On Sat, 14 Jul 2012 14:53:57 -0700, Oren wrote:

Seeking opinions of current parts.


This is the wrong group, I'm sure-- but the last 3 I put together were
'bare bones' from either Newegg or geeks.com.

The last one was from geeks.com a few months ago--
A *de*branded HP-
slimline tower- dual core E6700 processor 3.2GHz, 2GB ram, 750GB HDD,
DVD burner- wireless keyboard & mouse- $200.

It would have been a real breeze if I'd known that hardware could be
OS dependent. I spent a couple days trying to figure out why it
wouldn't work before I emailed geeks and asked for help. They sent
me to the HP page with the driver set-- which was only available for
Windows 7 -- So I bought a copy of windows 7, retired my XP CD- and
I've got a pretty nice machine for $300-- and a Windows 7 CD for the
next box.

[I think my last monitor came from Walmart or Staples]

Jim