Dan Schlitt <[email protected]> writes:

>It looks like I will be needing to replace my Dell machine running ubuntu.
>
>What is a good source for such a machine? A tower configuration is 
>prefered. Other detaied requirements are probably simple to get.


You left us to guess at your budget or affinity/aversion to a prebuilt versus 
DIY machine. 


If you want *nothing* to do with DIY, the prebuilt machine URLs, like zareason, 
are the way to go. You pay for what you want and you do not pay for a Windows 
license you won't use.

However, if your budget demands that you consider a DIY project, let me point 
out that you can reuse a number of components on your existing machine. 


Most upgrades "because my box is dead or dying" don't imply you have a sudden 
need for upgraded components. You can probably readily reuse the following:
Hard Drive
Optical media drive (CD/DVD/BD)
Graphics card

You may be able to reuse the following, depending on how far adrift from the 
standard ATX form factor your Dell housing is:
Case
Power Supply

This leaves the Motherboard, and it's most dependent components, the CPU and 
RAM. Likely you  will need to replace all three of these minimum. 
Motherboards with 4 RAM slots and support for multiple Intel CPUs can cost 
around $150. Asus and Gibabyte use commonly found chipsets, they are what 
Hackintosh builders use. E.g.,
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131837

An i5 would be a midpoint CPU, for $220. E.g., 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115072


16GB of DDR3 1600 RAM is around $100. E.g., 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820145347


So for $470, you can upgrade with headroom for the future if you can reuse the 
other components. And I deliberately did not choose the least expensive item in 
each of the three categories.


If you can't reuse the Dell case and power supply, call it ~$600. That's still 
a substantial savings over a prebuilt. 


BTW, if a MicroCenter is near you, my experience is that they have the best 
deals on CPUs. 

e.g., a 3.5GHz i7 for $220:
http://www.microcenter.com/product/376491/Core_i7_2700K_35GHz_LGA_1155_Boxed_Processor

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