to be louder, and from personal experience I also had a particular written CD-rom that simply wouldn't work in a cheap no-name drive, but worked fine in a Sony one (about 3x the price). How much this concerns you really matters how much you actually use CDs and DVDs - apart from installing Windows or SC2, I haven't used a DVD in a long time.

The build should come with all the cables you need. The motherboard is the one that usually comes with extra cables, like SATA for hard drives, and then the power supply comes with all of the power cables (of course). Really in most modern PCs, the only sort of internal cables tend to be SATA cables to connect to the HDs, but as you're only buying 1 hard drive, even the skimpiest motherboard should have at least 1 SATA cable (generally they'll have at least 2).

You will need the power cord that goes from the PC into the wall as most PSUs sold these days are OEM and don't include one. Everything else you need should be included. Make sure you have multiple sizes of screw drivers and some wrenches handy just in case. I also found needle nose pliers to be of use in some situations.

Wait. If I want sound, do I need to buy a sound card?

Unless the motherboard has an onboard sound card. They cost a few bucks only though, and I've got like 6 lying around. If you want a QUALITY sound card, that's a bit different, of course.

EDIT and it does have an onboard sound card, you're covered.

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on Dec 31 2010, 12:32 am by Jack.

If you're just going to plug an earphone or a simple dual speaker- you don't need a sound card. If you're going buffers and surround sound, then you need sound cards.

All current motherboards have onboard sound, and most have 8 channel sound. Some have digital. Nearly all of them use Realtek HD Audio, which quite frankly is terrible due to the drivers, the slow website, and the general idiocy of getting "stereo mix" to work.

Unless you have money to waste on your ears, it's not worth getting a sound card. Only people with amazing hearing can notice the difference between 128 kbps mp3s and flac without directly comparing the two (ie, play a song, identify whether it's lossless or lossy without playing the other file). If you're one of those people who can tell that the flac album you downloaded from what.cd is actually an mp3 converted into flac, then you'll need a sound card. If you're 99.9% of other people, a sound card is only worthwhile when you have plenty of money to spend (ie a gift, a shell shocker, a friend).

I've got a 5.1 setup on onboard. It's probably better to have 2.1.

So I need something like this? Why is that almost 20 bucks.. >>

Yes, something like that, but if you pay $20 for one you're being ripped off. Assuming you've not got any plans for your current computer, just use the cable from that. If you do have plans for the current computer, then you could either temporarily use the power cable from it (so you can use the new computer in the mean time) and look around for one to buy. You can probably get one from Walmart or some $2 store for a couple of bucks. Even Best Buy would probably be cheaper than $20. I don't live in the US so I'm not familiar with the different types of stores you can go to there.

I have like 10 of these laying around.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16812201007

They stopped shipping them with products because it's cheaper and everyone already has 20. However, all the power supplies I've bought came with one. HDDs are much more likely to not include a sata cable due to oem.

Yeah, I've never had a HD come with a cable, but then again they've all been OEM. Retail boxes do exist, but they cost considerably more and are usually sold at retail stores - if you're buying from a distributor (eg newegg) there's no reason to pay extra for retail packaging when all it boils down to is basically a flash box, a SATA cable and probably power connector and instructions.

Every recent motherboard I've seen comes with at least 2 SATA cables, and usually as many as equal to the number of SATA ports on the board. So you should be fine for SATA cables.

Judging from the picture, that cheap one might be a thinner cable than the ones they usually include. If you need to order one, you could get one from monoprice.com and it would be cheaper without being a low quality cable, especially if you have any other cables you need to order with it.

Look at the specs for the power supply to see how many amps it might use on the AC input and find a cable rated at least above that. For one that will use only less than 10A, you could get an 18 AWG cable (this is what many power supplies with lower watts come with). For up to 13A, get a 16 AWG cable. If you get something that might draw above that, get a 14 AWG cable for up to 15A. (based on the cable specifications on MonoPrice) My SeaSonic X650 came with a cable rated for 13A, but some power supplies below that should probably use a cable like that as well, based on their specs.

Also Dem0n, ask your dad, I'm pretty sure he's got a bunch of these cables lying around since it's a standardized power cable for basically any electrical device with detachable power cable.

Post has been edited 2 time(s), last time on Jan 2 2011, 12:05 am by NudeRaider. Reason: did my homework

Actually, I just noticed that the power supply comes with a cable.