my 1st time doing this

[Chris]

well, im brand new to this place, and brand new to building computers, but extremely interested. I wanted to see if any of ya'll could help me out in selecting my components. I bought a book building computers, but it doesnt do so well in naming specifics. I dont have the money right now, but I'm expecting to be recieving much of it soon. I want to try to stay under $1000. I already have a monitor. I dont really know too much about what everything does or what it means, but everyplace I go, everyone seems to like the Athlon 64 CPU's, so I guess I go w/something like that. But, that's about as far as I have figured things out. I'll pretty much just be using my computer for storing and editing music and gaming. Then of course, web browsing and schoolwork, but those dont seem to require much. Is there any one out there who could help me out?

[RipperRoo]

welcome to PCTT Chris,

Originally Posted by Chris

I want to try to stay under $1000.

Originally Posted by Chris

I'll pretty much just be using my computer for storing and editing music and gaming. Then of course, web browsing and schoolwork, but those dont seem to require much.

it very much depends on how serious a gamer you are, if you want to be able to play all the very latest games at full speed with a high frame rate or FPS then unfortunatly games DO require much and a $1000 budget wont build you the machine you want, however thats not to say you wont get a very nice PC for your money.

ask yourself a few questions about what you realy need your system to do, for example you want to edit music, will you be recording sound directly with the system or just chopping up and mixing?

if you need to record its going to mean spending a little more on your sound card, if not a motherboard with onboard sound will do.

do you want all the latest games at full speed or are you satisfied with a mid range performance - and let me say these days even midrange can be impressive.

do you want a case with flashing lights, temp sensors and all the other bells and whistles or will a white box be enough for you?

the answers to these questions will determine the cost of your major componants, show you just where you can shave a bit off your budget and where you need to spend the major portion of your money.

you will find building your own system can be a very rewarding but sometimes frustriating experiance, but i will say this - you will end up with the system YOU want.

[Chris]

I guess gaming is too broad of a term. I dont need to play the latest greatest stuff, or be very close to it, at that matter. But the computer I have now just doesn't cut it for me. I'm sure that I could do something to it to fix that, but I want to build my own anyways.

As far as music goes, I wont be recording, or anything like that. I just want to be able to chop songs up and that sort of thing. Mostly simple stuffI want to make sure that I have enough room to store it too. Right now I have 2.79 Gigabytes worth of music and I'm getting more all the time.

I do want to be able to burn cd's and dvd's. Is that something that I just need to think about when I buy the drive, or will it have an effect on other things I need to buy also?

For a case, I was going to decide what were all of the other parts I needed, how much it would cost me, and see how much money I had spent. If I had the money for it, I wanted to buy something that I could be proud of and show off with, with some cool lights and stuff. But, if I end up spending a lot on everything else, I will just have to settle with a simple box.

Where exactly do I begin? I guess i'll start looking for a motherboard and the processor. What should I look for in paticular? Like I said, I dont know too much about what everything is or what it does, and I know that motherboards have all sorts of different features and what not. Well, thanks for the input. Anything else you could do to help me or steer me in the right direction would surley be appreciated.

[igalan]

Please, take a look at this thread. Anothet user is also in the process of deciding the components; the tips explained there will also help you.