It's pretty easy to get hoodwinked into buying something you know very little or nothing about. It's very easy to make this mistake when you're buying a new computer or just new pc parts. It's like cooking the perfect three course meal for a perfect evening. You can't just throw all the big heavy selections in, you need to pick recipes out with care and make sure they suit the evening. When you're out buying computer parts, don't start throwing in the most expensive or the coolest looking stuff into your cart. Know what you're going to with the thing before you start doing anything.

There are specific parts to optimize your usage and keep within your budget. The main thing every computer needs is a motherboard. You can not have a functional computer without a motherboard. You can't have a computer without all the other things that make it up but this is the central component. You need one that can support all the components that you want to run. The kind that you should be should depend entirely on the kind of work that you do. The work that you do can be identified as three things: typing and surfing, pc gaming and designing and rendering.

If you basically use your pc for running an online business then you can go for dual-core. Quad-core should be perfect if you're running games or if you do rendering or designing work. When you're picking out memory, should be looking at 1-8 gigs of RAM memory. This will also solely depend on the kind of work you do. High spec games and rendering consume a lot of memory so you should be safe with more than 1 gig of RAM. If you're a gamer, you should pick out a high standard graphic card since most games, whether online or offline, usually run on high graphics.

While some of them give you the option to play with low quality graphics to allow it to function smoothly, it's best to optimize your gaming experience. The same should be said about picking a graphic card for rendering and designing. Sound cards should be optimized if you plan to do some real music editing or if you want to enhance your gaming experience. When your components need a lot of power, then you need a strong power supply. Strong ones can easily overheat but I still recommend strong power supplies and because a lot of the hardware out there have big power requirements.

The standard these days is usually 550W, but when you use it for games or modeling work, then you should get a power supply that delivers 800-1400W. If you want your computer to look cool then you can go crazy with your choice of casing. The only important factor is space; it needs to be big enough to fit your motherboard, your drives and especially your coolers. You should be working with 3-4 working coolers. When your system is cool, you drastically lessen the chances of your circuits burning up. If you're working with heavy stuff then a good cooling system is very important.

When picking out computer monitors, I generally go for LCD. Sizes can range from 15 inch screens to 22 inch screens. While I don't think there's really nothing wrong with CRT, flat screens like TFT and LCD save a lot of space. If you're a gamer, I'd advise you to buy a 5 button mouse for your computer simply because you can attach several different commands to the 3 other buttons. So whether you're playing RTS or RPG, you have quicker hotkeys. With all these said, you should really know what you need to get when you buy parts for your desktop pc.

Get friendly with the clerk and talk to him about what you do and what kind of performance you need.