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There is more to it than pure DC power draw. You need to take into account power drawn per power rail.

http://www.motherboards.org/articles/guides/1487_3.html

A 400W power supply will probably be just fine powering 200W system, but you may lack proper power layout to power a 300W or even 250W system. In today's world, it is all about the 12V rail(s) and the current it can supply.

Perhaps they use a pencil.

Lots and lots of tests and bechmarks. Looking good.

Intel 'Lynnfield' Core i5 750 and Core i7 870 Performance Testing Introduction :: TweakTown
Intel Core i5 and Core i7: Lynnfield CPUs reviewed - Intel, Core i5, Core i-750, Core i7, Core i7-860, Core i7-870, Lynnfield, Bloomfield, AMD Phenom II X4 - PC Games Hardware
Core i5 750 - Core i7 860 and 870 processor review
HEXUS.net - Review :: Intel Lynnfield Core i5 750, Core i7 860 and Core i7 870 CPU review: bombarding the mid-range : Page - 1/12
Legion Hardware
Intel Core i5 750 & i7 870 Review - Page 1 - The Next Nehalem-based CPU lineup
PC Perspective - Intel Lynnfield Core i7-870 and Core i5-750 Processor Review
Introduction - Intel Lynnfield Core i5 and Core i7 Processors | [H]ard|OCP
In Theory: How Does Lynnfield's On-Die PCI Express Affect Gaming? : Introduction - Review Tom's Hardware
AnandTech: Intel's Core i7 870 & i5 750, Lynnfield: Harder, Better, Faster Stronger[/QUOTE]
Intel Core i5 750 Core i7 870 Review - Overclockers Club
Techgage - Intel Core i7-870 & i5-750 - Nehalem for the Mainstream
Core i5-750 and Core i7-870 Processors Review | Hardware Secrets
Intel Core i5 750 Processor Review - TechSpot News
Intel Core i5 And Core i7: Intel?s Mainstream Magnum Opus : Introduction - Review Tom's Hardware
Intel Lynnfield Core i5-750 & Core i7-870 Processor Review
Intel's Core i5-750 and Core i7-870 processors - The Tech Report - Page 1
bit-tech.net | Review - Intel Core i5 and Core i7 Lynnfield review
bit-tech.net | Feature - Intel Lynnfield: Details and Architecture
Intel Core i5, Core i7 800 Processors and P55 Express - HotHardware
Intel Core i5-750 Processor BX80605I5750 | Intel Core i5-750,BX80605I5750,Lynnfield,LGA1156,CPU,Proocessor, Intel Core i5-750 Lynnfield LGA1156 CPU Benchmark Performance Test Processor Review | Benchmark Reviews Performance Tests
Intel Core i7 870/Core i5 750/P55 Express chipset Review :: Introduction :: Motherboards.org

Or unlocking certain multipliers on your Athlon. . .I never actually did this trick as I used window defogger instead (more reliable as it is more conductive). I still have 2x Athlon 2200xps Bartons overclocked to ~3000xp equivalent and running as MP in a dually of mine. . .super cheap dual-processor machine with craptons of processing power back in the day.

Kneejerk flamebait mods: Avert your eyes.

Let me start out by saying HotHardware itself is nothing better than a middle-of-the-pack hardware review site. If I remember correctly, they're a generic offshoot of one of the more major tech sites that tries (too hard) to appeal to enthusiasts but comes across as nothing more than stiff corporate whores desperately spewing cool lingo to draw hapless internet goers into viewing their adbortion (SPELLING INTENTIONAL) of a website. And I'm OK with that.

What I'm not OK with is their oh so blatant blogspam bullshit they send to slashdot. Wow guys, you reviewed a small form factor PC. If that's not front page worthy, I don't know what is! Even worse, the only link in their submission was to their own site.

In the spirit of sharing, I've decided to help out slashdotters who might be genuinely interested in the product beyond a "sweet flames, bro!" 10 pager (it's a fucking barebones system!) fluff review with some informative links. Let's start with a direct link to hothardware's printable version of the page.
http://www.hothardware.com/printarticle.aspx?artic leid=986

That wasn't so hard, was it guys? Oh sure, it might cut into your ad revenue, but it would be disingenuous of me to accuse you guys of submitting this for the shallow purpose of bumping ad revenue, right? Right?!

In other news, I was looking for alternate reviews of this system. What did I find? HotHardware are apparently a bunch of linkwhoring board spamming bastards. Witness the evidence:
http://www.elitebastards.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t =19838
http://www.dvhardware.net/review/31338
http://forums.hardwarelogic.com/f68/shuttle-sdxi-b arebones-system-7831.html
http://www.mbreview.com/article.php?sid=11683
http://www.motherboards.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p =673332

Maybe the hardware review business is now just as inbred as most news blog sites. I don't know. What I do know is I spent way too much time writing this post. And this story is beyond worthless.

like this?

They saw that HardOCP pointed out the same thing today and had to get even.

I have the MSI 5900 ultra and it makes less noise than my GF3 TI500.

Not only can you save a pci card, it is also cheaper and less of a hassle a lot of times. Some motherboards have excellent on board audio, such as the P4S8X I think it really depends on if you think its worth it. I can do fine with just the bios speaker going beep beep beep.

I had assumed that people had finally realized that there is many shall we say... "inconsistencies" in the boards that review sites get, and the consumer boards. Recently (about 2-4 months ago) asus realeased their P4S8X motherboard based on the SIS 648 chipset. Almost every hardware review site praised this board, yet when the boards hit the market, all hell broke loose, (some sites, such as Motherboards.org still have the P4S8X rated as the top board, when it is clear that this board is not worth the sand it was created with.) Enough hell that many people began reffering to the board as the P4Sux.

So why:
A)Post the review of a not-so-new board (based off of the I845PE board) and
B) Why even post it's review at all, especially now that we have learned not to trust review sites?

I am not trying to be troll-ish, but this is Slashdot, News for Nerds. Stuff that matters. Clearly this was neither of the two.

Well as quite a few people probably know, its today possible to build a PC for $199 if you get the right components.

It can be fun to build your own computer, once you know how. It isn't too hard, once you know how. It can be impressive, to those who haven't tried it themselves. I've built quite a few myself, over the years.

But I no longer try do so. Why? Because I can't save money doing so. I keep an eye on prices, and I can't build one for as cheap as my local clone shops. I can't build one as cheap, even if count the value of my labour at $0 per hour. So, I am going to buy a clone next time, at a place where they look clueful.

A friend of mine isn't convinced by this argument. She has started to build computers for her friends. So far she is doing for fun, and love, and is only charging for the parts. (But she thinks she could be making a profit, if she just got her volume up a couple of hundred percent.) And sometimes her buddies bring them back. I am cruel. When she asks for my advice, I tell her. "Just take it back to the manufacturer, and let them worry about it."

You can buy a brand new $199 PC (Yeah yeah minus the monitor) from this place and website...

Worth noting that while these computers may be "new", they are not really comparable to other new computers. Here in Toronto the slowest new computers are all 1 gigahertz. The computer you pointed uses a motherboard that maxes out at only 800 megahertz. Why is that? It is an old motherboard -- released in June 1999. Is it really fair to call it a "new" computer if it uses such an old motherboard? This motherboard is the old AT form factor version, not an ATX form factor.

Its a very decent configuration with an ASUS motherboard and can be easily upgraded later to a higher speed Pentium III CPU...

Okay, I just did a google search on this motherboard. It got some okay reviews, and some crappy ones. Here is the .pdf version of the manual. FWIW the manual doesn't say a word about mounting a Pentium III. Maybe the ability to mount a socket 370 Celeron implies that? I wouldn't know. I have stuck with AMD processors the last five or six years.

They have an excellent website: good selection, well laid out, good navingation tools (View by name, View By Price, include tax etc.) and good ordering system. They have good prices and very reasonable (my last order €8 on ~1½ kg) shipping charges which importantly is with DHL Express (2 days), so you can track your shipment on the DHL website (which is brilliant - I've been stuck in limbo several times not knowing when or if a shipment will arrive when buying from other retailers like dabs.com). And no I don't work for Komplett, just a happy customer.

As many others have said it will probably not be cheaper when you build your first machine but you will get higher quality parts. What this means is that when it comes time to upgrade (in 9-12 months) you only need to upgrade part of your system (say, only motherboard, processor, memory and graphics card). Also having bought quality parts any you upgrade can still continue to have a useful life as a server or SO's machine.

If you are going to build your own machine you do need to do your homework. Overview sites like http://www.arstechnica.com/, http://www.sharkyextreme.com are useful but don't always get it right. I find component/area focused wesites invaluable. Here are some good examples: http://www.motherboards.org/ , http://www.3dsoundsurge.com/ , http://storagereview.com/

Also a good idea is to lurk for a while in some of the product newsgroups / online forums.

One thing that you should not forget is that building your own PC is a lot of fun! It's interesting, satisfying and educational. So in the long run I think that it is both cheaper and more rewarding.

...at the moment I haven't been able to find a definitive or comprehensive list on the 'net.
You can find charts for specific products by doing a 'Webferret' search - but then you're only talking about street prices, which are beaten daily on the internet, and are really only 'guide prices' for most products on the high street.
If you're buying, your best bet is to cross reference a list of available components with sites like:
Streetprices.com - perhaps one of the best sites
cnet - does some price comparisons

If you're still doing research then why not go to some of the component-specific sites on the web, such as http://www.motherboards.org/ and the like. They often have articles that deal with price fluctuations. Your fav computer mag.'s web site no doubt also has a littany of articles on the subject with decent research in them.
But methinks the resource you're after would be valuable to marketing students more than anyone else - if that's your thrust then I suggest you go to the manufacturer's web pages ( should you be trying to get geeks to do your marketing project for you? :). Seriously, I think the reason such a site isn't about at the moment is that such information can be used to do exactly what you want to do - the large firms probably wouldn't want geeks and non-geeks to suss out how the whole 'product life-cycle' and 'price-cycle' works and disrupt the whole thing. For the moment your just going to have to use that power that lies somewhere between 'the force' and 'the knack' and kinda guesstimate when prices are about to fall.
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