I want to build a small PC to replace an old laptop whose keyboard is playing up.
What I need is something that will consume as less power as possible because it is running on a solar system.
What I need is a connection to the Internet, to a printer, a 19" screen, keyboard and mouse and I will put a 60GB SSD and 2 or 4 GB ram in it.
I found a fair bit of info on the Gygabyte/Intel Atom combo but it seems I have to buy the parts from various vendors, a bit messy.

Can someone suggest a similar board/cpu combo that is more readily available?

Thank you for your help.

USB or parallel port printer?

I recently made a very low electrical power computer with a Gigabyte GA-E350N-USB3 which has a E-350N APU and Hudson-M1 chipset and had it loaded with Ubuntu 11.04 and Windows 7 (neither my choice! Both 64 bit). It's not exactly fast but it is an adequate performer as an office computer and was very cheap. Hardest part was sourcing the cabinet in India but should not be a problem elsewhere.

There's a comparative review of E350s here.

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Why not just buy an netbook ? They are geared towards low power usage and are usually quite cheap. In fact I built a low power desktop for my parents and then bought 3 netbooks for me and others, and the price was about the same and netbooks were better, IMO. Personally, I would get an ASUS or other netbook.

If you still want a desktop, try one of:
http://usa.asus.com/Motherboards/Intel_CPU_on_Board
or the AMD ones, it's your choice.

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You can also check out cappucinopc.com; I have a DE2700, which has an ASUS mb and Atom processor but is a low power small footprint "desktop" you can plug a conventional monitor and keyboard, etc. Runs all day, very low power, very quiet, reasonable performance.

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What you want is an intel atom or AMD fusion setup. Its possible that even some of the ARM systems like the raspberry pi would do what you want as well, and would be even lower powered...both in consumption (yay!) and computational power (d'oh!).

The AMD Fusion (like in catkins link) is slightly better on power consumption, a little more CPU power, and has a better video chip than the intel atoms. But its newer, so 'out of the box' support' with older distros isnt as good, or non-existant in some cases. I'd probably get an intel atom if I wanted to run an older 'stable' distro (eg debian stable, ubuntu 10.04 LTS, centOS). Or I would get an AMD Fusion setup if I wawnted to run a newer distro, or was confident in my ability to get the AMD system running with older distros.

Comparing apples and oranges again?

If you are copmparing the cost of a whole setup (case, the bits to put in the case, keyboard, mouse and monitor) the low power desktop could be more expensive. That is not what the rblampain needs though, they already have a monitor, keyboard and mouse.

So all that would be needed is a motherboard/CPU/RAM, case, power supply and (possibly) SSD. If rblampain is getting the SSD for speed, the cheap netbooks will need a replacement anyway, they tend to haev nasty, cheap and fairly slow SSDs, so thats out as well.

You can get motherboard/CPU/RAM/case/power supply for less than any netbook I've seen on sale here. IMO it would be a better system anyway for many reasons.....

What sort of solar setup do you have?

One of the problems with solar is the waste that happens with a lot of setups. The solar cells tend to be 12v, the batteries tend to be 12v as well, but lots of solar setups have 12vDC-> 220vAC converters, so that people can use the 'off the shelf', sold everywhere standard household stuff.

To run your computer, that 220v AC is converted back in 12v DC, and then some of that 12v is converted into smaller voltages your computer needs (3.3v, 5v). You've lost efficiency at bothy ends, in the 12vDC->220vAC conversion, and then again in the 220vAC-> 12vDC conversion. If you have 12v DC wiring runs (not common), or way to run some 12v DC to your computer, you can save yourself some money, and more importantly, some power. With this-

http://www.mini-box.com/s.nl/it.A/id...=8&category=13

That is a power supply. Tiny, eh? The best thing is that it runs on 12v DC, so you dont have that efficiency loss from converting back and forth.

No, you wont have to buy from various vendors.

Ihave no idea where you are in WA, being on solar I would guess the middle of nowhere. No idea what the local computer store would be like, if there is one at all. Judging from what I've heard about computer shops in the middle of nowhere, WA, you migth be better off getting one in perth (if you go there for any reason) or getting a system mail ordered to you.

Places like MSY (branches in WA) will build a computer for you to your spec- you just pick the parts, they build it and you pick it up, or they mail it to you. MSY is probably not that bad if you go to perth where AFAIK the branches are. The problem with MSY is they never answer their phones, and are very, very slack with answering emails. Umart is good with stuff like answering phones and emails....but that only have Qld branches (and one in Vic). Unles you can find a good local computer dealer, or someone who you know is very good with mail orders, I'd suggest getting it from umart. If you decide to go down the 'build it to my spec' route anyway.

Thank you all for the good suggestions.

The solar system is 6x120 watt solar panels and 1.5 Kw total battery banks @ 12 volts. The laser printer is USB or parallel but needs to run from a generator when I need to print. I already have mouses and keyboards.

I will investigate all the suggestions in the next few days, specially supplying 12 volts to the whole system including the Ipstar sender/receiver. This is because the 450 watts true sine-wave (SEA) inverter from which the whole system was operating gave a lot of smoke yesterday. Some time ago I found the unit had been supplied (about 15 years ago) with the low voltage positive wire not tied enough giving intermittent problems but it's been arcing so much that every strand of copper is black and the connector is rusty.

Not that suprising, laser printers are known for being high draw devices. The 1.5Kw worth of batteries could probably take it, given a full charge. But your (now dead) 450watts inverter proably wouldnt. Even if you ran just the laser printer....

IPStar had 12v modems avaible years ago, from late 2004/early 2005 I think.

You might be able to run the modem you have on 12v, or you might need some sort of current conversion (eg to 24v DC) or it might be 110/220v only. Depends on the model.

Ouch!

My Ipstar modem has a 24v input @ 1.2A and a 8.5v input @ 1.8A, some posts on the Internet suggest this may be too much for electronic parts available on the market for one to build their own regulated power supply (I am only an amateur in this).

Since my true sine wave inverter passed away in a gasp of smoke, I am using a small 720w generator and, to my surprise, I have less problems with my keyboard, so I think I will postpone for a few weeks the purchase of new PC parts and try the new ordered Inverter which is necessary for the LCD TV (another hard-to-build 12v power supply).

If my laptop keyboard keeps playing up then I will replace the laptop.

But what I have found when I talk about the necessity to buy from various vendors is that the mobo/cpu are available from places that do not have SSD in their cataloge and since most of those on-line vendors bump up their profit through postage and handling, it is an aspect to be considered when purchasing on-line, beside the fact that it is easier to find matching parts from the same vendor.

Those who make a PC to your specs do not even mention that the parts work together.

Thank you all for your help, I'll keep this updated.

I was hoping that you would have a 12v IPstar modem, they are easy. The 24v/8.5v versions should be do-abe, but how much work you would have to do, I dont know. I'm barely an amateur, LOL. I've got people to quiz about proper electronic engineering.

Your converter had problems with the positive wire, so bad that is had led to arcing, its quite likely that arcing wasnt your only problem.

'Dirty' power can cause all sorts of nasty problems. I havent heard of keyboard problems in particular before. Its possible that your 'keyboard' problems were actually due to the power, and the only sign you had was the keyboard.

If you are looking at places that dont have SSDs, franky you are looking in the wrong places. Where are you looking?

Its assumed that you know what you are buying. If you dont know what works together, that is what sites like this and any of the several dozen hardware sites are for. IMO anyway.

The stores arent going to list 'this RAM will work with motherboard XXX, YYY and ZZZ, but not with AAA or BBB'. Its just to much work, for little payoff. Actually, less than zero payoff, doing that kind of itemisation/compatibility list would be a nightmare for the store with large parts lists (most of them, and pretty much all the decent stores will have a large parts lists). Its going to take ages, make the product pages complicated, and its not exactly true even then. For example, 'sandy bridge' CPUs should have 1.5v RAM. They will run with 1.65v RAM though......what do you do with 1.65v RAM? List it as 'incompatible' with sandy bridge, even though it will run?....at least in some cases.

In general, you shouldnt have any compatiblity problems with the SSD and any SATA controllers on modern motherboards.

If you actaully ring up/email a store that will mail you the system, and ask for the system to be built, they should tell you if your parts list is wrong in any way. Apart from dodgy operators, the worst thing that will happen is that they will ring/email you after you have ordered and tell you 'parts XXXX, YYYY and ZZZZ are incompatible. Do you want to change XXXX to AAAA, YYYY to BBBB or ZZZZ to CCCC?'