El Cheepo System

[Butters]

I'm building a very inexpensive system, yet I still want to get as much power out of it. First of all, it's not going to be my system so I'm not going to be tinkering with it. That means no overclocking, yes, I know, but it will be okay!

I'm going to get an NF7 (not the NF7-S) and an XP2500 Barton.

My question is if I should go with 3200 ram instead of the 2700. (2 X 256)

Also, the ram will definately be not high performance, it will be more towards the Kingston Value ram~Crucial~Corsair Value~GeiL range. So I don't know how well mid-range 3200 would compare to higher 2700 ram. :banghead: //Edit, after reading what I just said, I just answered my own question!! This Barton is 333.. duh!!! //Edit

I don't want to have any regrets once I build this system because the person recieving this, it will probably be his only PC for the next 10 years... literally. It will replace K5 or K6, whichever ran at @ 300mhz (or so I'm told).

I'm given $600, and I don't want dip into my wallet for this one. (It's for my girlfriends gaming brother if you were curious).

All comments will be appreciated.

[mmonnin]

What else are the requirements. I mean does it need CD ROM drives, monitor, floppy, keyboard and mouse? If you can reuse those it can save a lot of money.

How into gaming is he? GeForce 3 gaming or onboard vid or what? Onboard sound and vid can save some money. Onboard sound isnt that bad anymore. If you get the NF7-M it has onboard vid, GeForce4 MX. It is about $20 more tho but thats cheaper than a MX card. $123

2500+ Barton - $90

PC2700 would be the best. Dont go for the cheapest but Kingston value RAM will do. 1*512 would be sufficient. $74

Maybe a mid tower case that he can help pick out. 400W Powmax PSU.

If you need a burner you can get Lite On. They are cheap. ~$50 for a 52X.

HDD size can be whats left over. If enough get a 80gb WD SE. If not a 7200 rpm drive.

[Butters]

I got everything settled as far as the other components.

It's just determining which way I should choose to go with the Ram is my only concern. Right now with el cheepo ram (Kingmax) (http://store.yahoo.com/joyluckshop/25kintintrup1.html) @ $43 I have a complete system and I got the price close to where I can go, with everything.

[ScrapSilicon]

a single stick of 512MB (either pc2700 or 3200) is best..when funds become available grab a matching 512MB of the same (dcddr is noticeable just not that big of one.. and you said "el cheepo" ;))