Build Vs Buy (the new computer quandry)

[dmendenjr]

I think all I need to do is show my wife all the, erm, success (sad sarcastically) stories from people who bought from a few of those boutique builders I mentioned earlier... I realize that when people have a bad experience the b!+#& about to anyone with ears... but when the only good things you can read about a company come from people who sound like they work for em... well, newegg and microcenter here I come. Now just need the time to buy and build.

 

[Koilvr]

For the last 10 yrs I have built my own. I now have built 30 or so computers for friends and family. I have 3 computers and 5 laptops I still use the first computer I have ever built and it is Awsome still fast and with out issues. I do think it is time I retire it but heck it works better then a new one. last one i built I added the fancy lights and 1tb hard drive with 6gb ram. If you do build do use a differant cpu coooler, not the stock from anyone

 

[TheForce]

I can't vote on this because I do another option. I find a basic factory built system and then add the extras I need. Last machine I did this way was based on a top of the line HP. Then I added double the ram, 3 extra hard drives, additional 4X Blue Ray burner, esata port, and double the power supply wattage. The cpu and video board was adequate as well as the HD DVD / DVD burner.
While I agree with ramy that I barely broke even on the base machine, what I did save was the construct time and days of installation configuration. Not sure what the hp proprietary software was worth but since I don't really use it, I'd have to admit - nothing. Bottom line is the base system was a break even deal. I'm really happy with the speed vs. cost of this system.

 

[mdram]

i have mine bult at a local shop, its really only @ 50-100 more then i can build one for, and a good friemd works there and does the builds. add that to the ability to rma parts via them and not wait for the turn around time

 

[navychop]

I am getting frustrated, trying to buy a pre-built from Dell for work. I was willing to pay more for it, since time is scarce, and because there are no trialware programs loaded. It can take me longer to remove that junk than to build from scratch. At least, with XP that was the case. Plus, I figured buying a pre-built now would get me a free upgrade to 7 later.

Now the Dell process will not allow me to order a PC without a monitor. I am swimming in small monitors. I'll be buying a widescreen for this PC, but not one of the ones Dell offers. Getting very frustrated, and am tempted to go back to building my own. And there appears to be no way to build one with RAID built in. I've never built one from scratch with RAID; my current work PC was ordered that way from a local guy I trusted, who had low prices. Too low, as it turns out. Getting hard to find a small shop these days, even harder one you would trust and count on being around for a year or more.

 

[mdram]

many motherboards come with sataraid now, its almost standard

i can give you the name of someone that can do what you want in my area, im on marylands eastern shore, i do believe they ship anyplace.

ive been buying work pcs from them for over 10 years with no issues

 

[dmendenjr]

OK, decided to build. Actually drove out to a micro center (St Davids, PA) today to scout out some parts and decided to take the plunge and grab an OEM Samsung DVD Burner while they had em (the same one that I always see on newegg as being sold out). Sadly, I should have looked a little harder at the drive because instead grabbing the SATA version, I grabbed the PATA (IDE) version. I have no qualms about using an IDE DVD burner (it reviews really well) but I wonder if it will work with an SATA Hard drive... if it's gonna give me nightmares I likewise have no qualms returning it.

 

[JAG72]

As long as your motherboard has a IDE interface you will have no problems.

 

[Pepper]

There's a batch of Dell machines in a Library that I repair and clean up when necessary. I noticed inside of those, the board will hold four RAM chips. Or rather, it would, if they had actually bothered to put all four sockets on the board. There are two sockets that are populated, and two empty solder areas on the board where two empty sockets SHOULD be.

This level of cheapness is why I won't buy another Dell. The crapware they load them down with is just icing on the cake.

Those machines are old, surely they learned and don't do that kind of stuff anymore right? Wrong. A customer bought some brand new Dell towers. There is an IDE connector on the motherboard, but the power supply has no molex connectors. I have to find something to convert SATA power to molex if I actually want to use that IDE connector.

I'll continue to build my own, using my choice of parts, rather than trust some big manufacturer's choice of whatever cheap stuff would increase their profit margin.

 

[mike123abc]

Order something from the vostro line, they have a minimum of extra software installed and you can order without monitors.

 

[Pepper]

Sure, but until you pop the cover on it you won't know what they skimped on to save a few pennies.

 

[Gib4500]

Check out mwave's build it option. You basically can pick out all the parts you want and they put it together for a certain price. Or you could do like i did and order the bundles there that include cpu and motherboard bundles there. They test it and make sure the cpu and motherboard are working correctly together before shipping. Best of all this option used to be free for the testing part. This would significantly reduce the chances of having a bad part in your new computer. It really isn't that hard to put together all the parts.

Another good part about building your own is you can overclock your parts if you want. I think some of the dell's out there the bios won't let you overclock. I have my q6600 overclocked to 3.00 ghz up from 2.4 ghz. I'v heard those i-7's overclock really good. As the ssd drives come down in price you could also look into getting one of those. i'v heard those can really boost performance because a lot of times the hard drive is the slowest part of the system. I would also suggest getting the windows 7 upgrade preorder now for 50 bucks. You could just run the free release candidate for windows 7 until the final version comes out around october 22nd. Hope this helps.

 

[SnowVan]

I always buy Mac's

They have always been reliable for me both hardware wise and software wise

Maybe they are built with the same stuff as Dell's, etc....I have no idea

But my 2 MB's and iMac have last me many happy years so I just continue buying them

 

[dmendenjr]

I always buy Mac's

They have always been reliable for me both hardware wise and software wise

Maybe they are built with the same stuff as Dell's, etc....I have no idea

But my 2 MB's and iMac have last me many happy years so I just continue buying them

Believe me SnowVan, if I could have an equally equipped Mac Pro with what I am going to pay for my computer; I'd be all over it... but to get close I'd be at around 2749 and still not have the gfx card I want (plus another hundred or so for a fresh copy of vista home prem 64 to run from boot camp)

But I can build a rock solid PC for well under a thousand dollars less than the Starting mac pro and for about $400 more I could add an EFIx boot dongle to my pc (along with another HD and a store bought copy of OSX) and have a fully functioning mac in the same box for a several hundred less...

 

[dmendenjr]

Hate double posting in my own topic, but wanted to grab an opinion:

I ended up getting a little more than I was planning on for the system build, and think I might put the extra into the storage (devices). Thinking about going really crazy, would this work:

A 32GB SSD for the OS (Win 7) and a couple of key apps
1X SUPER TALENT UltraDrive ME FTM32GX25H 2.5" 32GB SATA II -$119

2 750GB's in RAID 0 - for most of the non-os programs (Office, Games, etc)
2 X SAMSUNG F1 RAID Class HE753LJ 750GB - $89.99 each ($179.98)

and an extra drive for Vista (since I've read you can't install Vista onto an SSD) until Win 7 comes out... then as a back up drive for my important files after that.
1 X Western Digital Caviar Black WD6401AALS 640GB - $74.99

Or would it make more sense to get 4 of the Samsung Discs and run it in a RAID 1+0 configuration?

Also, has anyone picked up a Core I7 920 from Micro Center? I'm wondering about the stepping on em, are they cheap because they c0?

 

[diogen]

I'm surprised nobody asked the question that should be asked first: Do you like building systems?
Not: Can you do it? Have you done it before? How many have you built? Did you have many problems? Just: Do you like it?

If you don't, forget about DIY.
Risk to screw things up with a i7 system is high (just read Anandtech's latest memory review). And you hardly save any money nowadays (on top of the line systems).

If you do, DIY such a system can be very satisfying.

Diogen.

 

[dmendenjr]

I'm surprised nobody asked the question that should be asked first: Do you like building systems?

I started one about 10 years ago. At the time it was an Athlon K6 machine. I had no budget and was getting parts here and there from the traveling wonder that is known as "Computer Show and Sale" (the electronic world equivalent of Mallrat's Dirt Mall). At that time, it was dealing with jumpers on the motherboard and hoping that the CPU I bought 4 weeks ago isn't bad, since the carnival wasn't in town. I was also smart enough to never keep a receipt or do any fore planning. The result was a system that ran Win NT 4.0 (until the demo liscense expired). Two weeks later I ended up buying my second mac.

Lessons from round one: the shopping is fun, but planning is better. If you can't afford the CPU then WTF are you building in the first place.

For round two: I have a concrete budget (more than I really need to spend) and the knowledge from the past mistakes. However, it's been 10 years - it's hard to find a motherboard with jumpers on it anymore, AGP is no where to be seen and what's the deal with three sticks of memory! (/sarcasm) Thanks to the web and buying online, I can better plan out the parts and buy from people who will be there tomorrow (whether in Cailfornia or outside Philly)

Seriously though, I want that feeling of satisfaction to sit down on and boot up a computer that I assembled. I want speed, stability and style. And most importantly, I want to KNOW my system. So, the long answer to your question is... I hope so.

 

[diogen]

So, the long answer to your question is... I hope so.

That's a good start, although I'm a bit puzzled, what the short answer would be...;-)

I think the second question today should be: Why i7?
I think these systems today have the highest risk factor for a DIY project. All drivers and BIOSes are at v.1.0 (if that).
And it doesn't look like you'll be doing any video rendering where this choice would be justified. Price and selection isn't too good either.

Is it for the games? Planning to run VMWare? Any number crunching - SAS, SPSS, Mathematica?

Diogen.

 

[dmendenjr]

I'm already at the point of overkill for the system. Since I building from the ground up, I want something that has a future upgrade path. C2D and C4D are at the end of their line. AM3 AMD chips are tempting for the price/perfomance rate; but from the pure power point, since I have the extra, I've been aiming at the I7. Actually, a nagging little voice in the back of my head keeps saying to wait for the LGA1156 since it looks like long term LGA1366 are for server application. The Intel thing is not a lock, but if I go AMD I'll want an AM3 Mobo from the start and the selection there is lacking.

(edit) sorry, missed part b of the question.
gonna use it for everyday computing. Games, web, music, office apps, etc... looking for pure power and perfomance. One of the reasons why I'm looking at SSD or RAID to boost drive speed.

 

[diogen]

Well, it looks like you've made the decision. Don't cut corners and it should work out.
Spend some time picking the right mobo. Avoid Alpida RAM. Think twice about RAID.

Diogen.