Computer question for the young from the old-

Go to CompUSA and tell them you want a computer that can play the top of the line pc games...They know what you mean...Plus they set the thing up for you too...Get the warranty too!

 

Oh sorry, I have to defend eMachines. Insofar as they were before being acquired by Gateway. I had a T2080 in the stable for awhile. There was nothing proprietary in there. Not much of a performer with an ECS board in there, to be sure, but at the time a new system with a 2000+XP, 512MBs DDR, 80gig HD, monitor, speakers and keyboard for under $500 was a heck of a deal almost 4 years ago. My sons 1/2 brother has been running it 24/7 for over a year with a 5900XT without any issues. The thing is solider (solider...is that a word?LOL) than a brick shit house. Also the proprietary recovery disks work on any system with a VIA chipset, without being tied to a hardware specific CMOS chip. After having said all that, do it yourself is still the way to go. And I would never trust a salesman at CompUSA. Been there, done that!

 

Circuit City was selling a Compaq in December for $530 after rebate that had a 2.2GHz Athlon 64 3500 Asus MB, 0.5 Gig Infeon ram, 200G hard, ATI Radeon Xpress 200 video, Lightscribe dual layer burner that can also print titles on the DVD, and a multi-card reader.

I added up the prices of all these components on Newegg and it would cost a couple hundred more, not including the cost of adding Windows. The enclosure has good ventilation and there is a very large quiet fan that cools the CPU. For this particular computer, the components aren't junk.

There are some advantages of using an OEM motherboard and components. You have full control of overclocking, whereas something bought ready made by HP may have BIOS options locked out.

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