Home-Built vs. Store-Bought PCs 1132
Greg Searle asks: "I'm going to be in the market for another PC soon, and have been watching the prices drop and the power go up over the years. There are a lot of 'bargains' out there, but then I heard that the best and least expensive PC's are 'white box' systems that are custom build by small, local companies. This got me thinking, I know how to put together a PC from scratch, why don't I just do it? This should save me quite a few bucks, and I get the exact system I want. My question to you: Where is the best place to order the parts (case, MB, drives, etc.) over the web? I am familiar with sites that sell typical consumer products, but have no idea where to start to get raw parts. I'd prefer one site that sells everything, but wouldn't be surprised if there are some specialty sites that provide the most bang for the buck for a particular piece. What do you think?"
How about? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Home Build! (Score:1, Funny)
Having become the "tech support" for my family, I now tell everyone to just buy a freaking dell..and quit asking me bios questions!
Re:$450 from dell - one word: Steven (Score:2, Funny)
BTW, he's been voted the most annoying person on God's green earth! Check it out! [amiannoying.com] He's #1 on the annoying list!
LOL
Re:$450 from dell (Score:4, Funny)
But he WILL get the satisfaction of looking at the mainboard (or DIMM, or sound card, or whatever) sitting in the trash, and saying, "I fried that."
Re:newegg.com (Score:3, Funny)
monarchcomputer.com is also quite good. Their inventory is usually good, but when it's small they still have all the best parts-- they just aren't carrying some crappy ones.
I like monarch computer for two reasons:
1. They always had the parts that had great reviews on the different hardware sites, and
2. if you're lazy, you can pay 'em a few bucks to stuff the pieces you bought in a case for ya.
When I was putting together my girlfriend's computer I wanted it to be good, but not too much work. So I picked some sweet parts and then tacked on 20 bucks to have them put the mb in the case, and install the cpu and HD for me. Saved me the hassle of getting the MB in, worrying about ribbon cables, and things like that. I bought a few parts from other places, tossed 'em in, and it was ready to go. They also put a warranty on some of the stuff they sold me (part of the 20 buck thing), which was nice but I haven't needed it.
Re:$450 from dell (Score:5, Funny)
And, of course, if you get the Dell you don't have to dick around for five hours selecting and ordering the parts, finding drivers, putting everything together, and installing the OS. In the world I live in, my time is worth something. Maybe you're able to download time off the internet or something.
Re:newegg.com (Score:2, Funny)
Next Month's CC Bill
Groceries
Dinner
Movies
Stolen Missile plans
Jeep shipped to China
11 new stereos
Re:newegg.com (Score:3, Funny)
The deals can get better than 25% too. Hardware that they no longer carry in their new store can be real cheap. And even when they still carry the item, if they have many available they sometimes mark things down drastically. I recently bought a Epox 8k7a+ board (raid) for $40.
They tend to post new items at about 10:30AM PST and they can go real quick. For things like DVD drives, I'm talking minutes. I wrote a script to actually buy me stuff I got so frustrated at one point (god bless Perl). A word of caution: If you ever want a lesson in the importance of writing bug free code, write a program that spends your own money! Anybody want to buy a modem? or two? or seventy?
From scratch? (Score:5, Funny)
Really? You'll have a hell of a time designing a 4-layer printed circuit board that won't fail at the memory bus speeds.
It would take many man-years to design the ASICs for the bus controllers, I/O, sound, and CPU support.
And all that fancy equipment you need to do wave soldering would take up a good chunk of you garage.
Back in the Apple ][ days, people still used to build computers from scratch, because they were still 100% off-the-shelf components. I've seen friends from the FSR show me Apple ][ clones they wire-wrapped, part by part, using some chinese clone 6502 chip as the CPU.
Today, of course, building a computer from scratch means only taking about 10 components and shoving them in a case.
Re:Mwave.com is awesome (Score:2, Funny)
I have been using www.mwave.com for over 3 years!
They have Pricewatch based pricing!
they are a great company!
They have a nice site that is easy to navigate and use. And they have all
the major parts both oem and retail!
You:
a) Attended the William Shatner acting school.
b) Have been watching too much Barney lately.
c) Have just discovered Ecstasy.