setting up 8 year old boy with computer fun

got a new girlfriend and she has the nicest little 8 year old, really sweet kid. they were over at my house and he saw all the parts i had layed out on table. he was soooo interested, i told him i would help him build a computer and he was supper excited. i want to set him up with some decent parts, stuff he can do pretty much anything he wants with, not junk. he can read is is rather smart and definitely nerdy. Im going to help him assemble the machine, set him up with an id on this forum and help him if he has questions.

here's what im thinking of giving him:

- asus 4850 1gb video card ($90 on newegg already ordered)
- 60gb ocz vertex 2
- AMD 1055T (already own but not using)
- GIGABYTE GA-890FXA-UD5 mobo
- 4 sticks (8 gigs) of this ram, http://www.mushkin.com/Memory/Blackline/991601.aspx its kinda strange ram and im not sure if its a good choice but I have it laying around and its FAST. (i don't know if it will cause problems with mem controller, no one makes mems with that high of voltage any more 1600mhz 7-7-6-18 1t @ ~1.85 volts).

that's what i have picked out so far.

hopeing to get him an ok RAID card with onboard cache and probably 4 or so new samsung 320gb F4 drives

let me know what you all think

I think thats a sweet rig for anyone, none the less an 8 year old. I wouldnt worry about raid cards, and raid in general personally...but if you have the money to blow, go for it.

EarthDog said:

I think thats a sweet rig for anyone, none the less an 8 year old. I wouldnt worry about raid cards, and raid in general personally...but if you have the money to blow, go for it.

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its amazing how cheep you can find raid cards on ebay. like relatively newish $500 cards for like $200, found an Adaptec 5405 4-Port. card for $220 and bought it. and the F4s..... i think its just a single 320gig plater. really interested how they work. i just dont have the time to keep up with everything anymore, especially the new SSDs, i already had the vertex 2, and wasn't using it.

ill probably give him the install disk for win 7 home premium 64 w/ out the install code, when he has it stable and happy i'll give him a code.

have to find him a good quality huge PSU and a case, but cases are easy to come by.

but interested if anyone sees potential issues with the mems and the 1.85 - 1.9 volt thing. can he still get CPU to ~4ghz if he wants?

your board supports raid you realize that.... the only time u need to really spend big bucks on a raid card is when your doing stuff like raid 5 with multiple (more than 4 disks)

I agree with earth that is a nice system for any one .
Onboard raid isnt that bad any more you could give that a try before getting a stand alone .

I mean... hes 8. I understand you want to get him something decent, but, raid cards for no reason (and $200?), 8gb of ram for what? Is he going to render and encode HD stuff? There is just no need for some of this stuff when a $500 system (or one sans raid card and 8gb of memory that may be too much for a mobo anyway) would be perfect!

I agree a raid card seems silly....what are you expecting an 8yr old to do with this pc?

I built a computer for my little sister last October (she had just turned 11) and she watched and had questions while I was putting it together. I think without any prior knowledge, any kid will be really impressed even if you're throwing together a single-core rig with onboard graphics; much less a hex-core with a powerful GPU and 8 gigs of RAM! One thing I noticed is my sister was really impressed by all the lights; no matter what the lights came from, she wanted more. I swapped out my Crucial Ballistix Tracer RAM into her rig, for the OCZ stuff that I had bought for her, and she was even happier. I'd suggest something along these lines would get him really pumped. then you can teach him how to fold for team 32!

Yeah, no need for a hexacore or a SSD. Seriously, get an AMD Sempron 140, maybe 2GB of RAM, etc, etc. Actually, here's a suggestion.

http://secure.newegg.com/WishList/PublicWishDetail.aspx?WishListNumber=11955331

to get him started i would go with a Atom setup with a ION chipset. use the SSD to make it feel faster then it is. something for him to get started on you know? i got started on a now old 386 DX 8mhz, with 256kb or 512kb ram, two 10MB drives that were double spaced. i learned dos the best i could without any help from anyone or even having a manual.

really though i would go as cheap as possible but something he can build and be proud of.

I agree with going as simple as possible. Make it easy for him to learn. Is he really going to need that much storage space or processing power? Start him out simple and then help him upgrade it as he needs to. He will probably learn a lot more by slowly picking things up as he needs it. I know that is how I learned. An example would be giving him even say 512 to 1Gb a ram then help him figure out why his system is sometimes slow.

ok ..... so maybe then an old 940 phenom 2 on a ud5 am2+ board. 2 2gig sticks of 1066 ocz plat and the vertex 2. the 4850 and a slave?

i have a siig 2 port raid controller if he wants to add it some time. i hate the 750 southbridge.

i dont have an after market cooler for am2 laying around think i should get one or just leave stock?

insanemonkey said:

I agree with going as simple as possible. Make it easy for him to learn. Is he really going to need that much storage space or processing power? Start him out simple and then help him upgrade it as he needs to. He will probably learn a lot more by slowly picking things up as he needs it. I know that is how I learned. An example would be giving him even say 512 to 1Gb a ram then help him figure out why his system is sometimes slow.

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I am going to have to disagree with this. Children I know have done gaming and other things on there computers at a young age. There might not be much children do at that age besides homework and gaming. Well the ones I know I guess.


What I did one year is got two sets of parts and asked the child which one he thought was better. Corrected and explained it as simple as I possibly could.

Although it really depends on the childs personality. Some just want it ready and others want to learn why its faster.

stereoud7 said:

ok ..... so maybe then an old 940 phenom 2 on a ud5 am2+ board. 2 2gig sticks of 1066 ocz plat and the vertex 2. the 4850 and a slave?

i have a siig 2 port raid controller if he wants to add it some time. i hate the 750 southbridge.

i dont have an after market cooler for am2 laying around think i should get one or just leave stock?

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The high-voltage RAM shouldn't be a problem for an AMD CPU. If anything is the super-low voltage stuff (1.35v) that's a problem.

You said you already had the 1055T sitting around and I don't see any reason not to use it. It may be a little overkill right now but why spend money on a CPU when you've already got one? You could always sign up for a BOINC project and really use all those cores while the computer is idle or nearly so. I run BIONC all the time unless I'm editing video or running a really fast game. Most of the time you don't even know it's there ...

An 8 year old should not be in front of a computer let alone a TV. He should be outside playing and be creative. No offence mate, but if you want to be nice to this kid get him a proper tool kit, or build a tree house with him.
There is plenty of time for computers later on, no worries, soon he be high on sugar whilst shooting animations on a screen making "unboxing" videos and "reviews" on YouTube.

I know this cause I'm there myself. And I am an OLD fart, mind you.

Solid build for anyone! Most of all, this 8 year old will have an SSD and I don't have one . But I think it's good that he's fascinated with computers and you're willing to help, that's how I got into computers when I was younger.