My mission to buy a desktop PC started out simple: I wanted a powerful work computer with support for three monitors. Getting a PC within my budget seemed reasonable.

But then, temptation set in. With a slightly better processor and graphics card, this desktop could play the latest video games. And with a solid state drive instead of hard disk storage, everyday work performance would be breezier. Of course, boosting those specs at any configure-your-own PC site made the final price skyrocket. After days of searching for a powerhouse PC under $1,000, I admitted the truth to myself: If I wanted it, I’d have to build it.

Today, I write to you from my homemade, high-powered rig, built last Thursday. It has a 3.3 GHz Intel Core i5 2500K processor, an AMD Radeon 6870 graphics card, 8 GB of RAM, a 120GB solid state drive and a basic DVD burner. The total cost, after taxes and rebates, was about $920. (I got parts from MicroCenter, an electronics retailer, which meant paying sales taxes but getting everything immediately.)

Building my first desktop PC wasn’t just a means to an end, it was also a learning experience. If you’ve ever thought of building your own PC, here are some things to consider.

1. It’s Not as Daunting As It Sounds

Conventional wisdom on Internet message boards says that if you want the best desktop PC for cheap, you need to build it yourself. I always figured that wasn’t so much advice as it was a way for geeks to boast about their engineering talents. But as someone who lacks said talent, I was surprised by how simple setting up a PC can be. I used a recent how-to from The Verge for general guidelines, and consulted my manuals–mainly for the desktop case and the motherboard–when I needed more detailed explanations. In most components, everything’s labelled well enough to be self-explanatory, and the only tool you need is a Phillips-head screwdriver.

2. Picking Your Parts is the Hardest Part

If you’re building a PC for the first time, the real daunting part is the initial commitment, in which you decide not to buy a pre-made rig and start trying to figure out what parts you need. I spent a lot of time trawling through message boards for suggested builds. Hours were lost obsessing over the balance between power and prices. And after deciding on specs, I still had to pick decent parts, which meant scanning through countless user reviews on Newegg to make sure my power supply and RAM wouldn’t crap out on day one. By the time I’d lined up all my components, the building process didn’t seem so scary.

3. Needed: A New Kind of CPU and GPU Review

I have immense respect for sites like AnandTech and Tom’s Hardware, which churn out exhaustive reviews of graphics cards and processors. But those reviews cater to a highly technical audience, which is to say not me. When picking a processor for a gaming PC, I only need two questions answered: What’s the newest game I can play at the highest settings, and what do I gain by spending $30 more on the next model up? Of course, lots of other variables affect the answer, but I’d love to see more short, sweet graphics card and processor reviews that explain what an extra 0.3 GHz gets you in the real world, not in benchmarks.

4. The Mail-In Rebate is Alive and Well

My big electronics purchases of the last few years–phones, tablets, a laptop and a TV–have come without mail-in rebates, which makes me think that retailers and vendors are doing away with this noisome practice. But when buying individual PC components, mail-in rebates are everywhere–$10 here, $20 there. In total, I’ve got $90 in rebates across five vendors to deal with. My guess: component makers hope it’s enough of a headache that some people won’t bother.

5. There Are Parts You Don’t Think About (And They Add Up)

The specs I bragged about at the top of this story aren’t the only parts of the machine, off course. You also need a motherboard, a power supply, and a case. Depending on your setup, you might also want extra USB controllers, a built-in SD card reader, and a wireless network adapter. And don’t forget about a copy of Windows 7. (Most online retailers sell the OEM version for about $100, which is roughly half the price of a retail copy, but can’t be transferred to another computer.) This stuff can get expensive, quick.

6. Sage Advice: Don’t Force Things, and Build in the Buff

Before building, I asked folks on Twitter if they had any tips. I liked Brian Katz’s advice, which is common-sense but worth being reminded about:

@OneJaredNewman take your time. Everything fits. Don't force anything and have fun…plus ping if you have an issue—
Brian Katz (@bmkatz) January 19, 2012

Also, PCWorld’s Patrick Miller had an interesting recommendation:

@OneJaredNewman Strip down to your skivvies. Oddly enough, everyone I know, myself included, does this. cc: @pcwlabs @NateRalph—
Patrick Miller (@pattheflip) January 19, 2012

The Verge’s how-to also suggested stripping down if you don’t have an anti-static wrist wrap. I have no idea if these claims of static danger are overblown, but I didn’t take any chances. I assembled on my kitchen table–where there’s no carpeting around–in my underpants. It was a weird scene, especially with all the electronics strewn about, but at least nothing got fried.

7. You Are Your Own Tech Support

I wish I could say everything went smoothly. Unfortunately, my new PC showed a tendency to get choppy after waking from a few hours of sleep. I tried updating drivers, updating the BIOS, and fiddling with settings, but to no avail. Eventually I reinstalled Windows, which seems to have fixed the problem. Also, one of my fans was behaving sporadically, until I found the lose connection to blame. Calling up the PC manufacturer would have been nice, except in this case, the manufacturer was me. This may seem stupidly obvious, but if something goes wrong, you’re on your own.

On that note, good luck!

The IdeaCentre A320

While it would take five hands to count Lenovo’s 23 new mobile PCs for consumers, home office and small- and medium-sized businesses can count the new IdeaCentres on just one. The new all-in-one PCs range from the A320, touted by Lenovo as “the industry’s slimmest AIO” to the Nvidia 3D Vision-enabled B520, for combined gaming and family entertainment; to the B320, billed as “the computer that’s also a TV.” On tap, too, is the entry-level Lenovo C205, an HD (high-definition)-enabled desktop which also adheres to an AIO design.

By way of  contrast, Lenovo will inundate the mobile PC space with a quintet of models for small- and medium-sized businesses–the ThinkPad E420s, E220s, E420 and E520, plus a refreshed x120e — along with a dozen-and-a-half new consumer and small office/home office notebooks.

More specifically, the consumer laptops will include the S100 and S205 ultaportables; the high performance Y570d, Y570, and Y470, sporting Intel Core processors up to i7, Turbo Boost Technology 2.0 and Nvidia GT 550M 1GB switchable graphics; and the IdeaPad Z570, Z470, and Z370, for “fashionable” consumers who care about such things as “futuristic designs” with transparent colors in “pop colors” like sky blue and fuschia.

Lenovo also plans to unveil five new “mainstream affordable notebooks” in its G Series; two new Intel Core i5-enabled B Series laptops for small office/home office users; and three new members of its V Series, for “looking sharp at the office and relaxing at home,” said Nick Reynolds, director of global marketing for Lenovo’s Product Group, in a press briefing.

Lenovo IdeaPad V570

Yet while far outnumbered by the notebooks, Lenovo’s new desktop PCs also stick out as significant. Although Lenovo is a relative newcomer to the consumer arena, the vendor is pouring some major engineering resources into a PC segment viewed by analysts as growing much more slowly than laptops, if at all.

With its latest ThinkPads for small- and medium-sized businesses now taking on some consumer-oriented characteristics, Lenovo is applying the same crossover approach to its consumer and SOHO notebooks, too.  In fact, the new V, G, and B series consumer models should offer even faster boot-up times than the ThinkPads, since they will include not just Lenovo Enhanced Experience (EE) 2.0 for Windows 7, also introduced with the ThinkPads, but Lenovo’s new RapidBoot option, which will use SSDs (solid state drives) to further boost boot-up in hybrid configurations.

The V Series, for example, will also come with business-oriented features such as a fingerprint reader; Lenovo’s OneKey Rescue System, for quick back-up and recovery; a USB port locker, for preventing unauthorized access to USB ports; and Lenovo Security Suite.

Lenovo’s new desktop PCs, on the other hand, are all about home entertainment of various sorts. The new notebook PCs aren’t any slouches in this department, either. The Y and Z series, for instance, each offer OneKey Theatre II, for automatically maximizing AV settings, along with advanced audio systems (Dolby Advanced Audio for the Z models, and SRS Premium Sound with JBL-designed speakers for the Ys). New members of the Z Series are also outfitted with HD 16:9 format widescreens, available in 13.3-, 14-, and 15.6-inch sizes. The consumer laptops are slated for availability on various release dates from March through May, at starting prices ranging from $329.99 (for the S models) to $899.99 (for the Ys).

The all-in-ones, however, step further in a multimedia direction, with larger HD widescreens across the line-up. And surely, since there are far fewer desktop than notebook models, the four AIOs are easier to tell apart from each other.

Lenovo certainly isn’t the first to try to rethink the desktop PC as a home entertainment center. To cite one example, Sony started taking that course at least as early as five years ago. In mid-2010, MSI intro’d the Wind Top AE2280, the first AIO to come with THX’s TruStudio Pro high-end audio.

Lenovo’s new AIO desktop PCs, though, are each forward-thinking in their own respective ways.  The new A32 AIO, just 18.5mm deep at its thinnest point, will feature a 21.5-inch display; an Intel Core i5 processor; Intel Turbo Boost Technology; HDMI in and out; and an integrated card reader. Pricing starts at $699.

The B520 gaming and family entertainment PC, priced starting at $899. will qualify as “the world’s first frameless multitouch AIO,” according to Reynolds. In another claim to fame, it 23-inch HD display will use Project Capacitive Touch (PCT) for a multitouch experience geared to better comfort and accuracy. Aside from Nvidia’s 3D Vision, other features will include an Intel Core i7 processor; SRS Premium Sound; and an optional 3-in-one-mouse with air-mouse and motion-drive gaming functionality.

Another multitouch system, the B320, will offer an HWTV (Hardware TV) technology option, for combined use as a PC and a regular 1080p HDTV, with switching between those two modes at the touch of the proverbial button. Equipped with an Intel Core i5 processor and a 21-5-inch screen, the B320 is priced at $699.

The entry-level C205, priced beginning at $449, is the only AMD-enabled AIO in Lenovo’s new lot. Features include an 18.5-inch screen; an optional single-touch touchscreen panel; a Webcam, microphone, and built-in speakers; an AMD Dual Core Processor E-350 with AMD Radeon HD 6310 Discrete-Class Graphics; and a ATI Radeon HD 6000 Series 1G graphics processor for 720p HD video support.

The B520 and B320 are slated to ship in June. Lenovo hasn’t yet set the dates for the A320 and C205. The new AIOs and notebooks will be available mainly online. However, some models will be sold at Best Buy stores. Lenovo might also announce partnerships with other US retailers later in 2011, Reynolds noted.

Market share figures show that the world’s made the leap to laptops, too–they’re the planet’s default personal computer, and it’s desktops that are now the variant device.

Which leads to today’s two-part T-Poll..

The Eee Keyboard has a touchscreen to the right of the keys and HDMI output, and DigiTimes is reporting that it’ll be out “as early as October” for $400-$500. Here’s a video demo by UMPC Portal, shot at the CeBIT show in Germany:

I’m not so sure about that touch-screen, which looks a trifle weird, period, and possibly unusable for southpaws like me. But an Eee PC hooked up to a TV as a sort of giant remote control has potential. One of the reasons I still don’t have a TV in my living room is that I’ve never seen one I’d want to put in my entertainment center. But with this computer, there’s nothing to put anywhere but in your lap.

And hey, I’m not ashamed to admit that I find the Eee Keyboard intriguing in part because the very first computer I used was also a PC-in-a-keyboard. (No, that’s not a touchscreen to the right of the keys–it’s a big ol’ TRS-80 logo.)

(TRS-80 image borrowed from Radio Shack Catalogs.)

But the Mini lives–and even though $599 is no longer anywhere near a dirt-cheap price for a computer, it remains the cheapest Mac. It also comes in a super-small package that’s still fun and distinctive. So it’s the subject of my fourth excessively in-depth Mac-vs.-PC price comparison. My goal, as always, is to gauge whether you pay a “Mac Tax” when you buy a Mini instead of a roughly comparable Windows PC.

Before we get started, here are links to earlier comparisons in this series, just in case you missed ‘em:

Round one: A mid-range MacBook vs. custom-configured Windows laptops.
Round two: The cheapest MacBook vs. cheap Windows laptops.
Round three: The iMac vs. Windows all-in-ones

As usual, I’ve got some questions and answers about this comparison…

Q. How did you decide what Windows computers to include?

A. There are relatively few Windows PCs that are anything like a Mac Mini. But Dell’s new Studio Hybrid clearly means to compete against the Mini in size and stylish design. Shuttle is famous for its small PCs, and it explicitly compares its XPC to the Mini on its Web site. And while HP doesn’t have anything quite as comparable, its Pavilion Slimline is close enough.

Q. The Mini is the cheapest Mac you can buy, but you can buy a Windows PC for half the price.
Surely that fact alone proves the Mini is expensive?

A. For some folks, a dirt-cheap Windows box might be all the computer they need, However, they’re really not that comparable to the Mini in terms of overall specs, case style, or industrial design. Which doesn’t mean I might not decide to do a comparison in a future article.

Q. How do you factor in the obvious superiority of the Mac platform? (Or, if you prefer, its obvious inferiority.)

A. I don’t! For this series, I tried to make my research err on the side of things that are easy to measure, like hard-drive size and the availability or unavailability of a particular feature. I’m not factoring in the quality of the operating systems, the presence or lack of junkware, or the amount of time that users have to spend wrestling with security software. Folks who are commenting on my comparisons are doing a great job of going beyond that to discuss the platforms in general, and I plan to do so myself eventually.

Q. Will you tell me which of the systems is best?

A. Nope–I’m just trying to determine whether the Mini looks pricey or reasonable when compared to compact Windows PCs that are at least sort of similar.

Q. Is there any way I can convince you to reveal your conclusions this very minute?

A. You need only ask. The Mini I configured looks pricey in comparison to the Dell and HP, not so much because the sticker price is high as because it scrimps on specs. The Shuttle, however, is pricier still. You can configure a well-equipped Mini, but that takes you over $1000, a price range in which the iMac looks more attractive.

Q. Stop calling it the “Mini.” It’s mini, capiche?

A. Sorry, my years of PC World copy editing are showing. We didn’t let companies give their products names that began with lower-case letters. We called the iPod the IPod until the e-mail from angry Apple fans became angry and disturbing! If I get any similar hate mail about “Mini,” I’ll probably fold quickly.

Q. You done asking yourself questions?

A. Why, yes. Yes, I am. Click on to the next page, and I’ll introduce the computers in this comparison.