Basic Budget PC

Last Updated: 27 July 2008

In this category of personal computers the main priority is pricing, with reliability as a close second consideration. Price has always been the number one concern of most Malaysian PC buyers.

While performance is important, we do not consider it a top priority when building a budget system; it is something that is considered after the total cost and system reliability has been established. This is not to say that performance is ignored - it has just taken a back seat due to budget constraints. We also believe that you're more than likely to be keeping this budget system for quite a long time without modification - at least 2½ to 3 years. Some of our clients are still running their Intel Celeron 333 MHz PCs purchased over five years ago!

Speakers & Hard Disc Drive

Speaker: Labtec® Spin™ 45 Hard Disc Drive: 40 GB Western Digital 400 JB 7,200 rpm c/w 8MB buffer
Approximate Retail Price: RM 240

Speakers are a basic requirement for any system, but they aren't that important overall. Labtec makes a great pair of 2.0 speakers, dubbed the Spin 45. These are excellent budget speakers for users who also want to have at least decent sound quality for training videos and music listening. There is no subwoofer, but that's unnecessary unless you're want a more powerful "earthquake" experience.

Western Digital makes well priced budget hard discs that are noticeably faster than the 5,400 rpm drives. Depending on what type of office tasks you perform, a 7200 rpm drive like the Western Digital 400 JB is going to be faster than pretty much any 5,400 rpm hard drive on the market, and all for a little extra money. 40GB should be more than enough if you're just storing mostly Word, Excel or PowerPoint documents, Outlook or Outlook Express e-mail, and some MP3's. Reliability is always a big deal when you're talking about important data, and luckily, this particular series of Western Digital drives has gained wide acceptance around the industry as extremely reliable.

Optical Storage, Keyboard & Mouse

CD Writer: LiteOn 52x 32x 52x + 16x COMBO Keyboard & Mouse: Microsoft Internet Hardware Value Pack (PS/2)
Approximate Retail Price: RM 250

LiteOn has done a good job with their CD-RW drives, which is why we decided to recommend them. You can burn music CD's in mere minutes, and even a full 700MB or 800MB with the appropriate media can be burned in a matter of 15-20 minutes depending on exactly what type of files you're burning. You really can't go wrong with this bit of hardware. With a 16X DVD reader, you can now watch DVDs on your PC too!

It's important that you purchase the right keyboard and mouse. Different people have different preferences for a keyboard's feel and look, and the same goes for a mouse. Therefore, we suggest that you personally try out and test a keyboard and a mouse for yourself if you find our recommendation unsuitable to your tastes. We suggest that you start with Microsoft and Logitech keyboards and mice.

Summary of Recommendations

The final price of our basic office and home PC is RM 2,010. This is the price for the bare components and does not include assembly costs (Micronet Solutions charges RM 100 for assembly and testing, including a 48 hour burn in process) and any money that you'll spend on software. If you are technically inclined, opting for open source software like Fedora Project or Mandrake Linux may cut some costs. Otherwise, you will need to spend approximately RM 350 on Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition (OEM licence). You can also download open source office applications like Open Office should you find the price of Microsoft Office too steep.

We have deliberately left out any dial up or ADSL modems in this system. If you opt to subscribe to TM Net Streamyx, you will find that there are offers of free modems in abundance! The MSI mainboard has a 10/100 Mbps Ethernet port to enable you instant connection to the broadband ADSL modems.

This system also has room for upgrades. There is the SATA-150 RAID controller that will enable you to fit a pair of Western Digital Raptor 10,000 rpm hard drives, should you feel the need for more speed! With its ample count of PCI slots, a video capture card or an IEEE 1394 Firewire card will turn your PC into a video editing station. With a higher end video card, you can start to play some serious games too! So, if you feel the need to upgrade about one or two years down the road, this system is still good enough to accept the upgrades that you will be throwing at it.

Here is a summary of the system:

CPU:	AMD Sempron™ 64 2600+
Mainboard:	MSI K8NGM-V (nVidia GeForce 6100 + nForce 410)
Graphics Card:	on board integrated nVidia GeForce 6100
Memory:	1 X 1 GB Apacer PC3200 (CAS2.5)
Monitor:	Samsung SyncMaster™ 795MB 17" MagicBright™ Flat-Tube
Case:	HEC Compucase 6C28
Sound Card:	Onboard 6 channel software audio codec Realtek ALC655
Networking:	VIA 8237 integrated MAC + Realtek 8201BL PHY
Speaker:	Labtec® Spin™ 45
Hard Disc Drive:	40 GB Western Digital 400 JB 7,200 rpm c/w 8 MB buffer
CD Writer:	LiteOn 16x52x32x52 Combo
Keyboard & Mouse:	Logitech Multimedia Keyboard and Optical Mouse
SYSTEM TOTAL:	RM 2,010

This isn't going to come close to breaking any speed records, but entry level systems

Our basic office or home PC isn't going to be breaking any speed records, but baseline systems have started to perform better and better over the years. This great value RM 2,010 system is the result of that progress and it even outperforms higher priced systems such as those based on the Intel® Celeron® processor. There are very few places that you can find a better system than this for the money.

Please contact us if you want to get your hands on this system!