Would you Reccomend a Refurbished Computer?

Besides TigerDirect CA there are a few other sites people can point to like http://www.canadacomputers.com/ or http://www.memoryexpress.com/index.php?PageTag=&SID= for an effective price shopping.

For any specific item run a good search to see how prices vary between vendors. That's one fast way to keep costs down. You can always start off with the basics until expanding on things later. The current build here was a rush job and cost saver last year by going for a lower end card and 2gb of value ram with a 480w supply bought locally since the old 430w model lacked the 20+4pin connector.

More is being on the new build to see that last for a few years. A 700w supply and flexible case will last while the board, cpu, memory, video card can all be swapped out later. Be a smart shopper and look for bargains while running the current system until you see everything for the lowest total. :D
(board+cpu bundles, rebates on hardwares like video, drives, etc.)
 
I don't care for the case itself while there's 2gb of DDR2 memory. a 250gb sata drive, and a larger supply seen there to support the 8800 card that's in it. It does come with Vista preinstalled however! If that takes a front fan it would probably be an 80mm case fan or just the small front vent. You can plainly see a small fan on the side cover.

That's only about $80CA less then the $1000+US being spent here to complete a new build with part of that being deducted from drives already running in the present case. That's probably a cheap brand 8800 included there as well. For that amount onhand you can easily start picking and choosing stuff for a good case easy enough over staying with a prebuild and it's limitations.
 
That case has a 120mm rear fan and a 90mm ducted side fan.

I wasn't saying it was the best solution, just a decent one. It is completely upgradeable for the future, with nothing being proprietary like an HP or Dell would be.

And I believe from the description of that prebuilt that it has a superclocked card in it. That's what I understand it to mean when it says 8600GT SC video card with 256k ram.

Not a screaming solution, but a good decent one for the price.
 
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Where are you seeing 120 and 90mm fans listed? There was no details shown there or specifications available to look over. A web search for that system brings you right back to memoryexpress.com.
 
From that link of the pre built it says it has a In-Win C583 Case

Well, went to newegg and found this IN WIN IW-C583T case. Looks just like it and it has the 583 in the model number.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811108020

and from the Inwin website.

http://www.in-win.us/products_case_series.php?cat_id=1&series_id=5&model_id=30#here

Buy I was wrong about the side fan, It is ducted for your cpu fan. But I am sure you could add a fan there.

But in the prebuilt they upgraded the psu to 410 watts.
 
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This is the PSU included with the Antec Sonata III case I was looking at.

It's the "Antec EarthWatts 500W"

Picture of Specifications I found on another site:
ant_ea6.jpg


This is decent is it not, probably better than what I would get from a prebuild.

Edit: This is the Case with PSU I was looking at:
http://www.memoryexpress.com/index....tDetail.php&DisplayProductID=10402&SID=220632
 
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Yeah it's probably much better.

Don't get me wrong, I was not telling you to get that other system, just that it was a pretty decent system for the money. And it was completely upgradeable.

If you want to build yourself a system, that's much better.

If you read any of my other threads, I am always saying to stay away from pre builts. Mostly Dell, HP and the other big ones. I hate those with a passion.
 
If you looked over the specifications on that particular case you would have noticed something else about it to be aware of. That would be compatibility with micro atx boards only! The information at newegg and photos show that to be the actual case used. But micro atx for a compact system only.

Meanwhile I was looking over the Earthwatts 500w model here to pull the TP2 550w out for that to sit as a spare. The Earthwatts line is more energy efficient with a power saving mode. The current build will be used to upgrade a relative from an old Socket A build now starting to see problems coming up. Time to upgrade!
 
The actual air flow in that case would be more suitable for a micro atc board over the cooling seen in NZXT, Lian-Li, ThermalTake, Antec, and other far better gaming cases to begin with. While some are complaining about the cramped space in the Antec Nine Hundrad model look at the cooling there or others seeing a 120mm front intake over a smal front vent at the botton seen there.
 
PC eye said:
The actual air flow in that case would be more suitable for a micro atc board over the cooling seen in NZXT, Lian-Li, ThermalTake, Antec, and other far better gaming cases to begin with. While some are complaining about the cramped space in the Antec Nine Hundrad model look at the cooling there or others seeing a 120mm front intake over a smal front vent at the botton seen there.
Click to expand...


Yeah that could be a factor, but from the reviews I have read about it, people seem to think it cools very well. Even with a full size ATX board and a 8600 card in it.

I really am not trying to sell this case by any means. It is not one I would choose for myself. Just saying it's not a bad case.
 
The Antec nine hundred model would be my case of choice, and it's not a bad deal ($120 at memoryexpress) But it's still a little more than I would spend on a case.
 
The time to go for the Antec case is when you see it reduced in price onsale somewhere. Right after buying the AeroCool model in use here for about $80 someone posted a link for it some time back. While someone may complaint about not having room for water cooling the design of the case leans on air cooling there. The twin 120s in the front serve as hard drive coolers as well as intake.
 
You would need to catch a sale on one of the Canadien sites or TigerDirect since they ship to Canada. The prices are low now due to slow business in the summer months when people are on vacations and schools are out. Once the fall schedules begin you will then have to look at any stucent specials for price reductions there maybe a combo with something else? The cardboard box for the case was a little rough suggesting FRYs simply marked them down to clear out the ones left lying around fast.
 
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