How Much Does It Cost to Build a PC? (A High School Budgeting Project)

At a Glance

Lesson Plan Notes How Much Does It Cost to Build a PC? (A High School Budgeting Project)

Building a computer is something I’ve never done and honestly never wanted to, but each year I had a handful of students who built their own computers and found it the most economical option, especially if they wanted a gaming PC. If we had the time and resources, I would have built one or two computers during the unit in my classroom. But the second-best option is giving students the opportunity to shop online during class; it’s an easy win.

How I taught building a PC on a budget

Start by posing questions.

• Open with the discussion question on page 1: why can you build a PC yourself, piece by piece, but not (easily) a phone or a Mac? It ties straight back to the Operating Systems lesson’s open vs. closed hardware ecosystem idea.

• Follow with a quick poll: has anyone actually built one? It sets up the second page 1 question about how hard the physical build might be.
• Ask students what they’re most interested in so they can circle one of three tracks: Gaming / Streaming, Creator: UX Designer & Videographer, or 24/7 AI Workload.

Then, connect this lesson to the previous lessons on computer costs and the supply and demand of parts.

• Point out the budget statement and its callback to the Demand for Computer Parts lesson: remember why RAM got so expensive? Now they get to feel it in their own budget.
• The research block (about 50 minutes) is the heart of it. Students log each part with a price, a source, and the date they checked it.
• Remind students early that a waitlisted or out-of-stock part is a real finding, not a failed search. They write it down and bring it up in the analysis.
• Before students reach the peripherals rows, point out the note: monitor, keyboard and mouse, headset, and webcam are optional and sit outside the $1,500 budget.

Many students want the most souped-up computers, with the most powerful GPUs for gaming, and they quickly realize it will cost more, so they have to make trade-offs. Peripherals let students research innovative devices marketed to consumers like them. Often, they go crazy for peripherals since they sit outside the budget, and peripherals can serve as an aspirational wish list. This lets the activity fill the whole class period and gives students who are less engaged with internal computer components ownership of the activity.

What this project actually is

1. Why can you build a PC? (page 1): two discussion questions, the track choice, and the $1,500 budget statement.
2. Budget tracker (page 2): a paper table with the 8 core PC categories (CPU, GPU, RAM, Storage, Motherboard, PSU, Case, Other), each with a part/model, price, source, and date checked. Then 4 optional peripheral rows, 3 open rows for extras, and a Total row.
3. Analyze (page 3): five questions on total cost, what the research showed about pricing, which sources were most reliable, wait times and the shortage connection, and whether the budget left room for peripherals.

• Individual project with a whole-class discussion to open. About two class periods.
• No slide deck, spreadsheet template, or extra materials. Students need a device with internet access and a calculator app.
• The Exemplar is one complete, realistic gaming and streaming build with real, dated, sourced prices, totaling $1,489.92 against the $1,500 cap.
• Any legitimate, current retailer counts as a source. No specific site is required, so dead links over time don’t break the assignment.

Why one shared budget (and real prices) matters

One cap for all three tracks creates real budget tension. A gaming build fits comfortably. A creator or 24/7 AI build has to give something up, and students have to explain what. That mirrors how real budget-limited buyers shop. Nobody gets a different budget because their use case is more demanding. Real prices make the stakes real. Students practice checking where a number came from and when, which connects to the data-literacy work in the Demand for Computer Parts lesson. Volatility is part of the lesson, not a problem to hide. Because students date every price, two students can get different prices for the same part and both be right. This makes the assignment practical and realistic.

Peripherals sit outside the budget on purpose. Students still have to consider whether peripherals matter for their build type (a streamer without a decent mic and webcam has a problem). This is where the unit’s component knowledge becomes a real decision. Students who learned what a CPU, GPU, and PSU are now have to pick specific parts and defend their choices. Cooling is also a major factor depending on the parts students use. The “Other” category can include cooling devices or other needed items.

Researching and gathering the latest data, prices, etc., are part of life and work. Encouraging students to compare prices and find more than one source is reiterated throughout the semester in every assignment that involves current issues or products. Budget trade-offs are a real-world skill and help students envision what this might be like in their future careers. For advanced students or quick finishers, have them build a second configuration for the same use case at 20% less, and explain what they’d sacrifice.

What I look for when I grade it

80 points total. The Exemplar shows one complete worked example.

• Component Completeness (25 pts): all 8 required PC categories filled with a real, current, sourced part.
• Budget Accuracy (20 pts): the total is calculated correctly and comes in at or under $1,500, or there’s a well-justified explanation for going over.
• Sourcing (15 pts): every price has a real source and a date checked. A price with no source isn’t verifiable.
• Written Analysis (20 pts): all 5 questions answered with real reasoning, including the shortage/waitlist connection and the peripherals reflection.

Peripheral and extra rows are optional and aren’t scored on their own. They support Question 5. Two very different builds can both earn full credit if they’re complete, sourced, on budget, and well reasoned. Watch for a demanding track (creator or AI) coming in far under budget. That’s usually a sign something is missing, and it’s a good question to ask the student. I’d treat this as another formative assessment, letting students practice the parts they researched since the beginning of the unit with a little more context around price.

Where this goes next

This is Lesson 6 of Unit 2 (Computing Systems). It follows Demand for Computer Parts, which explains why the prices students run into are so high. Next up is the Computer Hardware Store Inventory project, where students work with a large, messy, realistic parts inventory.