Build Your Own Mini-PC for $80

[KyleSTL]

What about a 200$ pc
http://secure.newegg.com/WishList/PublicWishDetail.aspx?WishListNumber=8460952&WishListTitle=aldo's 200$ PC

Last I checked $200 %u2260 $252 (before shipping)

However, in your case you have a fully-functioning computer for 252USD, and Tom's just has an $80 CPU/MB/memory combo.

Edit: you can drop $30 by only having 1 CPU on the wish list (after all, it is a single-socket MB).

 

[doomsdaydave11]

Sorry kids, the thought of an Intel micro-atx and a Celeron chills my spine. Sure their P35's and up are great, but I hate their lowend boards. I'm going to be paying the extra bucks for an AMD 4850e and a 780G board. 780G rocks for HTPCs.

 

[keeperplanet]

Why did you not review a more current motherboard mini itx: the
Intel D945GCLF Mini-ITX Motherboard which uses the Atom processor. I would really like to see this boards performance compared to the older celeron version of the same board.

 

[nukemaster]

Yes, a Hauppauge 1600 and an OEM Sony card from my old computer with hacked drivers.

Thats what give you an edge. I remember before hardware cards. 2 shows was almost impossible back then.

 

[shadowmaster625]

Why not compare this to:

Intel D945GCLF Mini-ITX Motherboard with Integrated Atom™ Processor (BLKD945GCLF)

??

 

[gwolfman]

Do people even read the previous comments anymore?

@nukemaster & @KyleSTL
Yeah, I had a software based one back in the day and I remember I couldn't run anything on the PC at all while I was capturing or I'd drop frames. hehe

 

[nukemaster]

Why not compare this to:

Intel D945GCLF Mini-ITX Motherboard with Integrated Atom™ Processor (BLKD945GCLF)

??

Its commented above, its slower and I checked reviews. It is a fair bit slower even with HT.

 

[Joe_The_Dragon]

[citation][nom]predaking[/nom]So wait, i'm confused. Is the $80 for the mobo/cpu combo?usually a mini-pc includes, ram, hdd, optical, psu, case, etc.I just checked newegg and they have this board for under $70. But they also have other boards for under $70(mobo/cpu/video card combo) that include pciexpress, more sata ports, upgradable cpu, more pci slots, etc.Heck, this board seems nice. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813135060[/citation]
not only that some those boards come with gig-e, more ram slots, and more pci-e / pci.

 

[KyleSTL]

Do people even read the previous comments anymore?

@nukemaster & @KyleSTL
Yeah, I had a software based one back in the day and I remember I couldn't run anything on the PC at all while I was capturing or I'd drop frames. hehe

Apparently not all of them. My comment was in response to MU-Engineer's post. And I totally agree if my cards were not hardware-accelerated, I'd be dead in the H2O. I was also stating that a Core-based Celeron is not a useless processor like some were implying, it's actually quite capable of most tasks.

 

[KyleSTL]

Sorry for the double post but this is possibly the best Newegg review ever (on the Intel ITX motherboard with Celeron 220):

Pros: Cheap, easy to set up, LOW power consumption, quiet!

Cons: Could use more memory capacity, BIOS limited.

Other Thoughts: DO NOT use Patriot Memory in this. GSKILL worked great. Built it into an old Motorcycle Helmet. Looks cool and works.

Reference
Motorcycle helmet? Exactly what the hell does that look like? Car-puter is so 2004, motoPC is in.

 

[gwolfman]

[citation][nom]KyleSTL[/nom]Apparently not all of them. My comment was in response to MU-Engineer's post. And I totally agree if my cards were not hardware-accelerated, I'd be dead in the H2O. I was also stating that a Core-based Celeron is not a useless processor like some were implying, it's actually quite capable of most tasks.[/citation]
I agree. It runs my web server, ssh gateway, squid, and everything I want and only idles at ~30 watts being pulled from the wall using a pico-PSU (and I'm even using an old 3.5" HDD) Can't beat the efficiency!

 

[gwolfman]

Oh yeah, it'll beat the "Intel Nettop" coming out, which is Atom based. It's definitely a win for me and a cheap, efficient, and reasonable piece of hardware. I plan on modding mine to fit into an original Nintendo (NES) case in the next month. Keep an eye out in the forums for my post once I get around to it.

 

[gglawits]

Interesting review.
Only problem is, the D201GLY2 has gone end-of-life in early July.
That's right, it can no longer be ordered from Intel, all retail orders will just be shipped from existing dealer stock.
So why publish a review of a product that has end-of-life status?

We're actually going to use a 4-figure number of these boards in a special purpose computer and we made sure we put our purchase order in with a major Intel distributor in June.

Btw., we never got the system to draw 55 Watts. We saw 45W max, when we tortured the board with cpuburn or cpu-burn whatever the Linux-based CPU torture test is called.

 

[mmc4587]

a motherboard/CPU combo is not a PC
one would think that THG would know that...

F-

IF YOU WANT A CRAPPY PC:
walk down to the local pawn shop with $50-150 and pick up a an old HP/DELL/etc (OS, Case, Monitor, RAM, PSU, HD, DVD-ROM, etc.. REAL PC's have all the needed components)

 

[jlopezst20]

So.... which would be a better choice for a file server? This D201GLY2, the D945GCLF with the Atom 230 or and old Pentium III Coppermine 1GHz paired with a D815EEA2 Motherboard?

 

[dspear]

The choice of processor is ridiculous, unless this article is designed to convince the young and innocent that they need a fairly expensive machine. A far better choice than the 1.2GHz Celeron would be for example...

AMD Athlon 64 LE-1600 2.2GHz AM2 45W Single-Core Processor ADH1600DHBOX
N82E16819103199 $34.50

PC CHIPS A33G V1.0 AM2 SiS 761 GX Micro ATX AMD Motherboard
N82E16813185083 $43.99 -$10 MIR

This totals $68.49 with the MIR. Generally you can get MIRs somewhere, so I'm counting this.

Of course, you need a few more things to build a computer. These are my choices, which make a fairly usable system for only a few dollars more than bottom components.

Mushkin 1GB 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2-800 Desktop Memory Model 991527
N82E16820146117 $22.99 -$7.50 MIR

RAIDMAX Elite ATX-208BP Black 0.7mm SECC Steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case 450W Power Supply
N82E16811156201 $35.99

Western Digital Caviar SE WD800JB 80GB 7200 RPM IDE ATA100 Hard Drive-OEM
N82E16822144122 $38.99

LITE-ON 20X DVD±R DVD Burner Black IDE Model DH-20A4P-04 - OEM
N82E16827106228 $20.99

BYTECC Black 1.44MB Internal Floppy Drive
N82E16821121001 $6.99

Logitech Office Pro 967452-0403 White PS/2 Standard Keyboard - OEM
N82E16823126002 $4.99

Rosewill RM800P Black 3 Buttons 1 x Wheel PS/2 Wired Optical Mouse - OEM
N82E16826193001 $4.99

Cyber Acoustics CA-2015WW 3 watts 2.0 2 Piece USB Amplified Speaker
N82E16836150009 $4.19

Total for a complete system (less O/S, monitor, printer) is $201.11 with MIRs. A decent economical system has stayed at $200 for several years.

 

[dspear]

The choice of processor is ridiculous, unless this article is designed to convince the young and innocent that they need a fairly expensive machine. A far better choice than the 1.2GHz Celeron would be for example...

AMD Athlon 64 LE-1600 2.2GHz AM2 45W Single-Core Processor ADH1600DHBOX
N82E16819103199 $34.50

PC CHIPS A33G V1.0 AM2 SiS 761 GX Micro ATX AMD Motherboard
N82E16813185083 $43.99 -$10 MIR

This totals $68.49 with the MIR. Generally you can get MIRs somewhere, so I'm counting this. An Intel system would cost maybe $10 more.

Of course, you need a few more things to build a computer. These are my choices, which make a fairly usable system for only a few dollars more than bottom components.

Mushkin 1GB 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2-800 Desktop Memory Model 991527
N82E16820146117 $22.99 -$7.50 MIR

RAIDMAX Elite ATX-208BP Black 0.7mm SECC Steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case 450W Power Supply
N82E16811156201 $35.99

Western Digital Caviar SE WD800JB 80GB 7200 RPM IDE ATA100 Hard Drive-OEM
N82E16822144122 $38.99

LITE-ON 20X DVD±R DVD Burner Black IDE Model DH-20A4P-04 - OEM
N82E16827106228 $20.99

BYTECC Black 1.44MB Internal Floppy Drive
N82E16821121001 $6.99

Logitech Office Pro 967452-0403 White PS/2 Standard Keyboard - OEM
N82E16823126002 $4.99

Rosewill RM800P Black 3 Buttons 1 x Wheel PS/2 Wired Optical Mouse - OEM
N82E16826193001 $4.99

Cyber Acoustics CA-2015WW 3 watts 2.0 2 Piece USB Amplified Speaker
N82E16836150009 $4.19

Total for a complete system (less O/S, monitor, printer) is $201.11 with MIRs. A decent economical system has stayed at $200 for several years.

 

[palladin9479]

I don't understand why Toms is reviewing this one and not comparing it to the various Via Epia platforms. There are dozens of different boards with various configurations that better support different platforms.
http://www.logicsupply.com/categories/mainboards/via_c7

Some have built in HDMI / Component / Digital Audio and are more HTPC-esque, some have dual Gig-E ports for a high speed linux router / Firewall. Or my personal favorite is the Jetway J7F2WE-2G with the 3 Gig-E daughter board add-on. I load CentOS-5 and configure it with Quagga / OpenVPN / Shoreline Firewall / Webmin / Squid / Snort and have it load into run level 3 (so X11 doesn't start up automatically but is available for GUI configuration).

Also something not mentioned is the Padlock technology on these. Requires some tweaking in your kernel to get it to 2.6.19 or higher (most distros come with 2.6.16 or 2.6.18) and recompile OpenSSL with applied patchs. But once its up, I benchmarked a 10-20x increase in packet encryption speed (using AES-256-CBC). I use this puppy as a backbone VPN Router / Network Gateway and it does an amazing job. Encypted transfer speeds across interfaces (2 PCs on different Gig-E interfaces with different IP subnets) at 380+ Mbps. All for under 40W at max load (Board + 1Gig DDR2-667 memory + slim DVD drive + 2.5" 160GB sata drive) with a pico PSU.

The VIA's may be expensive, but you get ALOT of functionality / power for what your paying for. All in a nice small package that can be installed into a mini-ITX case that looks nice. Also cheap on electric bill, I have a few of these are routers and one as a AD server (used a different board though) that never get turned off.

 

[piasabird]

I have an Intel DG35EC MATX Motherboard with an Intel E7200 and 2 gigs of DDR2 and it runs vista just as fast as XP ran on my old system. Has Integrated Intel X35 HD video, and HD Audio. I find the integrated video is excellent.

 

[Ebonflame]

Actually the video is supported under Linux, but one has to find them on the internet and compile them. I believe Intel has the drivers available. With the new driver, X will run without issue. I've used the board under Ubuntu and X with success.

 

[randomizer]

[citation][nom]genored[/nom]Oki my english is a bit bad. But here i go again. The performace of a 4850e is equal to a E6400. Its quite simple to understand that 4850e draws more power then e2140 under load. But the 4850e also outperformes w2140 but a lot of margine.I know the article is not focused on the 4850e but then it souldent eather be focused on e2140 with they did lots of tests on. What pisses me of is that they only thest the crapy sempron in the test from amd's side. Making it look like amd hade nothing to come with. Also the e2140( witch i actally think is a briliant CPU) shines over the sempron and the celeron like it would be the ovios choise. But it would not shine over the 4850e. Also do you randomizer think its fair to compare the CPU's that way. [/citation]
Ok I understand what you are saying now. But what would be the point of putting the 4850e into the benchmark suite? It isn't even in the same league as any of these processors. I don't know why they added it in for the sake of power consumption comparison either when they are comparing a mid-range chip to low-end and bottom-of-the-barrel chips. I doubt this has anything to do with fanboyism, and I don't see how the review shows AMD has nothing to come back with. They compared the lowest end to the lowest end and threw in the E2140 for comparison to a "real" CPU, otherwise you could argue that it wasn't fair to Intel to throw in the superior Sempron with only the Celeron to compete.

 

[jprevost]

This board is a great platform for a small business VOIP system. I've installed Trixbox on it and it works great as a webserver host, router, NAS, etc. I love the darn thing and the CPU usage is very low with most OS's. The driver support in Linux is shoddy. The video card drivers are terrible so if you run a GUI with Linux, expect a huge performance hit, maybe not so bad with xfce but with KDE and GNOME my experience was poor. XP runs flawlessly on this machine. It's actually got a slow bios boot but the OS loads just as fast as my main raptor machine (though it's loaded down with software).

 

[revoddball]

I really find this an unbalanced comparison it is getting compared to fully micro ATX boards and ATX boards as well as full desktop CPU's

It will compared to this fall behind. it should have been compared to similar form factor based boards, the via based boards, the geode, even the rare Intel mobile or am2 solutions.

Also interestingly enough you can clean up the video on this board for use with Unbuntu, and make it a snappy little desktop Linux machine. you just have to do some hunting to get it to work.

and being able to DIY a computer for about 250 bux that will do most everything except heavy media work, and play most video games that's very respectable.

the other part of this is it is a full computer, that with a single fan is about the size of a shoebox. and still very quiet and it will run better than some p3/p4 machine form back in the day that you might want to recycle. (it beats an old beater notebook i have with a 2.2 p4 and 1gb ram i have.)

 

[skythra]

[citation][nom]predaking[/nom]So wait, i'm confused. Is the $80 for the mobo/cpu combo?usually a mini-pc includes, ram, hdd, optical, psu, case, etc.I just checked newegg and they have this board for under $70. But they also have other boards for under $70(mobo/cpu/video card combo) that include pciexpress, more sata ports, upgradable cpu, more pci slots, etc.Heck, this board seems nice. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813135060[/citation]
You've pointed out a fullsize board.. comparing the price of an apple to the price of a bannana under the idea that its a "fruit" doesnt influence the person who's selling them.

Its a low power mini pc. Ie, power consumption, not an underpowered old amd thing that they want to get rid of as excess stock

 

[skythra]

[citation][nom]Ebonflame[/nom]Actually the video is supported under Linux, but one has to find them on the internet and compile them. I believe Intel has the drivers available. With the new driver, X will run without issue. I've used the board under Ubuntu and X with success.[/citation]
Really? Because the integrated video is by sis not intel. So..