Is this a nice computer?

[uranium2011]

I've been wanting to upgrade my old, crappy, desktop for a while now. I have a question though, is this a good computer for the cost. I wanted to custom build a computer, but upon further research, the price is slightly problematic. Hardware alone adds up to $1000, without an OS, monitor, or any other necessary parts. And the chance I screw up the assembly just adds to the possible price of a few hundred dollars. The computer I currently have my eyes on looks good, and its cheap for what you get (I think, I'm not that tech savvy). I want to buy it before the dreaded Oct. 26th release of Windows 8 (or the end of the Windows OS for the pc). I plan on upgrading the graphics card to a 2GB Nvidia GeForce GT630 for 50 dollars. I would use it for mild gaming and all purpose use. Any help or suggestions would be appreciated.

http://www.shopping.hp.com/en_US/home-office/-/products/Desktops/HP-Pavilion/B4J27AV;pgid=G4tAZAw0JNJSRpMhk6ZxGxz80000m7unJp1C;sid=nplYogBjVMrioVBYxonyKthslELVCTR_W8wJTJx_lELVCcYSE6yc1Nms?HP-Pavilion-HPE-h8-1360t-Desktop-PC

[Jay?]

It's not bad, and if you qualify for that savings, it's pretty good. Great if you're a tudent and can take advantage of that free xbox thing that HP does with some machines.

However, you could get a better machine by using one of those places that builds machines bit by bit rather than buying from the manufacturers site. You could save even more (or get much better performance) by building it yourself (which is much easier than it sounds), and just buying the hardware off of newegg and whatnot.

[TaylorsTekkit]

This is the one I first got. All you have to do is upgrade the GeForce GTS 250 to a better one, so that the performace isn't bottlenecking in games. I got about 600 FPS in Minecraft on max settings with the GTS though.

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=2021639&CatId=2628

Oh, and it is listed as coming with 500GB HDD, but in reality it comes with 1TB!

[cmwatford]

If you have to ask then no. But seriously I'd go with what Jay said. It's usually better in the long run to build it yourself than buy something from dell, hp, etc.

[uranium2011]

It's not bad, and if you qualify for that savings, it's pretty good. Great if you're a tudent and can take advantage of that free xbox thing that HP does with some machines.

However, you could get a better machine by using one of those places that builds machines bit by bit rather than buying from the manufacturers site. You could save even more (or get much better performance) by building it yourself (which is much easier than it sounds), and just buying the hardware off of newegg and whatnot.

Sorry to revive an old thread, but I've decided on custom building a computer. So far I've bought the Gigabyte motherboard 990FXA-UD3, an AMD 6100, and a Corsair Carbide 300R case. I'm thinking about getting a GeForce GTX-550 Ti from Gigabyte. I know this isn't a complete list, but I don't want to overspend when I go buy the hardware at Microcenter and so I'm taking it in strides. Any suggestions are greatly appreciated.

[Jay?]

Well, the GTX-550 Ti is dual sli, and i have two of them in my machine. If you can afford an extra after you've got your machine all put together, you should consider it. Just make sure you have adequate cooling and power source to handle it.