I am going to be perusing a degree starting september, I will be taking it through athabasca university so it will be done mostly online.
Currently the only PC I have is a netbook, and while it has served as my desktop for nearly 5 months now I feel that I will want something more powerful for the start of the term.
The most important tasks that this computer will need to do are basic; word processing, web browsing, streaming media etc.
I would like to use the computer for photo editing, torrent downloading, HD media playback and as a DAW however this is personal use and I would rather get a working computer NOW that can do what I need it to and focus on these tasks later with an upgrade.
[my apologies if this post seems scrambled, I am working a night job and it is currently 4 am my time. still getting used to this kind of shift work]
I already have the following components:
samsung 22" monitor
keyboard/mouse/speakers etc
samsung 1tb hdd
OS (windows 7 RC)
antec 300 case
LG DVD burner
I will be buying all my parts in canada from ncix, however I generally use newegg.ca for pricing as ncix will price match them and they seem to have better prices.
these are the parts I am considering purchasing:
ASRock A780GXE motherboard - 99$
AMD Phenom II X2 550 BE - 123$
G.SKILL 2 x 2GB DDR2 1066 - 68.99$
antec earthwatts EA500 500w - 87.49
this brings me to a total of $379.47. I MAY be interested in overclocking in which case I would invest in a better cooler and a better motherboard if needed. I will not decide on this until I see some OC results from this CPU.
For an upgrade path, I would like to add an SSD drive, a better CPU (perhaps the x4 BE CPU), graphics card and another 4gb of ram. I will be purchasing this PC hopefully early july and putting up to 500$ in upgrades around december. I am willing to purchase more expensive parts as long as it is still a value centric system.
Currently the only PC I have is a netbook, and while it has served as my desktop for nearly 5 months now I feel that I will want something more powerful for the start of the term.
The most important tasks that this computer will need to do are basic; word processing, web browsing, streaming media etc.
I would like to use the computer for photo editing, torrent downloading, HD media playback and as a DAW however this is personal use and I would rather get a working computer NOW that can do what I need it to and focus on these tasks later with an upgrade.
[my apologies if this post seems scrambled, I am working a night job and it is currently 4 am my time. still getting used to this kind of shift work]
I already have the following components:
samsung 22" monitor
keyboard/mouse/speakers etc
samsung 1tb hdd
OS (windows 7 RC)
antec 300 case
LG DVD burner
I will be buying all my parts in canada from ncix, however I generally use newegg.ca for pricing as ncix will price match them and they seem to have better prices.
these are the parts I am considering purchasing:
ASRock A780GXE motherboard - 99$
AMD Phenom II X2 550 BE - 123$
G.SKILL 2 x 2GB DDR2 1066 - 68.99$
antec earthwatts EA500 500w - 87.49
this brings me to a total of $379.47. I MAY be interested in overclocking in which case I would invest in a better cooler and a better motherboard if needed. I will not decide on this until I see some OC results from this CPU.
For an upgrade path, I would like to add an SSD drive, a better CPU (perhaps the x4 BE CPU), graphics card and another 4gb of ram. I will be purchasing this PC hopefully early july and putting up to 500$ in upgrades around december. I am willing to purchase more expensive parts as long as it is still a value centric system.