Building an office pf for my gf

John Lin

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Sep 21, 2014
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Hi everyone. I would like a second opinion regarding my build. My gf does not play game, she will only browsing web, watch video, word process. She does want a cute looking PC, hence I build the PC around that case.

Date: No dead line, can take as long as possible (she just want to feel special to have me build a PC for her)
budget: Under CAD $400.00 is a must, and under 350 if possible
usage: Web surfing, watch video, word processing.
No monitor, no keyboard no mouse
Do not need OS
No OC
No dedicate GPU

Would I get a major performance hit if I use Celeron G1840 instead? i wouldn't know since I use an I5 atm. If a Celeron is good enough to deal with those basic tasks, I rather save a few bucks there. I tried to come up with an AMD CPU version, but for mITX, there isnt many cheap mobo avaliable, or good AMD CPU.

Second question, would 4 gig ram be enough for windows 7 professional 64 bits? She is likely to open 15+ tab on Google chrome, and I notice when I do that on my nettop, 4 gig ram run out quickly and I get the low memory error message :( I am not sure if it is net top thing, or win 7 thing. Since on my old laptop 4 gig ran fine with 20+ tabs. The reason why we open so many tabs is because often we have to do online research and that involve keeping web pages available for comparison.

SSD is for quick office performance, she isn't likely to store a lot of documents. She will open ms Words, PDF and stuff frequently, and I notice SSD make those application open very fast.

Any feed back would be welcome.

Thank you everyone.

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PCPartPicker part list: http://ca.pcpartpicker.com/p/PyRjvK
Price breakdown by merchant: http://ca.pcpartpicker.com/p/PyRjvK/by_merchant/

CPU: Intel Pentium G3220 3.0GHz Dual-Core Processor ($59.99 @ NCIX)
Motherboard: ASRock H81M-ITX/WIFI Mini ITX LGA1150 Motherboard ($74.50 @ Vuugo)
Memory: Crucial 4GB (1 x 4GB) DDR3-1333 Memory ($39.99 @ DirectCanada)
Storage: Sandisk Ultra Plus 128GB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($58.98 @ DirectCanada)
Case: BitFenix Prodigy (Red) Mini ITX Tower Case ($64.99 @ Canada Computers)
Power Supply: CoolMax 300W ATX Power Supply ($31.98 @ Newegg Canada)
Optical Drive: Samsung SH-224DB/BEBE DVD/CD Writer ($15.79 @ DirectCanada)
Total: $346.22
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-10-01 19:52 EDT-0400
 
Solution
Here is something for $370 with a Graphics card. I completely agree with @gizzard1987 as the graphics card will take the load off of the RAM. This build also has dual channel RAM, which will make a huge improvement over the single stick. The case I have included is very small, in case it needs to be stored somewhere small. The CPU can be overclocked ALOT (especially if this PC somehow turns into a light gaming PC), but you will need an after market cooler.

http://ca.pcpartpicker.com/p/R2GsMp

Hope this helps!

gizzard1987

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Aug 7, 2013
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Personally I would go with an AMD A series for this build. First thing I notice is a SSD, which is more of a waste in this system than anything. You should probably consider getting a 7200 RPM HDD. SSD are nice, but for that amount of space, she's going to run out quick if she's not very savvy on keeping things tidy in a PC. A SSD that size is really designed for boot and primary programs, while having like a 1 TB drive to dump onto. With the stuff you've got picked out, you'd be much better off to just get a WD Blue or a Seagate 1 TB drive. As for the RAM, I'm guessing you'll probably never really upgrade it, so I'd go with 2 sticks over the single. The dual channel memory will make a huge different in a system this low end. I'm sure that PSU is just wonderful for a paperweight, but if you're going that cheap at least get a Corsair Builder Series 430w. It's got a little extra wattage, but it certainly won't hurt anything. Not sure of your pricing in CA, but I know in the US you can pick these up for around 30 bucks at Best Buy.


Personally I would look into at least adding a small graphics card to it. You can add basically anything. The main reason for this is just to alleviate some of the added stress on the RAM from having to try to keep up with any videos or whatever she may do on the PC. On a PC this low-end, you're definitely going to feel every added task while a video is playing with so little ram, and no graphics card. I know in my old dell workstation, I just had a GT 620 2 gb card that I picked up for 30 bucks from Best Buy. It made my computer seem 10x faster, and it handled all the bloat that facebook and various other sites carry. Just remember, graphics cards do far more than just Photoshop and load games.

On another note, You might look into like the FX processors. They're cheap and they have more cores. For people who love to multi-task, it comes in handy.
 

TheIcedCanadian

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Jun 17, 2014
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Here is something for $370 with a Graphics card. I completely agree with @gizzard1987 as the graphics card will take the load off of the RAM. This build also has dual channel RAM, which will make a huge improvement over the single stick. The case I have included is very small, in case it needs to be stored somewhere small. The CPU can be overclocked ALOT (especially if this PC somehow turns into a light gaming PC), but you will need an after market cooler.

http://ca.pcpartpicker.com/p/R2GsMp

Hope this helps!
 
Solution

gizzard1987

Honorable
Aug 7, 2013
320
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10,860
PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: AMD Athlon X4 750K 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor ($83.98 @ Newegg Canada)
Motherboard: Asus A78M-E Micro ATX FM2+ Motherboard ($55.00 @ NCIX)
Memory: Corsair XMS3 DHX 4GB (2 x 2GB) DDR3-1333 Memory ($39.88 @ Canada Computers)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($56.98 @ DirectCanada)
Video Card: Asus Radeon HD 6450 2GB Video Card ($49.95 @ Vuugo)
Case: Xion XON-560 MicroATX Mini Tower Case ($39.99 @ Amazon Canada)
Power Supply: EVGA 430W 80+ Certified ATX Power Supply ($33.98 @ Newegg Canada)
Optical Drive: Samsung SH-224DB/BEBE DVD/CD Writer ($15.79 @ DirectCanada)
Total: $375.55
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-10-01 20:59 EDT-0400

Here's my suggested build. It's under budget, and it'll power through office work and general web browsing (facebook, youtube, email, all that kind of crap) and it'll be able to handle plenty of tabs and her word docs all at once. I went with a white case with blue lights as I think the color scheme seems quite nice, yet not too flashy.

I also managed to squeeze in USB 3 on the front panel, because who doesn't like loading 4000 pictures from their flash drive in under a minute? I know I do.
 

John Lin

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Sep 21, 2014
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Thank you for all your help. I decided to stick with the Pentium G3220, change to 2x2 gig ram and add a cheap Asus Radeon HD 5450 1GB Video Card for 35 bucks. Stuff in Canada is expensive. My reason to stay with Pentium is because it has a good single core performance. I will debate on the HDD vs SSD for a while. Since its not urgent, I have time to think it over. Thank you so much for all your inputs.
 

TheIcedCanadian

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Jun 17, 2014
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Good choice with the RAM, and since this is an office PC, the CPU shouldn't matter (in terms of G3220 to G3258). The GPU will make the computer feel much quicker. I still strongly recommend a 2GB GPU for $50, just in case the computer is running a heavy task and the RAM is being over-stressed.