The last time we visited this price bracket, we helped you establish a well equipped mid-level multimedia machine that we guaranteed would satisfy most users, and would give you a great audio-visual experience. Though the article did not generate the popularity in a manner the Rs. 20,000 PC did, we received a humongous amount of feedback from our readers. While the Rs. 20,000 budget makes a decent machine, it may not satisfy anyone who is looking for a more powerful machine with better multimedia features.

Keeping this in mind, we decided to refresh and update the article on building a PC under Rs. 30,000. Since the last roundup, quite a few things have changed in the way of specifications. The things that have changed include some essential components of a PC such as the motherboard, processor and RAM. Here is the new list as of March '07.

CPU: AMD Athlon 3000+ AM2 (Rs. 2,750)

At first glance, our readers may be puzzled as to why we are choosing the same processor that had powered our earlier roundup. Reason - though the processor has the same name, the 3000+ is now built on AMD's AM2 platform. The AM2 platform as compared to the previous generation socket 939 offers a few distinct advantages. Firstly the AM2 platform is DDR 2 compatible, which has now become the mainstream choice. Secondly the AM2 platform is common for AMD's single and dual-core ranges. Anyone investing in an AM2 setup now will be able to easily upgrade to a dual-core processor at a later date.

The 3000 AM2+ despite being built on the new platform however retains its clock speed. It has a clock speed of 1.8 GHz, and sports a 512K L2 cache that handles general computing and multimedia use quite easily.

Motherboard: Asus M2NPV-VM board (Rs. 4,800)

This inexpensive and extremely capable board supports all current generation AM2 based variants ranging from the Sempron range to the expensive and powerful FX range. It comes with a Windows Vista ready graphic chipset onboard and has support for DDR2 800 memory. It offers connectivity options, both for DVI and RGB options therefore allowing you to connect, both LCD and CRT monitors. The board also offers a Hi-Definition 5.1 channel audio chip, which offers excellent music playback capability. There is a single PCIe slot present in case you ever want to upgrade to a dedicated graphics solution for gaming.

The board even has an onboard Gigabit Lan adapter, and a deluxe 8 USB 2.0 ports for expansion. With these kinds of features and its competitive price, it is the perfect foundation to build your PC.

RAM: Corsair Value Select 512 MB (Rs. 2,550)

The system memory for the new motherboard is now DDR2. For this we have chosen Corsair Value Select DDR2 667 MHz RAM. Corsair is a well known and respected brand, and offers great performance. It also offers a great lifetime warranty and this makes it the perfect choice for building our multimedia system.