Try talking to  gasmask, he got an excellent computer custom built for only $500 (I tihnk he knows a guy).

My friend's brother custom makes PCs at an amazing price. Here's what he has listed under the high end ones: http://pcshack.net/highend.htm
This one's only $700: http://pcshack.net/q6600.htm

Personally I would consider a custom built computer. All those pre build ones your paying extra for convince and probably stuff that you don't need or sub par parts.

get a Toshiba

600$


..try to find one that doesn't have Vista on it FFFFFFF got it babe



*stares at you*

building your own would be the cheapest route. we built one recently for less than 600 and it should be able to run maya O.o

are you wanting a prefab or something you can put together?

Custom self-built PCs are much cheaper today than when I built my system 2 years ago.

Keeping it under $500 [excludes monitor] should be very feasable if you talk to the right person to configure one for you.

BUILD A COMPUTA LIKE THE REST OF THESE FOKLS

yep I'd say build your own! Get some duck tape and some cardboard and get to work!

im building my own using some ideas from http://www.mysuperpc.com/ for component ideas

not sticking to the list there but changing a couple things for my own preferences

Upgrading con become more expensive, since you'd might have replace everything that your current computer has.

For a computer that runs Maya, that's going to almost less than 500$ (excluding monitor). But if you want to buy/build a decent gaming computer, that's also going to cost less than 1000$ (including monitor).

My best suggestion is first go to site called "Can you Run it?", where you can compare your current computer to numerous amount of system requirements of numerous PC-games. See some of the specific games you'd like play. In case of your current system isn't able to run the game, they have the "least"-suggestion for the parts.
My strategy was to first take of look at the sugested components, then I bought components that were "two steps"-better. Of course that was two years ago and I'm living in expensive country, so my whole gaming rig coted more than 1000 dollars back then.

I really recomment you to ask for a possibility to get your PC build, in case you don't know how do you install the motherboard for example (which was my case back then too, and still is). Most of the times the tech people don't demand huge payment for the building process.


Also, there are some specific components/manufacturer/developers I'd recomment for paople who want good components for cheap price:
- AMD for processors (Dual Core-should be fine for your needs).
- ATI for graphic card (Take at least HD3000-series since the HD2000-series is already quite old and X1XX-series isn't supported any longer).
- Creative Soundcard (anything from 16-bit-series. Though I really recomment to get a card with X-FI support nowadays).

Oh, and one very important thing: Avoid Vista at all cost, especially since you want to play games. really, when Vista playing games on that OS is like playing with dices: Either the games will run or not. Windows XP currently is the best OS to play with. And Windows 7 is said to fix all the problems that Vista had (though this OS is going to be released not earlier than next year).

I belive these tips should give a good start. Hopefully you'll able to find the computer for your needs.

Build your own - the hardest part is making sense of the motherboard / CPU / graphics card manufacturer debates.
(See, because who's the "best" switches around more often than folks' opinions of the best do...usually they go with whomever was best last time they bought a computer, or what someone talked them into)

I'd check tigerdirect.com

One like this is decent
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=4459602&CatId=2629
should be able to run all that just fine, and much cheaper than $1000

Not bad considering the price. Personally though, I'd rather build my own.

I agree, but I'm not 100% computer savvy, and from the way Bowrll made it seem, neither is she.

you could build a simple and fast computer for about 600$ depends on what you want it to have. I'd rather build than buy one cause really the expensive ones are kinda worse than the built ones.

yeah I just wish I knew how to build one

dont buy anything with vista or 7... THEY BOTH SUCK ASS AND HAVE LAME PERFORMANCE.

depends on if you want a laptop or desktop :P

Want my advice? Try nabbing yourself a all-in-one desktop. It's got tons of BG than your average lappy and everything you need is in a handsome compact space. Not sure how much they are across the water, mind, but it's worth checking out anyway ^^

ncix.com is a good place i got mine for like 1400$ yea thats not as cheep as most every one else's who has posted here but thing is its a canadian company so not sure where ya live but it might help out, but i basicly picked all the stuff my self, you can have them build it for you too if you wanted also, ( though i think the prices on there stuff went up... i at least know the price of my case did... antec 1200 :P ^_^) anyway good luck and go with AMD ^_^ hehe

Vista's actually fine if you have a system capable of running it, which any modern system should handle. Most of the bad impressions came from the initial release, with stupid morons trying to install it on old systems that couldn't handle it or innocent victims buying underpowered new machines fraudulently listed as vista capable when they actually weren't. Its compatability with older stuff has improved too, and it's more compatible with newer hardware than XP is. So don't worry too much if you can only buy a system with Vista on it.

7 is far better than Vista though, and you'll still want to trade out vista for 7, but it's not something to worry about immediately.