Which is better to do for the average computer knowledged person to do?
I am wanting to build or buy decent gaming computer and I already have a good idea of the components I want included. I also want a computer that is fairly easy to upgrade and doesn’t have a lot of integrated components on the motherboard. I figured the best way of doing this was to put my own system together.
Problem is I don’t know a lot of what is involved beyond connecting the components and installing the operating system (Win XP) and drivers, i.e. how to optimize the settings to minimize crashes and maximize effeciency. (Also unsure where the BIOS comes from - does it come with the motherboard?)
Also, generally speaking, is it any cheaper on average to build your own system or to buy one that is pre-built (but has the component that I want)? Or the cost between building and buying negliable?
I used to say that you could easily save up to 50% of the price of a computer building yourself and have a signficantly higher quality one but, with the whole Dell deal for the 4550’s, its really blurring the lines. I don’t know if it is still on but you could get a very respectably specced computer from dell for less than $500 US.
However, building computers in not exactly hard and it doesnt take a genius to work it out. Everything is pretty self evident and theres always lots of online help if you run into any troubles.
The BIOS is on the motherboard and, for a beginner, you really dont need to actually tweaking anything. At most, you might get a 10% performance gain which is not really noticable unless you like to brag about numbers. You might want to look at overclocker however or you might not.
I priced out building a high end gaming system versus buying a Dell, and it wasn’t worth it to build one. About the only reason I can think of to build a machine is if you’ve never done it before, and you think it would be fun to try.
I’ve built plenty of systems in the past, and IMO, it’s a pain in the butt. Given that there’s next to no price break involved in building one, it was an easy decision.
For what it’s worth, I ended up with a Dell 8200, and once I figured out the network card they sent with it was bad, I’ve been very happy with it. Of course, it was several days of hell trying to figure out just why the damn thing barely limped along the Internet, and Dell did their best to insist it wasn’t their fault and ultimately it took me buying another network card and installing it to figure out what was wrong, but hey, who expects support anyway?
One word of caution on Dells. I don’t know what the newer motherboards for the higher speed processors are like, but when my power supply fried a couple weeks ago, it took me a week to find out that the power supply was properiatary. Of course, properiatary components are to be expected, but it was quite annoying in the case of a power supply. If there was ever a component you should just be able to easily replace, that’s it.
I used to say that the thing to do was to build your own system, especially if you had the time and drive to resolve why every little thing that went wrong did. My father has made several homebrews, and I remember one time he was at it for several days trying to figure out why the hardware wouldn’t optimize. Now, I agree with what the others have said. The price difference just isn’t there anymore, since you can get a Gateway or a Dell for about 600 dollars and have them be good to boot. It might be worth going Gateway since they use AMD, and the Athlon is more than capable of holding its own against a P4, and is cheaper to boot. Only thing you can really do is shop around, maybe even consider having a local place due a custom-build for you. That way you support the local economy and get better tech support, since you can just drive it in.
Well, all of the above posters are correct in that you just can’t save 40% by building your own anymore. You can still save money by building one yourself if you buy OEM parts from a Mom & Pop shop. If you were even thinking about buying your parts from a retail store like CompUSA or Best Buy, stop now and just buy a Dell. By buying OEM parts you will have 5-10% or more than a similar Dell or Gateway box, or you will be able to get a better box for the same money.
For example, a standard (generic) ATX power supply costs around $12. As someone pointed out, Dell uses proprietary power supplies that either cost more or will take a few days to replace under warranty. Should the power supply on your “homebrew” box die, you can replace it with one purchased almost anywhere for around $15 instead of waiting around for the UPS guy to bring you one from Dell. To me, I’d rather pay the $15 to not have downtime than wait 2-3 days to get one from Dell.
Likewise, you can more easily upgrade your system down the road with an “open architecture” home box than a possibly proprietary Dell or Gateway box. For example, I used to own a Compaq that had the sound and modem on the same card! When the modem died, I didn’t have sound for a week until I could get a new modem in from Compaq.
Lastly, it’s fun and it’s a learning experience. Building a PC isn’t rocket science and as long as you don’t force something into a slot the wrong way - which is almost impossible given the form factors being used today.
Accipiter1, if you happen to be in the DFW or North Texas area (your profile doesn’t say)… I will be happy to get you in touch with the custom builder I use.
About the same price as equivilently configured Dell or Gateway box, but… 100% standard parts and only Intel’s best grade motherboards are used. These machines are stable and upgrade or replacement parts are widely available.
And, he puts together configurations that you just can’t get from Dell/Gateway.
You have a monitor/mouse/keyboard/speakers that you like… He will deliver without that stuff and you don’t have to pay for it.
Already have the OS you want to run? He will deliver without an OS.
Want to buy a new copy of the OS but want it installed your way… no problem, he will partition, install to spec (within reason) or let you do it all.
If you want the Ultimate Gaming Machine, you could pay a little extra and get an Alienware system. I’m not a gamer myself but they do advertise themselves as “the ultimate”!
Where can you find a generic ATX supply for 12 dollars? When I went to a small place in town to have my supply checked out and order a new one, I was getting quotes of about 80 dollars. I assume that included shipping and profit for the store, but not 60 dollars worth. Power supplies are a lot cheaper than when the one on my family’s old 286 went back in probably 1987 or 1988, but I just don’t see a 12 dollar supply.
Building your own will generally result in better components all around, but the money savings is no longer there. You can also mix and match on a home-built to a greater extent than on a Dell or Gateway. If you want a machine optimized for gaming, look at building, Alienware, or Falcon Northwest rather than Dell or Gateway.
I was going to just update my computer but when I saw what I could get from Dell, got one of their 5440s. Comes with 3 gigs of software on it already, inluding, XP Home on a NTSF file system, WORD, ms money, 6 months of AOL & 6 months of MSN…etc.
If you want one, let me know & I can post the deals they have at the moment.
When it comes to computers never underestimate the manufacturers warranty!!! I have only just built my first computer, but everyone before it was bought from either Gateway or Acer, along with a hefty extended warranty, and I got every darned penny worth out of those warranty’s. Don’t forget how nice it will be to have a part replaced overnight, or a free tech support to call when something (and it will) breaks or goes wrong. They say that the extended warranty is a scam to make easy money for the store or manufacturer, and it is. Except for computers! If you are at all unsure about your l33t sk1lzz, go with a nice Dell, Gateway, or maybe even a company like Alienware. You will not regret it.
Thanks again for all the advice. The main thing to me in building or buying the system is that it has a lot of room to grow. I know that I can’t afford all the components that I want or even the processor speed I’d really like. But as long as the base system is solid and easy to upgrade is the main thing to me.
For example, I was looking at some AMD systems and the motherboards that typically come with them. Most of the motherboards that I’ve seen in pre-built systems that only support a front bus of 100 Mhz (and that is all AMDs up to now have delivered). But the new AMD 2700+ and 2800+ processors have a 133 Mhz front bus and won’t work as well in those 100 Mhz motherboards. If I were to buy a system where the motherboard only supported 100 Mhz, I couldn’t upgrade my processor past the AMD 2400+ unless I want to go back and buy yet another motherboard. It could be the same with memory, the computer may have 2x 256 MB chips, but those same chips will later be useless when there is a need to reach max RAM mem, you have to use 512 MB chips which basically means it was wasted money.
Things like the 3d graphics card can wait (I can rip an old GeForce2 Mx from my current computer in the meantime). And a good motherboard can make buy a sound card unneccessary.
So here are the pros and cons I’ve gathered from everyone’s advice:
1 - Build you own system:
Pro: Get the components you want; easy upgradability
Con: May not be optimized; no tech support; unlikely to have anything other than factory warranties; no real $$ savings
2 - Buy the system from Dell/Gateway:
Pro: Support and warranties; pre-build
Con: Don’t get exact components wanted; questionable ungradability
3 - Buy the system from Falcon-NW or Alienware:
Pro: Solid systems that a likely easy to upgrade; support; pre-built and optimize
Neg: Likely to have higher $$ tag
Ultimately, as long as the computer can upgrade easily, I will go with #2, if it can not be upgraded very easily, then #1 or #3 may be only options. #1 is sorta a last resort but I can see how it would be fun to build a system from scratch.
Scotth: BTW, I’m from Nashville, TN - gotta fit my profile
Thanks again for all the advice. The main thing to me in building or buying the system is that it has a lot of room to grow. I know that I can’t afford all the components that I want or even the processor speed I’d really like. But as long as the base system is solid and easy to upgrade is the main thing to me.
For example, I was looking at some AMD systems and the motherboards that typically come with them. Most of the motherboards that I’ve seen in pre-built systems that only support a front bus of 100 Mhz (and that is all AMDs up to now have delivered). But the new AMD 2700+ and 2800+ processors have a 133 Mhz front bus and won’t work as well in those 100 Mhz motherboards. If I were to buy a system where the motherboard only supported 100 Mhz, I couldn’t upgrade my processor past the AMD 2400+ unless I want to go back and buy yet another motherboard. It could be the same with memory, the computer may have 2x 256 MB chips, but those same chips will later be useless when there is a need to reach max RAM mem, you have to use 512 MB chips which basically means it was wasted money.
Things like the 3d graphics card can wait (I can rip an old GeForce2 Mx from my current computer in the meantime). And a good motherboard can make buy a sound card unneccessary.
So here are the pros and cons I’ve gathered from everyone’s advice:
1 - Build you own system:
Pro: Get the components you want; easy upgradability
Con: May not be optimized; no tech support; unlikely to have anything other than factory warranties; no real $$ savings
2 - Buy the system from Dell/Gateway:
Pro: Support and warranties; pre-build
Con: Don’t get exact components wanted; questionable ungradability
3 - Buy the system from Falcon-NW or Alienware:
Pro: Solid systems that a likely easy to upgrade; support; pre-built and optimize
Neg: Likely to have higher $$ tag
Ultimately, as long as the computer can upgrade easily, I will go with #2, if it can not be upgraded very easily, then #1 or #3 may be only options. #1 is sorta a last resort but I can see how it would be fun to build a system from scratch.
Scotth: BTW, I’m from Nashville, TN - gotta fit my profile
I recommend building it yourself if you want to give it a try. Components nowadays are easily come by and there are forums such as Tech Support Guy which can help. One of my computers was custom-built by a company, and althogh I could have bought a pre-built system from a shop, they wanted to sell me a package, where I got a specific processor, operating system, printer, and scanner. However, I didn’t want some of these things, and felt the money would be better spent on what I did want. There is no easy way to get technical support if you build it yourself, but replacement parts are readily available.
On my Dell 5440, I push two buttons, the case opens & everything is right in front of me for updating. I changed the cdrom drive & memory & it was the easiest computer I have ever updated.
Even though I put three fans in the computers I made myself they still got hot.
Hey, visa.com doubles your guarantee. So a Dell, which comes with a one year guarantee (thats the shortest) is now two years…cool.
