Can someone help me with building(?) a good computer on Black Friday

I would really like to have a computer that can run PC games and I've never really had a PC with a good video card before. O_O

I was wondering if someone could help me build a good PC for a reasonable amount of $$ that will last me a couple of years so I can scope out deals on Black Friday.

Also, are barebone kits worth looking into for something like this?

Thanks in advanced!

well unitl the ads come out there is not much advice that can be offered have you built a pc before do you have a copy of windows?

the only barebone kits that I have seen as good are the MC CPU+mobo deals, and some others like HTPC build ones where the CPU is pre-installed on the motherboard, but not much else - normally they bundle in a crappy case + PSU which need to be replaced, and don't exactly offer much of a "deal" on the components

intended games, budget, and screen resolution would also be good to post

The really big deals on Black Friday are products built for that sale, they are of the lowest quality, an wouldn't be the kind of thing you're looking for. I'm talking about $249 laptops and $399 TV sets.

What you need to do is plan your exact build, everything you want, and learn what each part costs at Microcenter, Newegg and Amazon. That way, when Black Friday comes, *if* some of the parts you want go on sale, you can take advantage of the deal.

If you don't plan like that, I don't see how it can work out for you.

Quote from slapshot136 : the only barebone kits that I have seen as good are the MC CPU+mobo deals, and some others like HTPC build ones where the CPU is pre-installed on the motherboard, but not much else - normally they bundle in a crappy case + PSU which need to be replaced, and don't exactly offer much of a "deal" on the components intended games, budget, and screen resolution would also be good to post

I would like to play a lot of the games that have are usually released on the major game consoles (Xbox 360, PS3). Borderlands2, DarkSiders2 and the like.

I would prefer to be around $700, but I realize that may not be very realistic. So I would say 700-1000 absolute max.

Quote from Rebound : What you need to do is plan your exact build, everything you want, and learn what each part costs at Microcenter, Newegg and Amazon. That way, when Black Friday comes, *if* some of the parts you want go on sale, you can take advantage of the deal.

Yeah this is probably what I'll do. I've seen some pretty good deals being thrown out there lately on mobo's but I'm not really knowledgeable enough to know what is good and what is trash but the specs look good.

I don't think BF offers much, if anything, in the way of PC builds.
With a month and a half to take us to BF, I bet that one by one, you could get super deals on the parts you want, or similar.
During that period of time, you could also keep an eye out for ready built PC's that come on special, then add in the GPU of your choice, and maybe an SSD too.
When I bought my Dell XPS on special, I could not find the components for less, in fact, the ready built was a good $100 less than anything I could build myself (of a similar nature).
Waiting for BF and the weekend deals, will be a disappointment, IMO, for components.

do have microcenter or frys around?

Quote from dude2000 : do have microcenter or frys around?

Yeah there is a MicroCenter near here

if you close to microcenter it like BF 365 days
microcenter has nice in store only deals on cpu / mobo combo;

amd deals
http://www.microcenter.com/site/p....aspx?rd=1

for intel they do not have a web apge but they have $50 of $60 off from cpu / mobo combo and if you purchase mobo with rebate you can save more.

last year they offered $60 every day and $80 off big sales; this year they are offering $50 on regular and $60 on big sales.

Quote from duder673 : Yeah there is a MicroCenter near here

Lucky! You'll be able to find some great deals.

I have to agree with the other posters. BF probably won't offer any great quality component deals, that you can't match with a little work at Micro, Newegg, Tiger, NCIX, Amazon +SD

I just put an econo build together thanks to SlickDeals. Here's what I put together in a couple of weeks.

Case--------------- SD $19.99 NZXT-Source 210
Psu----------------- SD $34.99 PC Power and Cooling Silencer MK III 400W
Motherboard-----------$62.99 Asrock H77 Pro4/MVP
Processor--------------$62.99 Intel G850 2.9GHz
Ram----------------SD $29.99 Crucial Ballistix (2 x 4GB)
SSD----------------SD $59.99 Kingston HyperX 3K SH103S3/120G 2.5" 120GB
HDD-----Not Yet
DVD----------------------$14.99 Samsung SH-222BB/BEBE 22X SATA DVDRW Internal Drive
Fans---------------SD $1.39 Cooler Master SickleFlow 120mm Green LED Case Fan
Keyboard---------SD - $9.99 Logitech MK320 USB RF Wireless Keyboard/Mouse
Mouse
OS----------------- SD $79.99 Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 64-bit - OEM
Monitor----------- SD $135.99 ASUS 23.6" (VH242H) LCD
$513.29

Not the cheapest, and some overkill, but quality components and fun to start building again.

Okay, thank you for all the great responses.
That's great that I MicroCenter is the right place to go.

One thing to note is that I won't need anything other than the actual PC. I have a pretty good monitor, keyboard, mouse, etc.

Quote from savrnot : Lucky! You'll be able to find some great deals. I have to agree with the other posters. BF probably won't offer any great quality component deals, that you can't match with a little work at Micro, Newegg, Tiger, NCIX, Amazon +SD I just put an econo build together thanks to SlickDeals. Here's what I put together in a couple of weeks. Case--------------- SD $19.99 NZXT-Source 210 Psu----------------- SD $34.99 PC Power and Cooling Silencer MK III 400W Motherboard-----------$62.99 Asrock H77 Pro4/MVP Processor--------------$62.99 Intel G850 2.9GHz Ram----------------SD $29.99 Crucial Ballistix (2 x 4GB) SSD----------------SD $59.99 Kingston HyperX 3K SH103S3/120G 2.5" 120GB HDD-----Not Yet DVD----------------------$14.99 Samsung SH-222BB/BEBE 22X SATA DVDRW Internal Drive Fans---------------SD $1.39 Cooler Master SickleFlow 120mm Green LED Case Fan Keyboard---------SD - $9.99 Logitech MK320 USB RF Wireless Keyboard/Mouse Mouse OS----------------- SD $79.99 Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 64-bit - OEM Monitor----------- SD $135.99 ASUS 23.6" (VH242H) LCD $513.29 Not the cheapest, and some overkill, but quality components and fun to start building again.

these days i would just go with prebuilt

i got a lenovo B520 23" touch screen with i3 (sandy bridge), 1TB HDD, 4GB ram, for 320 + tax... that's pretty cheap, I like the touch screen, it also came with nice BT mouse/keyboard and remote control. and since it's prebuilt it has all the junk like SD card reader, wifi, tv tuner ect... I just took out the 1TB drive and slap on a SSD, runs pretty well.

Quote from warlock110 : these days i would just go with prebuilt

his build is better.. an extra 4gb of ram, a 120gb SSD - and I would guess he also has a better screen, as opposed to a touch-screen (you might as well put win8 on it) - you mentioned the pitfall of pre-builts when you had to take the HDD out and swap in a SSD - the cheap ones are cheap for a reason, they have a couple old/out-dated components that drag the build down, especially once you consider that they drag the rest of the build down and involve work/$$ to swap them out - for example, what PSU do you have? can you add a decent graphics card? (remember, the OP wanted a gaming computer) - those are heavily lacking in pre-built systems

if all you want is a cheap computer, then yes, pre-build outlet systems are usually the way to go, but once you step up and want a SSD/graphics card/good PSU, you can either pay a premium or DIY

Quote from slapshot136 : his build is better.. an extra 4gb of ram, a 120gb SSD - and I would guess he also has a better screen, as opposed to a touch-screen (you might as well put win8 on it) - you mentioned the pitfall of pre-builts when you had to take the HDD out and swap in a SSD - the cheap ones are cheap for a reason, they have a couple old/out-dated components that drag the build down, especially once you consider that they drag the rest of the build down and involve work/$$ to swap them out - for example, what PSU do you have? can you add a decent graphics card? (remember, the OP wanted a gaming computer) - those are heavily lacking in pre-built systems if all you want is a cheap computer, then yes, pre-build outlet systems are usually the way to go, but once you step up and want a SSD/graphics card/good PSU, you can either pay a premium or DIY

1tb HDD included = 50 bucks, SSD 120-128GB ~ same price, that didn't add to the cost. The PSU is generally pretty good from big brands, they might not be standard but most of the time it's decent.

In fact most prebuilt unit are much quieter and uses less power than a built unit, that's something to be consider. and also with the spec/prices i quoted, he didn't have a graphic card either.

He's also using a pentium G850 and I got an i3, so if you're talking about out dated, it's really not.

I mean I built plenty of computers in the older days (let say since I was in 6th grade, and I'm now long out of college), it was nice back then because the CPU lacked power, and OCing was a great way to get more out of your money while pushing up the performance to acceptable level. Now a day everything is so strong, there's no longer a need to OC, making building computer more expensive than most of the big brand can sell you one.

if I want to add stuff into a prebuilt unit, all I have to do is go and google, see what slots the motherboard has and what type of casing/PSU it has. But these days it might not even matter what PSU it has, my whole i3 system with the screen is doing 55W while watching movies lol.

pretty much what i got was a little more costly to built than the post I quoted, yet I made it out 200 bucks cheaper, and if you want to talk about labor cost to put it together, all i had to do was swap a HDD, the poster had to put the whole thing together.