Bare bones system

[Dreamboat Annie]

Hi!

I'm looking to buy a bare bones system...nothing extravegant, just basics to start with. Can anyone recommend good, reliable, and reasonably priced dealers/vendors in this catagory? I would appreciate any feedback.

Thanks!

[daveleau]

I usually buy from Multiwave (www.mwave.com). Haven't bought a barebones system but I buy most of my parts from them.
Dave

[LED]

http://www.************.com/pw.htm
or you can check
http://www.resellerratings.com/

[Skeeter]

Barebones systems are usually just a
case / motherboard pair which may or may
not have been FCC certified together.
Sometimes you get a cheap keyboard/mouse
with it too. Unfortunately

I say find the motherboard you want, get
a good case and start from there. I'm
a big fan of AOpen. I like their mobos
and cases. There's lots of threads about
cases in here and there's a whole forum
on mobos...

[Dreamboat Annie]

Thanks to everyone for all your suggestions and ideas.

I just bought this used PC (Compaq Prolinea 575e) for $50 from my employer. It has a 2GB hard drive and 32 MB RAM, which I upgraded to 48 MB with memory I had in my 486.

The problem is that I want to upgrade, and the fastest processor I could put into this case is 166 mhz (according to Compaq) and I would have to buy a special board from them for about the same cost as what a 400Mhz barebones system would cost(while I realize Compaq will tell me this to sell me their own products, I don't know enough about motherboards to know if any other type will fit into my case). I can use my own hard drive and memory and probably my floppy drive. I'm a bit of a novice, but I am familiar with (a fair amount of) the insides of my PC, and I really want to do the installations myself. To me, that is the best part of upgrading! I once installed a CDROM drive in my 486, and that was pretty easy. What I REALLY want is a Ricoh MP7060S CD/RW drive, and that requires AT LEAST 166 mhz. At the same time, I would like to do all of this as cheaply as possible without risking quality.

If anyone has a better idea, I'm all ears!

[Dreamboat Annie]

By the way, I forgot to tell you all what a GREAT site this is! Everyone here is so nice! I know I will learn a lot from all of you. I just hope I can make some worthy contributions of my own

Thanks!

[grandslammer]

Annie, I love that name, and the song, and the woman it was written for!

You seem like a real nice person, too.

Glad to have you here at Sysopt, the best board on the 'net

Mike P.

[noresull]

Annie,

I would suggest, you go to the Compaq support forum, post a question, and HOPEFULLY they will respond! Although, I have used this site several times, but it hasn't helped me at all, although some of the posts say it helped them! I myself don't like the site, but it could help you!

[scotter]

annie for about $200.00 or less you could buy a new case motherboard and CPU then use all the older extras from the system you have now as in the hard drive Cd-rom memery sound and video etc etc. if you go with a SS7 board a AMD k-6-2 and Cheap ATX case you could do for around 150.00

[Axel]

Annie - what's the system for? What do you want to run? Do you intend on expanding the system as more funds become available?
Have you thought about buying a used system?

As you are in Seattle, have you thought about driving down to Portland in 4 hours so you don't have to pay any taxes on the system?

Also, GTE has offices all over the state, look for an inventory recovery office within GTE and go buy a nice used P 100 HP system for a few hundred. You might even find a P120 if you wait a few weeks. If you have a few months, I know that there will be some HP P200 systems available. There are a lot of P75's out there you can pick up really cheap.

I got my HP 17" monitor at a GTE Inventory Recovery office for $95 and it was virtually new. Love it.

[richamies]

I have a P100 here and it is more than adequate for what I do. I only upgraded because encoding MP£'s took so long. If all you want to do it browse the internet and type some letters etc then a good cheap second hand system will do fine....If you want to go further then a second hand system can be good too as you can upgrade and expand it yourself, and if you run into problems with it, most people here will offer good sound unbiased advice. Let us know what you will be using the system for and everyone here will have some thoughts for you.....

[bub]

Well... I haven't bought from them, but many recommend http://www.sunshinestar.com

They have a complete Intel 366/Abit MB system for $499 less monitor. Only thing is the cpu probably won't overclock cause they also sell guaranteed 366 @ 550mhz cpu's.

As already mentioned, mwave.com is a good source and they do have bare bones systems.

Don't know about your Compact system, but many have sound & video built-in the motherboard. If that's the case, the only thing you've got for salvage is a hard drive, CD ROM, floppy, and maybe memory.