My adventures at Newegg- building a desktop to match a laptop

So, I got curious about what it would cost to build a complete desktop system that matched the specs of the Vostro 1500 I recently ordered. I had to make a few concessions; there were no 15.4" destop LCDs so I chose the cheapest 17" and no 5400rpm HDs but I chose the same size at 7200rpm. I basically chose the cheapest option for a matching component but tried to match the same speeds and specs; Core 2 Duo at 1.6Ghz, 965P motherboard... Newegg even had a Geforce 8600GT with DDR2.

Here's the results:

LG 18X DVD±R DVD Burner $27.99

Athenatech Steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case 350W Power Supply $14.99

Western Digital Caviar WD1200BB 120GB 7200 RPM IDE HD $48.99

Hanns·G HW-173DBB Black 17" 8ms DVI Widescreen LCD Monitor $149.99

BIOSTAR GeForce 8600GT 256MB GDDR2 Video Card $109.99

SpecResearch PS/2 Standard Multi-Media Keyboard Mouse Included $6.99

Patriot Signature 1GB (2 x 512MB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 667 $41.99

MSI P965 Neo-F LGA 775 Intel P965 Express ATX Intel Motherboard $86.99

Intel Dual-Core E2140 Allendale 1.6GHz LGA 775 Processor $88.99

Microsoft Windows XP Home With SP2B 1 Pack - OEM $89.99

Subtotal: $666.90

Shipping: $44.92

Grand Total: $711.82



I'm sure you could get better prices and better deals but I was still pretty suprised at how close the price was to the Vostro I ordered - a little over $860 with tax. Kudos to Dell for offering such a great value in a laptop.

 

actually, the desktop version would still be better than the laptop version for gaming as the 8600gt desktop version is clocked higher

not to mention greater overclocking headroom

 

True true, there's always tradeoffs. A few years ago you couldn't approach the same specs of a desktop on a laptop, at least for gaming, for less than a few grand. Now the prices are coming pretty close.

 

Ha, thats funny, my 1400 only cost $9 more... Although it doesn't have the 8600gt...