My moms computer motherboard was scrapped so she got a new computer. I have her old one was thinking of trying to put a motherboard in it. I have never tried it before so do any if you guys have any pointers?

With an older Dell case (as reported previously) you might:
1. Have an underpowered power supply
2. Not have brackets for extra HDD's, CD-DVD drives, or even a floppy

What you might want to do is salvage the DVD-CD ROM drive and maybe the HDD (probably small GB capacity) for later use. Cases are cheap and the memory on the old Dell MoBo is so out-of-date as to be virtually useless.

You _could_ make it into an underpowered machine for the kids - that's about it.

I was going to swap memory with mine but mine is older than hers and the memory would not fit. I may just save it for parts.

Trust me, the saving old pc's for parts just usually means you have junk to get rid of later.

Truer words were never spoken.

i have rebuilt 2 computers with part swapping. then i bought a new one. you can only expect so much out of old junk.

The old PC is probably good only for spare parts for yours, but even then how long do you want to keep your clunker running? New PCs can be had for $500.

DL,
Find the model and look for a motherboard for that model on ebay and just use all the existing peripherals. You can probably get a new or refurb MB for next to nothing.

get a new mac.