Throw another $100-$150 in there for a Win11 key. Or $10 for a sketch key, I don’t judge (but others might not want to)
Just tossing this out there, my experience with sketch has been very positive. I believe it’s been 2 years now.
Conversely, the whopping $380 I spent on Windows and Office (both Home) for my main gaming rig has become a pretty significant sore spot for me based on the wonderful $30 (both Pro) sketch experience on my secondary / workstation computer.
IIRC Zipcar has a steep upfront cost to let you join the club (so to speak) so, for a one-off rental, you are likely to get a better deal with usual rental place (like Hertz or Budget or whatever).
Sorry for the aside…
I thought Office is only a subscription now. You can’t just buy it.
IMO the subscription is a bigger rip-off but it seems usual these days (Adobe is another that pisses me off having to pay a subscription).
I bought Office 2019 back in January of 2021. Then again in August of the same year. If I were buying today, I would probably get Office 2021, which appears to still be a thing you can buy.
I’ve now had my main gaming rig for 33 months, for which I paid full price of $260 for Microsoft Office 2019 Home. That works out to under $8 per month, so even with that ridiculous price I think I’m still ahead of the curve compared to their 365 subscription package. (Google says 365 costs $100 per year or $10 per month.)
Preaching to the choir. In fact, I think I might have given you the link to my preferred source (but maybe I’m thinking of someone else).
But some people are worried about cooties and won’t want to do it, even to save $125
(For the record, we’re not talking about piracy. Rather the number of OEM or enterprise keys you can get for around ten bucks usually, directly or indirectly, from Asian markets)
Yep, that was me.
I will say that if you are a spreadsheet poweruser MS-Excel is, by FAR, the gold standard for spreadsheets. It’s kinda crazy what that can do in the hands of someone who knows how to get the most out of it. If you are one of those people that can be worth the price of admission.
Other than that there are free alternatives to the MS-Office suite that are as good (or close enough).
I’ve just about had my fill of that sort of thing. I used to do that for a living, way back when the 80286 was just entering the market.
It’s do-able but takes two buses and a Metro train, totaling about 80 minutes each way; last thing I bought there was my iPad. We have a small hand truck somewhere, capable of moving computer equipment.
We’ve been using Open Office for a long time.
Fair enough, can’t argue with that.
I’ll start the pre-built options with a 13700 / 4070 build for $1440. (On sale from $1800.) Note that this has a better CPU than the build-your-own option I posted above, which was a 13600 / 4070 build.
I specifically looked for an ABS pre-built (Newegg house brand) because last time we had a thread like this*, ABS ended up being the winner. Part of the reason it was attractive was because it used standard off-the-shelf parts as opposed to proprietary (non-upgradable) hardware.
Not sure if this one does too.
*Technically speaking, “last time we had a thread like this” was this very thread.
Speaking of, it’s been around 4 months now. @Johnny_Bravo, how do you like your ABS pre-built? Would you recommend ABS?
I like it! It’s definitely a little loud, but beyond that it does computer things real good.
Both the Microcenter and ABS systems look good. Really sort of a coin flip between them.
The MC one has an older 12th gen i7 but can be overclocked, is in a board that supports overclocking and has an AIO.
The ABS one is a newer 13th gen i7 but neither the chip nor board supports overclocking and the cooler wouldn’t handle it well anyway.
I’d rather have 32GB of DDR4 than 16GB of DDR5 but memory is a relatively cheap and simply upgrade. Same basic GPU, PSU, 1TB Storage, Wifi and Bluetooth enabled.
If I knew someone might want to tinker, I’d recommend the MC one, if I knew they’d never touch the BIOS then the ABS one will provide a little more oomph out of the box with the i7-13700F. Really neither is a bad option unless you have specific wants.
There’s also the element of having it delivered to your door but it will take a few days, or you can get yourself to the store which might be a hassle but you’ll go home with it that day.
There’s a decent chance you can make it much quieter for free (and without sacrificing much or any performance) with MSI Afterburner if you’re interested.
Yeah, that’s me. I don’t really do builds anymore but I do plenty of tinkering.
Looks like I missed out on the G444s; neither of the nearby stores have listed any in stock for quite a while. I’ll probably be going a bit outside my price range with a G446; maybe I’ll be able to score one of the open box items.
Yeah, there are two Micro Centers in my area; the one up in Rockville is further away but probably easier to get to, practically right across the street from a Metro station. I still prefer Fairfax, a Lyft from there should be like 20 bucks.
Bummer. With a 12th gen processor, they were likely old stock and once gone, gone. Still, with an i7-14700KF, you won’t be looking for an upgrade any time soon.