Wow this was totally unexpected. I ordered a laptop from dell when it was on really good deal mode, but because of problems with their server they said the order was cancelled. Well guess what came in today.

Introducing my new laptop, and replacing the computer I just built.

Here are the specs -

P4-M 3.06
512 megs DDR
15.1" UXGA 1600x1200 screen
Radeon 9000
40gig HD
802.11G wireless
8x DVD

All for only...$1225

the problem is now I have to sell the machine I just built. If any tfp'ers looking for parts, email me. I don't want to advertise, but I wouldn't mind giving you a very fair price over ebay or anything else.

well damn, i'm behind in the times...I've *wanted* to build a comp but 1) haven't had the time, and 2) haven't had the money

But soon enough, my plans will fall into place, yes...<evil laugh>

I will always stand behind my "Frankenstien" machines...

I like to "tweak" and modify too much to buy a pre-built machine...

Have a 19 inch monitor already...

Just got the case, CPU 2400 AMD Athalon.. dual 256 DDR.. the new stuff :D... a 30 Gig HD (old one) and a new 160 Gig HD, some fans... and I'm about to go get a GFX 5900.. Ultra isn't in town, so no need thinking about it.. can't wait for price to lower as my old card died in.... the accident :( hehe. But so I should hopefully be building her tonite!! :D:D:D:D

ive built my last 3 as well as 2 for my dad, 1 for my mom, and 3 for other friends

I've built about a dozen pc's, for myslef, friends, and work, and I guess I have been lucky because I haven't yet had to RMA a part. Its probably becauses always buy from newegg and get quality parts (ASUS, ABIT, Antec, Crucial, etc.) Might cost more, but it saves alot of hassle

Okay guys, get ready for me to preach about Dell's Deal again.

I just bought a Server that had an interesting upgrade....Get a 3.2/800fsb p4 chip for $199 more.

So I just upgraded the main cpu in my system for $199. I bought the server total for $550 after shipping and sold the machine for $350 replacing the 3.2 with a 2.4 from another system.

Dell can make things happen you wouldn't believe.

Building for years, had the occasional hiccup, but i'll never buy OEM again.

42,653.123 at the last count!!

My first was a 386-25 sx with 1 meg ram and a 4 mb harddrive.
I've built coupla dozen since. Latest was AMD 1900xp, 256 mg ddr, GeForce4, SB 5.1, 2 HD (20mb/40mb dual boot), cdrw, dvd. It's over a year old, now. I'm getting the urge.....

I have quit building machines for my boss' auto parts store. His last 6 I told him to buy Dell. He hasn't paid more than @$600 each crammed with a shitload of software. I couldn't compete, economically. The latest was a 2.4 P4, 256 DDR, 40 mb HD, video, sound, speakers, LAN, modem, cdrw, and a 15in FLAT SCREEN! SHEESH!
Last year I had to build him a "special" with a slow celeron (under 1 gig) to accomodate a program for flashing GM OBDII pcm's. Played hell finding that processor! And I still spent as much as he did for the Dells.
I've always badmouthed the "packaged" systems. I especially hate the way they lock up their "proprietary" software. But if I had to recommend a system for a tight budget... Dell. (I believe there's a thread fomewhere about "bad aftertaste" somewhere around here.)

I've built 8 or 9 systems in the last couple of years. I try to use top notch components and I keep Newegg in business.

There is nothing so satisfying as the moment you are all done assemblying the system, hit the switch and she boots up sweet as can be.

Building your own is so much more satisfying, plus you know you're not being given crappy components by some PC dealer that just wants to give out the highest Mhz figure he can to the punters!

I think im on the 9th one... something like that.

Dell is the Walmart of the PC world.

Oh yeah, I build my own. I'm a nerd, what can I say. It's just satisfying. Plus after a while, you can morph all your old parts into other computers. It's so mad scientist.

If someone asks me to build them a cpu, I ask them how much they're willing to spend first. IF it's 500 i'll just say get a dell. But i've built some recent systems including this for a friend (He had a bit of $ to spend on it).


Abit NF7
AMD Barton 3000+ (2.73GHz) <--Not sure of the multiplier, it was close to that.
512mb Kingston PC 3200 DDR400 x3
ATI 9800 256mb
DSP-500 Headset (usb, built in sound card)
60GB Western Digital 8mb cache
Lian-Li pc-60 (I think, not sure)
Volcano 7+
6x panaflo 80x80 37cfm fans

My system comes nothing relatively close to this, this was one of those systems I just wanted to run away with =P.

I built my current system, researched it for about 3 months before I bought anything...it was a great experience and I want to do it again..I'm hooked :) it was like getting my first tatoo, I want to build lots of computers now :)

I'm about to build me own once a few more paychecks come rolling in the door, but this is what I'm looking at.

2.88 P4
1024 DDR PC2700
some nForce2 mobo, forget name offhand.
ATI Radeon 9500 128mb (No point spending double for a few extra FPS)
SB 5.1
80 gig 7200rpm
No fans, spent 5 bucks for a 12 inch fan from a dollar store
Optical mouse, wireless keyboard

For I think $1050.

Come on Thursdays!!!

i built 3 out of my 7

I do it all the time, wouldn't do it any other way for my personal systems.

Where I work though - it's all Dells, cheap and easy. :)

damn i wish they made nf2 pentium motherboards...

Built all I own except my laptop. Simple task really, it's nearly foolproof. Just a couple hours reading online and you'll know enough to get the job done.

You don't really need to 'learn' how to build a computer. Basically it's just like putting a very obvious puzzle together. Incredibly easy, but most people don't have the confidence to get inside the computer. They don't trust themselves to do it right.

I started building machines for music....easier than making dinner for six. It's cheaper than buying a Dell and I get exactly what I want.

ive built my own for three years now, mostly amd due to price considerations. as has been said, quite a bit easier than most imagine, just like a giant, overly expensive, erector set :p

To make some people happy, I just got a building job from a costumer that I won't go through dell for. Love these specs

P4 3.2c
abit IS7-E
1 Gig Corsair 3200
Geforce FX 5900

All for a gaming rig for a nice 40+ year old lady who is addicted to MMORPG's.

So people, I do build systems once in a while :)

I built mine. fried my processor. convinced AMD it was their fault.

I win!

My current system will probably be the last system I build. The only time I can see building a system in the future is if i piecemeal sale parts into a system. But then when I built this it was because I did not have a credit card to order online so I bought everything at the store which made it cost more than buying a prebuilt system. Oh well at least I get the new top of the line.

I built both of mine... Much cheaper that way.

DOH! :eek:

Built my own PC and several others, 1.2 gig AMD, 512mb DDR, 100 Gigs of hd, Yamaha 44x CDR/RW, Hercules Game Theater XP 6.1. Case has a cut out of my school's mascot, www.mnstate.edu. Soon to build a new system, but waiting for amd 64bit!

Last computer I built was a 300mhz machine. Seems like ages ago. Now I just buy 'em. I don't have enough time to keep up with the technology.

I have built for friends and made decent money at it. Its way cheaper for a custom built machine to do it yourself. Its probably just a bad trait but I want to 100% know for sure that the machine was put together the way I wanted it to be put together. Guess Im just a bit picky that way.

Just built mine a week ago :D

Athlon XP 2500+
120gb Western Digital Special Edition
Memorex 48/24/48x CD-RW
Soltek SL-75MRN-L Mobo w/onboard nForce adapter
Plus I got a case w/a window on the side, 2 blue LED fans, and cold cathrode tube. ^_^ It's a riced box!

Always built my own, always will.

Just built my first desktop about 5 months ago... I will NEVER go back to buying from a manufacturer. Total customization is sweet!

Been building or revamping systems for two years. Can't get enough of it. Just need to get some money (just graduated college) to do some personal stuff and some experimenting with cooling systems. Any suggestions?

I think it is very popular.

It increases your technical skills, can be fun (if you're interested in PCs), allows you to configure your system exactly as you want it and is generally cheaper and more powerful than a similiarly priced packaged system.

Mr Mephisto

That's been my experience in home built as well.

I've built / fixed pc's for almost all of my friends over the years.

I've found that any computer I build will be better priced than the Equal from a OEM company. Depends on where you buy your parts heavily.

I would never buy a whole computer. I prefer building.

I've built mine. I'm never going prebuilt again. It's fun bringing your computer to life the first time you hit the power switch. I had an eMachines and a Compaq. I was scraping my dick across the bottom of the prebuilt barrel there. Boy am I glad I built my own computer..

i did, but had ALOT of problems, they're fixed now, and its great.

My last three are/were homemade jobs, prior to that had an old compaq someone sold me for 20 dollars. I upgraded the heck out of what I could, but there's only so much you can do to those things.

Current machine is a P4 2.4Ghz with 512mb and an nVidia 64MB card, bunch of other stuff, blah blah spent under 500. I'm incredibly pleased, except the power supply I bought died after 2 months. It was teh lame, I guess. I just went and got an old one from another machine, and everything's fine again.

I won't buy pre-built from Dell because I know where they send you when you call in for Hardware support or replacement. India, Pakistan, or the Phillipines. Or Manila.

I do software support for them until midnight Friday night/Saturday morning. I'm done after that, different job, more money.

Technically, I have a week of vacation next week, but I'll be working at the new place all week too. :)

But if someone knows jack about PCs, and they want to get a machine that runs e-mail and "tha intraweb," a $450 Dell is tough to argue with.

I never store bought a computer from my first 486 dx2.

I did. Many TFP users have.

I have a home net, all using XP.

IBM A31p, obviuosly not home built. Just the most used machine.

In the Living Room:

SOYO KT600 Dragon Ultra
1.5g DDR400 (pc3200) Corsair XMS
AMD Barton 3200
ATI Radeon AIW 9800 Pro
Koolance PC2-601BW
Enermax 550w
2x120g Maxtor 6y120m (sata 120 stripedx2)
Sony dvd burner

My Room (ok, the garage is my room. I mean my interior room, (den, office, cave)

SOYO KT600 Dragon Ultra (I have such good luck with SOYO. Asus has no support, Gigabite is screwy, haven't tried many others lately.)

2800 Barton
1.5g Corsair XMS
Radeon AIW9700
4x40g IBM pata (raid striped)
or
120g sata Maxtor (by itself) Depends on my mood, or backing up.
Plextor burner (cd)
Another SONY dvd burner, I love the SONY stuff!
IBM (SONY Trinitron) 21"

My Net is Linksys, bring on the DLink Opinions.

2.4g Linksys (g) router
Old Linksys 2 port print server (shared HP970cxi that duplexes)
Epson and HP photo printers (usb)

Audigy2 Platinum in the den, on-board in the living room as it feeds a Harmon-Kardon AVR225.

The den uses CambridgeSoundworks 551. (550 watt Creative Labs) stuff.

Oh, and I got a silly camera from PC World for free.

Another TFP member has the webspace to show the pictures. I will pass them along to him.

Oh, Dude from Texas! I have rounded cables for sale since I went to SATA!

Pheww, I need to get back to work. Somebody has to pay for all this stuff you know!

I've built a few computers in the past year. If you want to spend $400-600 on a computer and don't want superior performance out of it, then go for Dell. If you want to spend around $500 and up, then attempt to build your own PC, but only if you don't need a monitor/speakers and the other stuff that comes with a Dell. When it all boils down to it, Dell is a damn good deal, but if you want performance in games then you'll have to go custom-built. And when I say performance, I mean damn good performance, not just the ability to run Battlefield or UT2k3.

-Lasereth

I just bought a bunch of parts from NewEgg and Best Buy recently to upgrade mine. I always build my own systems so that I know what goes into them.

Giga-Byte MB - GA-7N400-L
AMD Athlon XP 2500+ "Barton" 333FSB
Kingmax 512Mbs DDR PC3200
MSI GeForce FX5600 VTDR128
Maxtor 120GB Hard Drive w/ 8Mb cache ATA133

I went from a P3 600 to this and I am now an AMD person!!!

Built my own in October of last year. Great computer (at the time) for the $1500 I paid for it.
My secret to computer building cheapness? Chinese malls. Theres one near my house and there are 6 computer parts stores inside it (no joke). They all compete with eachother. In fact, my friend got a list of parts with prices from one store, and then he went to the next and that store undercut the prices, then the next, and they undercut the prices and so on and so forth.
One even lied to AMD on his behalf for a fried chip that was completely my friends fault.

I've built my last few computers myself. It's a great way to learn about all the components and how they all work together.

It also usually works out cheaper being able to buy each component from the cheapest supplier.

i builded maybe 50 pcs already ... well i maded also mistakes sometimes , but you life and learn .... currently my pcs rock :))

my pcs are not cheap but i only use the best components on the market ... quality is important

Yep, if you go the cheap off-brand route when building computers you'll pay for it later. Quality matters!

-Lasereth

I have built my last three computers and find that it is by far the best way to get a quality machine. The best part about building your own computer is that you know (or at least should know) exactly what each component is and how easily it can be upgraded. That way, in the future, you can easily replace the bottlenecks, but keep components that are still useful.

always build your own - much cheaper - much more reliable.. and you can do cool things - like overclocking.. i bought an athlon xp 2500+ - bought a better fan for 30 dollars.. and overclocked it to a 3200+
suddenly my 150 dollar chip is a 700 dolar chip.. and it works great- i game heavily and have no troubles... with that 500+ dollars saved, i could afford nearly all the other parts of the PC -

when you build your own - you're attached to it... you know exactly what you have, and where your next upgrades lay - its the only way to go... and its not hard at all

built mine lil over a year ago...still runs better than most "new" computers

only time i'd ever buy a pre-built again is if i go the laptop route

meeeeeeeeeeeeee :D

p3 1.4 tualatin
geforce4 4200
two wd40bb
2 17 monitors
16x burner & 52x cd
512 ram

i think thats about it :p

I work for a computer store, and we build computers. The one BIGGEST selling point for us is proprietary parts in retail machines. We let people know up front that we build computers that can be fixed anywhere in the world at a computer shop. We also tell them that dell or gateway or whoever usually use proprietary parts. These can be costly.

Case in point: Compaq computer comes in with a dead floppy drive. No open drive bays, must be installed in place of original floppy. Front bezel incompatible with ordinary floppy drive. Ordinary floppy drive=$10.00, Compaq floppy drive=$90.00

Loser - Compaq owners

Case #2: Dell power supply goes out. Customer comes in and tells us he needs a new PSU and buys one. Comes back same day with dead M/b, CPU, pci cards, AND the new PSU. Did some searching, dell puts proprietary m/b & PSU in systems. Looks like normal ATX connector, but intel board was redesigned for dell and different voltages go to different rails. Normal ATX PSU's dont work and fried the system. Customer was not only out a whole computer, but dell lost a customer for doing something so stupid, and believe me, this guy was going to tell everyone he knew about his experience.

Loser - Dell owners

Just goes to show you that a cheaper computer might be available from a big name company, but when something goes wrong, dont come crying to me about the cost of fixing it.

I've built my last couple computers from scratch and done major upgrades on my most recent one, switching from AMD to Intel and nVidia to ATI in the same box. I also built my mom a rig from some older parts of mine. And put one together recently for a friend from parts he'd purchased.

Always build your own...You get what you want...nothing more, nothing less

I haven't built this machine as it was a bargin.
I couldn't have built it this cheap.

My last 4 machines have been built by me though.
Or should I say last machine. Its like having the exact same broom for 10 years, only you've changed the handle 4 times and the head 6 times.

My g/f is sat on a machine built from componants that have been in various machines.

ok just upgraded again now im running

Asus P4t533-c (asus makes the best)

P4 2.53 ghz OC to 2.85 (2.849 acualy)

512 RIMM4800 (32 bit rammbus clocked at 1200 mhz)

Radeon 9800 256 sapphire
(omg this is awsum)

1 80 gig HD and 1 120 gig HD

The last i build was a:
Asus P400
2.4GHz Intel
512MB DDR Ram
Radeon 9700 pro (Hercules)
120 gig HD