Super Cheap Computers

We need about 4 new machines at work, and they only need to run a web browser, MSN Messenger, and Quickbooks.

Do you think it's cheaper/better to buy used stuff off of ebay, or build one from parts?

We're looking to spend less than $200 per machine, so obviously price is the only consideration. A 20gb hard drive is fine, and integrated audio/video/lan on the motherboard is great. Cheap case, 1ghz processor, whatever.

What do you think is the best way to go? Any suggestions? I've been looking around at newegg.com and it doesn't look like it would be a problem to build a system that cheap.

If you don't have them under a lot of load then just about anything will work. The older machines will be slow(er) if you plan on running winblows on them. So you might be better off buying new ones.

Used stuff is hit and miss. Some machines are fine, others have been beaten to hell and back and someone figures they can dump them to some sucker on ebay.

Is the web server just for development at work?

We aren't going to have a web server or anything. We just bought an 8-port router/switch, and now we just need the other computers for the offices, shipping, etc. Our sites are hosting with InsiderHosting.

What is your network plan? A picture would be ideal. Some quick sketch.

One thing to remember if you set up a bunch of computers in an office and don't have a central location for files you run into workgroup hell, kind of like dependency hell in the linux world.

I am not sure how big your office is or how many work there. But if I had an idea I might be able to make some suggestions....

Here is an awesome sketch of our setup!

"my computer" and the engraving computer are the only ones that have to be fast. The rest can be crap.

the "print server" is actually just an old pentium II with the old printer drivers on it. When I download the new drivers for the laser printer and use it on a newer computer, it starts printing colors wrong. so i just left the old drivers on there and used the old machine.

as you can see, our 8-port router will already be full after we get all those computers, so i don't quite know what to do about that.

Some questions...

What are the unnamed machines for? Just desktops? Are you planning on bringing in more workers?

Will the production, shipping, engraving, and your computers need to talk to each other and share files?

Yeah they're all just crap desktops, except for mine and engraving. The engraving/my machine/production computers will need to share files. The rest aren't that' imperitive, but they're all on the same network, so they can all share files, yes?

That should be all the computers we'll need for now. Even if we get more people they probably won't need more computers.

actually they all need to share files... like all the computers up at the front where that little L shape is, those will all be running quickbooks to do our finances and stuff.

In your situation you are big enough where a file server would be usefall. Doesn't have to be a real "hardware server" but might be useful - a pc will work fine, but not a cheapo - you don't want your essential business backend running on a $200 pc. When you set up using the workgroup method you will run into versioning problems or workgroup hell at times, that is why I am suggesting a file server. But your outfit may be well organised +)

If your printer has a network card you can slap it onto the network and get rid of that p2 pc and make it your firewall before the router. A router has some firewalling going on, but it isn't that intelligent.

If you set up a pc fileserver, get it with a RAID mobo, which is pretty cheap now. Then put it with RAID1 and 2 hdd's... The higher the number the better the RAID, but cheap cards are usually 0 or 1. 1 would be mirrored. 0 is pointless. 1 will be the slowest, but you won't have that big a load to notice.

You can get shuttle pc's for under $200. You can't upgrade them much, but they have everything you need for a basic desktop. and they are sooo cute and tiny *pffft*

You should also get some Ghosting software. Get each station set up, Ghost it and save a mirror of it somewhere. Should you have a drive failure or need to add a workstation it'll save a lot of time, or if you get a crap load of viruses / spyware you can just wipe it and reinstall off the image.

I can see that your boss is trying to spend as little as possible, which is fine, but you have to plan for the worst scenario. If your building burnt down would you be able to get your business up and running in a few hours? Storing backups offsite, you can take them home if you like, centralised files, and ghosted hdd's will make rebuilding your network much simpler and less costly in the long run.

Just a suggestion. But I think you could get away with a few cheap pc's and one good one, around $600-800 for the good one. Don't skimp on the powersupply in a cheap case either (for a fileserver).

The shuttle pc's are barebone systems for that much though, aren't they? I don't think you could put in the RAM and a HD and processor and still be in under $200?

my boss is already all worked up over paying $200 per computer, so I don't know about a file server.

and no, our place is anything but organized. it's terribly unorganized.