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$800 Budget PC Buyer’s Guide -- Updated Prices and Parts For October 2008

Benson Hong — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 11:00:00 -0500

As some of you may recall, we featured a Budget Badass Buyer’s Guide at the beginning of the month to provide some guidance to those looking for solid performance at what we, Maximum PC, would consider to be a reasonable price. We read your responses to the build and many felt that $1500 was a bit over what the typical user would consider “budget.” So, we took it a step further and created a Budget PC below the $1500 mark. In fact, we even dropped it under $1000. At $800, we couldn’t quite figure out if it would even be possible to construct a PC that could play the latest games or even do some basic photo-manipulation in Photoshop. We stepped up to the challenge and built this Budget PC and put it to the test against our hardcore, $5000 machines to see how they match up.

Since we are still in the process of assembling the rig, benchmarks have yet to be run. For now, we give you our parts list. Check back soon for the results from our tests!

Budget Badass Buyer’s Guide -- Updated Prices and Parts For October 2008

Benson Hong — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 11:00:00 -0500

Since our last Budget Badass update back in July, the hardware industry has made some dramatic turns as far as new technology goes. With the release of the energy-efficient Penryn core from Intel, we took a side step away from the Kentsfield core and took a swing at the Q9300. While the Q9300 sports a slightly smaller cache than the Q6600, we found the Penryn to perform better in our tests. With the extra leeway we had in the budget from the previous configuration, we also swapped out the Radeon 4870 for a beefier GTX 280 while keeping the final price tag under $1500. Now this, my friends, is what we would like to call a Budget Badass!

What Could $100 Buy in Three Years? A: One Gallon of Gas B: A Laptop

Benson Hong — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 16:05:51 -0500

We thought maybe Jointech's $99 mini laptop would be the first sub $100 notebook to make it big in the market, but Gartner analysts say that the prices of mini-notebooks are unlikely to drop to that magical price range for at least another three years. Analysts warn, though, that the focus of breaking the $100 barrier should be shifted to other issues related to mini-notebooks such as determining relevant hardware specifications and power requirements.

Annette Jump, research director at Gartner, believes that the declining prices of hardware along with the increased demand for the devices could potentially reduce prices by 10 to 15 percent in the next two to three years. Will this decline in prices be enough to break the $100 barrier? Jump believes that in order for mini-notebooks to be successful in the consumer and business realm, they should not be considered a computing device but rather a device to explore the Internet and a way for people to work, play, and communicate.

“We expect to see increased product innovation in the PC market during the next few years,” said Ms. Jump. “Mini-notebooks will create opportunities to reach many buyers across all regions, both in mature markets as additional devices, and in emerging markets as PCs.”

July 2008: PC Hardware Hacks

The Maximum PC Staff — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 19:02:40 -0500

In the PDF archive of the July 2008 issue, you can find:

12 DIY Hardware Hacks
Budget Case Roundup
Midrange GPU Deathmatch
How To: Organize and Tag Your Videos
Awesome Product Reviews, including the excellent Thermaltake Duorb
Ask the Doctor
Rig of the Month
The Watchdog
And a whole lot more!

Click the big giant cover image to the right to download the PDF archive today!

Budget Badass Buyer’s Guide -- Updated Prices and Parts For July 2008

Norman Chan — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 19:48:35 -0500

Back in our April 2008 issue, we showed you how to configure and build a $1,500 no-compromises PC. Our budget badass wasn’t just an affordable “lean machine,” it performed admirably in our system benchmarks, earning respectable scores in comparison to our desktop testbed. Now that it’s several months later, and we wanted to give you an update to our component recommendations. Not only have hardware prices dropped since we wrote the story, but new technologies and products have also emerged that give you more for your money. In fact, our no-compromises $1,500 PC now only costs $1,320, that’s including upgraded parts. By Grabthar’s Hammer, what a savings!

Read on to find out how we configured our new Budget Badass.

Budget Cases Reach New Heights

David Murphy — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 16:58:33 -0500

Selecting the perfect computer case is like scouting the grocery store for a bottle of wine. And as oenophiles of all knowledge levels and palates know, you can’t judge a bottle by its price. In that sense, we’re scooping from the bargain bin in this month’s mega-roundup of computer cases: Only chassis priced at $100 or less are eligible.

Just because a case is cheap doesn’t mean it’s poor. So before you plunk down a pile of cash on your next case, see how these sub-$100 boxes stack up against their pricier brethren.

Antec Three Hundred

David Murphy — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 15:36:00 -0500

We find ourselves wondering how a company like NZXT can do a better job of creating a budget version of Antec’s gamer line than Antec itself. That’s not to say the Three Hundred is a bad case; it just has little that’s special.

Hit the jump to discover what, if anything, the Three Hundred has to offer.

NZXT Tempest

David Murphy — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 14:30:39 -0500

Does something about this case look familiar? That’s the first thing we said when pulling NZXT’s Tempest out of the box. Save for a few minor modifications to the chassis, this case is a carbon copy of Antec’s Nine Hundred chassis. It’s built like the Nine Hundred, performs like the Nine Hundred, and even glows like the Nine Hundred, thanks to its front- and side-panel blue LED fans.

And yeah, that's a good thing. Hit the jump for deets.