My first ever PC build. With a hard budget of less than £120 (150 USD), I scrapped together the [s]cheapest[/s] most value for money parts I could off of eBay and Gumtree. Very scrapyard wars-y. I also made sure to include an SSD and 8GB of RAM.

I ended up with a surprisingly decent system that could run GTA V at (1680x1050 due to my £5 monitor) 45 fps. And I made full use of it over the course of 4 months.

Also, when trying to replace the thermal paste on the stock AMD cooler, the paste was stuck so well that I ripped the whole CPU out of the socket along with the cooler. What proceeded was almost a day of trying to pry apart the CPU from the heatsink, using first rubbing alcohol, then floss, then a stanley knife, then a hairdryer+stanley knife. Finally, having given up being careful and gentle with it, after 4 minutes straight of heating from the hairdryer and prying with the knife, the CPU popped off.... And bent a couple of pins. Miraculously, it still worked.

Sold for a tiny profit after 4 months of good use.