Need help with the list of cheap coins one can mine using PC ?
Economically it is not profitable. Your income will be lower than the cost of electricity that you spend on computer power. Will you dig a pit for the Foundation of an apartment building with a shovel? Mining with a PC is as much a hopeless task.
Generally it is hopeless task, but not always. Depending which GPU s/he have in his or hers PC, mining with it could be profitable. Not as profitable as mining with ASIC, but still profitable.
Also, maybe OP wants to mine some "promising" coin so that s/he could sell them after longer period of time. Which at the end could be profitable also.
But you are right, one must know a lot of things, so the s/he could play their cards right and leave with a profit.