Budget general purpose machine, opinions appreciated.

This is basically gonna be a general light duty machine for my girlfriend who really only uses her current computer, a 4 year old Dell laptop, for putting music on her iPod and checking her email. Recently she's gotten into playing computer games, but nothing more intesive than WoW, which she does on my computer, listed in my profile. I don't really have a target budget, but I do want to try and keep it as low as possible without sacrificing a ton. I won't be doing any overclocking on this machine, just want to get her something stable and decent for her needs.

So this is what I'm looking at right now (all prices from NewEgg, since I can browse it at work for some reason):

CPU: Athlon 64-FX2 4000: 59.99 (retail)

Mobo: ASUS M2N AM2 NVIDIA nForce 430 MCP ATX AMD Motherboard - Retail: 79.99

Ram: A-DATA Value Series 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Memory: 36.99

HD: Western Digital WD1200AAJS 120GB 7200 RPM 8MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM 44.99

Optical Drive: LITE-ON Black 20X DVD+R 8X DVD+RW 8X DVD+R DL 20X DVD-R 6X DVD-RW 12X DVD-RAM 16X DVD-ROM 48X CD-R 32X CD-RW 48X CD-ROM 2MB Cache SATA DVD Burner - Retail: 33.99

Video Card: XFX PVT84JUSD4 GeForce 8600GT 256MB 128-bit GDDR3 PCI Express x16 HDCP Ready SLI Supported Video Card - Retail: 109.99

Case: COOLER MASTER Centurion 534 RC-534-KKN2-GP Black Aluminum & Mesh bezel / SECC Chassis ATX Mid Tower Computer Case: 39.99

PSU: CORSAIR CMPSU-550VX ATX12V V2.2 550W Power Supply 90 - 264 V UL, CUL, CE, CB, FCC Class B, TUV, CCC, C-tick - Retail: 89.99

Total cost before tax and shipping: 495.92



I've already got Windows XP Pro to throw on there, and of course a mouse and keyboard which won't be much. Really, the only thing I'm up in the air about is the video card, but I've got a feeling it'll handle WoW fine. Again, any feedback would be appreciated!

It looks good enough for WoW, IMO. There's a risk though that she will discover some other games later which will require more power. If you have another $150 or so I'd recommend upgrading the PSU to Corsair 550VX and the video card to HD 3850 512MB.

No clue about that motherboard. MSI gets some serious criticism in forums about their motherboards. For all I know the one you picked is perfect, so don't take this too seriously. Just do some more research. See if you can find an Asus or Gigabyte for example.

Made a few tweaks based on the suggestions here, so much obliged. : )

As far as onboard video goes, I'm not familiar with that partciular chipset, but I've never been satisfied with the quality of onboard video. I think I'm pretty happy with what I've got picked out. I'll probably do some checking on other sites to compare prices. I'm still totally open to suggestion.