Getting a system... what should be in it?

[david]

Okay, by the end of the summer I'll have enough money to either build or buy my own machine.

What should I get?
I'll have anout 2000$ CAN to play with.
I'm looking for stuff that'll work perfectly with linux, as in cd-rw, sound card, etc.
I already have a 15gig hard drive.

What I want:
CD-RW and (maybe) DVD drive
Good sound card
maybe 17" monitor, if i have enough
graphics card
1 Ghz processor, more likely to be AMD(or are the P4's faster?)

Other misc. stuff I'll need:
Case
Floppy drive
Power supply
Mobo
ext. modem


So what kind of recommendations can you give me?

thanks!

[Gamepro86x]

I'm new to linux but I've been looking around at the compatability listings and seeing how easy it is when I setup linux myself... it detects almost everything! as long as u dont get stuff that is very uncommon anyway...

I DON'T recommend the P4's from benchmarks a Athlon can be like almost double as fast in some cases... Intel's P4's still got problems

If you want to go P3 1GhZ thats rock solid though...

My specs are:
HP CD-RW 9300 Series (10x4x32)
PIII 733 flip chip
384MB Ram
SB AWE 64
Voodoo3 3500
Realtec network card
52x cd rom
floppy (of course)

[fancypiper]

The Cheap Linux Box (http://www.math.sunysb.edu/~comech/tools/CheapBox.html) site should have valuable info for you.

[bdg1983]

With $2000 Cdn, you should be able to get a pc with perhaps a 19" monitor.

M/B $200
AMD $250
Soundcard $50
CDRW $150
Video $150
Case $60
Memory (256MB) $75
HD (40GB) $200

19" monitors are around $500 these days, so you should have enough left over to get one.

[Molecule Man]

http://arstechnica.com/guide/system/godbox.html

A bit more but you can cut down the price by cutting out several things like scsi raid or a Live!value instead of a platinum.

[PaleoKing]

19" monitors are around $500 these days, so you should have enough left over to get one.
Not bad, but here's (http://direct.mwave.com/mwave/ProdMTR-VIE.hmx?UID=&CID=&updepts=MTR&DNAME=%3Cb%3EMonitors%3C%2Fb%3E&Back=ProdMTR-VIE.hmx?) a very respectable (.26 pitch) Viewsonic for half that. I would definitely get the biggest monitor you can afford (see the Cheap Linux Box link above for reasons why). 19" inchers are so cheap... it only makes sense.

[david]

anyone know of any good online canadian stores?
dell.ca is broken.

[bdg1983]

Not bad, but here's a very respectable (.26 pitch) Viewsonic for half that

I was thinking Canadian $$$ and the $500 was a rough estimate. $265 plus 40% exchange rate would be around $500.

Sorry as I don't know of any online stores. I always shop in person.