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Solved Forum question

Started by hoorhay | | 3 answers
Can I use parts from standard towers like Dell, HP, Emachines etc etc?
I have a gaming tower I've been building/upgrading a bit. I just got an r9 280X but I'm still running it with a q9400 c2q and 4GB DDR2 with an old p35 mobo. So obviously I have some things to upgrade. However like most people my money is tight and I don't have the 400-600 to spend to get my planned upgrades.

I'm just curious, as I've seen people from my town and surrounding towns selling their relatively new basic desktops for cheap, and I've contacted some to see if I could haggle them off their price a bit and have done so successfully sometimes, just to see if I could. I could end up with just the tower of like a dell with a 3rd or 4th gen i5 8gb ddr3 and obviously an intel mobo. Would I be able to port these over to my tower? For the 2-3 instances I've researched, the mobos fit per size reqs etc. I just don't know enough about compatibility to say whether or not an intel mobo in an oem company like dell's build would apply with their cpu and ram in my build. I'd be a cheaper option for me ultimately.

I've also been trying the same thing with people selling old gaming rigs as well, but it'll end up costing me relatively the same for perhaps slightly less. Like with the dells/hp I could get the tower for 200-350 saving a bit for a much stronger processor and more progressive ram. Down side being, most if not all intel mobos have only one gpu slot?

I've been talking to some people selling their gaming towers. One with an 2500k, which would be somewhat comparable to the 4960k I'd planned to purchase new when funds allow. Then a bunch of throw away parts I'd hold onto as back up, like 550W weird brand psu and 650ti lol. But they ask like 500+ often which would be in the same price ballpark as my new parts.

My main question is obviously, whether or not getting the OEM company tower for quick solution upgrades is possible? Not preferable

thanks
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Best solution chosen by hoorhay

September 29, 2014 7:55:25 PM

Apart from the general compatibility issues , there shouldn't be proprietary problems using the OEM parts. Of course, the OEM parts are going to be the cheapest parts available.

CPU socket , PCI slot, SATA compatibility issues do apply.
September 29, 2014 7:25:05 PM

So, if I found a decent deal for a stock dell tower with an intel mobo, 8GB DDR3 and an i5 2400. The parts wouldn't have any sort of odd incompatibilities because they're from Dell? If so this is definitely where I'll focus my efforts as I see people post really cheap but newish model towers everyday which I could much sooner bring my rig up to my 280X's performance level. Tired of overclock q9400 >.<
September 29, 2014 7:14:05 PM

Yes , you can do that. The results are limited though. Hard drives, optical drives, fans would all be possibilities. Motherboards and CPUs are best used in the original system due to diminishing returns.

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