Need help finding a cheap and worthy desktop.

[nicktricktricky]

Hello, lately I have been getting into gaming and falling in love with World of Warcraft. I was previously running it on a 2002 Compaq laptop with specs so low I won't even bother talking about them.

A few weeks ago my laptop finally broke down after nearly 8 years and I "upgraded" to my parent's 2004 desktop.

It is an HP Pavilion 714x with:
3100+ AMD Athlon XP Processor
512 MB PC2700 DDR SDRAM Memory
160 GB 7200RPM Ultra DMA Harddrive
Integrated graphics with 64mb shared video memory.

The machine runs WoW with little to no lag, however the graphics are horribly bad.

I am looking to upgrade to a more "modern" computer with better gaming specifications for around $500-600 if all possible.

Thanks,
Nick

 

[nicktricktricky]

Also I have heard that building my own computer is a lot cheaper, but I wouldn't know where to start being a greenhorn with this stuff.

 

[xaira]

x2 240
5570/5670
4gb or maybe even 2gb ddr3
if u dont get help by later ill go and actually look for parts

 

[nicktricktricky]

x2 240
5570/5670
4gb or maybe even 2gb ddr3
if u dont get help by later ill go and actually look for parts

Could I possibly get a link for that computer? Specs don't mean much to me because I am quite clueless about computers.

 

[Bluescreendeath]

youtube and forums ahve plenty of guides on building computers. There are plenty of start-to-finish computer building guides on youtube.

 

[ksampanna]

This would be perfect for you:
http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/cpu-gpu-overclock,review-31923.html

Go through it carefully, so that atleast you understand what goes into a PC. Order all of those parts & then with help of someone with experience in building PCs, assemble them together.