My cheap computer system

[Rick in PA]

I know others will have me beat with cheaper systems, but I'm amazed by what technology a little money and scrounging will get.

Computer: HP XW4300 workstation. 150 bucks from ebay. I thought this was a heck of a buy. It's old, but powerfull. Came with a clean, legit install of Windows XP. Runs great.

I added a CD/DVD burner with Lightscribe for about 20 bucks from Newegg and a 3.5 floppy drive that I had scrapped out of an old computer. Also added a 60GB hard drive that an IT friend gave me.

The keyboard came with the computer. It's some cheapy that the seller probably bought a case of, but I like it. It has a groove at the top where you can keep a pen, actually a very nice feature.

The mouse that came with the computer is also a cheapy but it works well enough. I call it "twitchy the mouse". Sometime it can't decide exactly where to place the arrow and it twitches back and forth. I have a second wireless mouse that was a give-away at some symposium years ago.

I just upgraded from a CRT monitor (another leftover from an earlier system) to a flat panel monitor. I paid too much for that, 65 bucks. That's another story.

The printer is an HP 6110 that I picked up for free, it was getting thrown out. I hooked it up with a dollar store USB cable, 1 dollar, of course! The ink cartridges I scrounged-up and refilled. They work fine, although I did have play with them for a while to get them to go.

The table it all sits on: It's one of those "finish it yourself" butcher block types with a sort of late '70s style. I originally put the table together for my Coleco Adam system back in the early '80s and it's seen many computer systems since then. It's a sturdy table and has weathered the years well. That doesn't owe me a penny.

Anyway, that's my cheap computer system. It's been fun putting it together. Got any bits or pieces I might add to it? (chuckling)

 

[lyle]

Those older HP workstations are bulletproof. I'm still using an even older XW4100. It's easy to upgrade components, except for the power supply which is some odd physical size, and dang but those things are heavy. I recently picked up a newer XW4400 and that thing is even heavier.

 

[Rick in PA]

Originally Posted By: lyle
Those older HP workstations are bulletproof. I'm still using an even older XW4100. It's easy to upgrade components, except for the power supply which is some odd physical size, and dang but those things are heavy....


Yeah, I even talked a buddy at work into buying one of these XW4300s fromn the same ebay seller. He got it for $140, it had a little less RAM. Anyway, after he got it he declared it "The Iron Duke" after the underappreciated GM motor.

 

[The_Jeff]

I had a set top box DVD burner fizzle out on me and I pried it apart to find a drive that hooks up with standard IDE and power cables. It's in my machine right now. No case, no face, and the eject button is this goofy little nub.

The box is a hideous yellowed thing from the late 90s. I like to think any burglars will run away from it. Latest MOBO upgrade made me get a ATX12V power supply, $15 from amazon, unbelivably cheap!

XP license peeled off a dumpster computer, works just fine.

 

[bepperb]

My home theater pc is a dual core Atom, it's slow but fanless. Anyway, the whole box cost about 150 and though I really only use it for XBMC and Hulu/Netflix, I'm always amazed at how reasonable in performance/responsiveness it feels. Nothing like a real pc, but perhaps better than a PC from five years ago.

Yeah, the price/performance curve is pretty shallow at the bottom. Once something is three years old most businesses junk the lease, so that really kills resale values of otherwise fine equipment.

 

[uc50ic4more]

For the last year or so I have done all of my non-professional work on a $75 refurb from a local computer store. P4 1.7GHz, 512MBRAM. I added a $15 Nvidia video card purchased on eBay and it runs flawlessly and reasonably quickly using Debian.

If I didn't have some higher end systems for media production, I would need only to invest a few bucks into a DVD burner and bluetooth adapter.

Originally Posted By: bepperb
Yeah, the price/performance curve is pretty shallow at the bottom. Once something is three years old most businesses junk the lease, so that really kills resale values of otherwise fine equipment.


Yup! My $75 machine was off of a corporate lease. In these types of situations I'll often replace the hard drive, as the originals are usually a little smaller than I'd like, as this system is also my home's file server, holding several GB of media.

 

[brianl703]

One of the computers that I use on a regular basis is a Dell OptiPlex GX260 (P4 2.2GHz) I bought for $120 shipped about 2 years ago. My mom also has an OptiPlex GX260 of the same specs from the same place.

Bluetooth adapters are all of about $3 on Ebay.

 

[Cutehumor]

rockin a cheap computer system is awesome. I've had good luck buying a used ebay compaq presario two years ago. I paid $150 for it. lots of folks think their computers are messed up and slow, when it just needs to be cleaned out of spyware. next time I need a pc, I'll buy used.

 

[oilboy123]

My main home one is one I built in 2005 from parts I got at a Frys Grand opening in Seattle. I brought the parts to San Diego where I lived for a couple of years. I finally put it together and got it running.
I let my Brother use it in Oregon, but my two other Gateways went out and now it's my main computer. I do have a little laptop though. It's an Athlon XP 1800+ 1.53 GHz 1Gib ram and 60 GB HD.

I paid I think at the time probably $250 But it's been going for 5 years and I learned a lot putting it together.
I want to just hook up a bigger HD for more storage of things for now.