New Desktop PC

I don't know what your deal is against Dell, but, though their quality has declined as they've gotten bigger, price per dollar of machine you purchase, they still beat out most. HP's been upward bound since Compaq's acquisition (HP quality & reliability is up as consumer-favorite flagship, versus their low-end self-Compaq-competition). There're others... Lenovo bought-out IBM's laptop division, and those stay true. Generally I trust Toshiba (not off-the-shelf), especially Toughbooks, though they lack in power & performance for perks like LCD brightness in daylight). I'll never buy a Vaio or Asus laptop.... scummy.

Anyway... trust dell, trust HP, for price-per-dollar-per-quality... it's what you get, barring top-end, high-priced stuff... if you can afford... money and who and what is no matter.

 

My problem against dell is that historically only apple has been more underwhelming in parts quality. Most particularly Dell power supplies are notorious for being underpowered, underbuilt, unreliable, and habitually taking out as many other parts with them as possible when they (almost) inevitably fail. And if you want to talk price-per-dollar-per-quality then nobody comes remotely close to building it yourself.

 

I just sent you a message... started a conversation... whatever this place calls it.

APPLE, once up on a time (many years before your "23" stated on your profile), had excellent hardware, and it was excellent, in part because it was proprietary. In recent years, Apple switched from their old IBM-produced RISC chipsets to x86 (CISC) instruction set processors (and subsequently, or more adamantly, to push 64-bit technology, where their OSX, BSD-based OS was going).

DELL is the worst / least of my worries. Yes, their power supplies don't supply a lot of power. They're not a 10-bay gaming case for obtuse maniacs (not offense to gamers, I've built my own, but for business, not games). Ever seen an E-Machine literally fizzle in front of your eyes? Yeah. They're still on the market. And you're talking "Dell" quality... what happens to any cool company when they sell-out and "get big." I've watched E-Machine, AND DELL, power supplies blow-up in my face. I've watched processors start smoking. I've loaded drivers for full-length-ISA-slot, 40mb HardCard from 5.25" floppies. I've built, I've over-clocked computers... and I've grown-up.

ANY Motherboard / RAM / PSU / Whatever Component configuration you put together, NO MATTER the buffers you put in place, are subject to failure, MTBF, or surge. I've had brand-spanking-new APC units go out on me and take a server with them (CD Rom drive salvaged).

I've build.
I've destoryed.
I've f*ed-up.
I've done wonders, too.

Please keep this in mind. I understand you're 23 and learning... but there is more to life and experience than what you have.

 

Building your own is definitely the most cost effective route.

If the security a company such as Dell and HP offers is important to you, there are definitely better places to go than those companies. There are 10 - 15 local places in my area that offer very high quality machinery with lifetime parts and service warranties and people that can actually assist me with any issues I may come across. In my experience, the same cannot be said about the big computer brands.

Dell, Gateway, HP, Vaio, etc. all had the same problem. They shit out after a year or so and the answer from customer support is always either "Pay us more money and we'll help you fix it." or "Pay to replace/repair the part because this situation doesn't fit into your warranty." ASUS is the one exception to that. Though, I've never dealt with their customer support because, three years later, the computer still runs as well as the day I took it out of the box.

The last time I bought a computer I decided to go outside of the big brands and check with some of those local places. While the machinery and warranties they offered were very nice, they were a bit out of my price bracket and even the lowest end rig they had to offer was beyond my needs. I decided to check online and found a small company called CyberPowerPC. They set me up with a rig that can handle everything I could possibly need a computer for at a price barely above build-it-yourself rate. I also got an unlimited 2 year parts warranty and a lifetime service warranty.

Granted, my graphics card came in D.O.A., but all I had to do was make one call and they fixed the issue without question. Thinking back on the power supply in the Dell I owned a few years back blowing two weeks after I purchased the thing, and the $100 I had to spend and two weeks of phone calls I had to make in order to get that situation resolved, I'm pretty happy that I have since left the HPs and Dells behind.

 

I liked their Riscware better.
Though, their X86 hardware seems to be standing-up okay.

I hate Asus pre-builts. Motherboards, okay (quality I like). I'm a Toshiba fan.

I concur.

Unfortunately, for some of the things I do in my line of work, I can't go cheap on workstations...

That's kind of what I was getting at with the age remark. When we're young, and learning, it's okay... but... as I've gotten older... I don't have time to dick around with things, I don't always have time to dedicated to learning something new technical when I have other things more pressing. As I've gotten older, built computers less, realizing there's a huge time savings in finding the right reliable equipment off the shelf, or customizing things for order under warranty & w/ service so I don't have to waste time... I've become very pragmatic. Such as is this.

But you're not gonna get quality. Of course you can piece together a $300 machine that'll last you 3+ years. It's not gonna have the power you want, if you're savvy enough to put together a computer... you always want more. If I go out and spend $1500 on a desktop or laptop, I usually get the bang for my buck without the hassle, or with less hassle, than finding components of quality to match, for less, and taking the time to piece it together.

The only thing I've found is more efficient for my needs is a recent project building my own networked SAN... and I'm sort-of regretting that @ the prices that cloud storage is coming down to.

Yeah, HP workstations.

Now, when it comes to gaming, hell yeah... on $1500, you can EASILY compete w/ the $4K market of Alienware crap... same guys doing the same stuff that the gamers do.
--- merged: Jun 16, 2012 4:26 AM ---

Not everyone.

Some people just give you that blank stare when you present them with a square board that has star, circle, square, and triangle, and the pieces and say "GO!"

Not everyone's that savvy, or cares. And some people take this in an insulting fashion... problem is... picture an elephant. Turn it upside down. Make it turn purple. Now flip it on a mirror image access (90-degree of whichever your previous flip was). Now make it pink. Can you do that?

Believe it or not... Not everyone can do this!!!!! (Fact.)

 

I would never touch an HP product with the exception of their laser printers or inkjets. I worked for their inbound tech support 10 years ago before and during the HP/Compaq merger and saw enough of which direction the company was going in quality and focus.

 

Funny. I actually trust HP (I'd rather die than buy a Compaq though, and, yes, I know, same company). I'll keep that in mind, though. I'm all about teh Xerox Color Lasers (consumer OTS). Love them.

Side note: I buy or pick-up free copiers I scrounge on Craigslist, tear them down, and put them back together as a side hobby... usually takes me a month per when I do one... when I have one laying around.

 

HP Printers are crap. The Japanese manufacturers (Kyocera/Canon) give you much better value for the money you spend. And they last a lot longer, too.

 

If you don't need color just get one of the Brother laser printers that you can refill yourself.

 

Sorry to address the OP instead of the derail, but I have my doubts about "top of the line" computers. If you have a specific application in mind that requires those specs, go for it. The last thing you want to do is try to future-proof yourself. Buy a top of the line PC for $3500 now (which is utter insanity, if you ask me,) and in three years you'll have something that might keep up with entry level in 3 years. The way to future-proof yourself is to buy middle-of-the-road now, upgrade if necessary, and do the same thing in a few years. Spending $1000-1200 now, $500 for a new graphics card and some more memory in 18 months, then starting from scratch (maybe keeping the same case, optical drive, card reader, and a few peripherals like that,) with $1000-1200 in three years gives you much more bang for your buck.

When buying stuff like graphics cards from Newegg, see if another manufacturer makes the same product for the same cost or $5-10 more to get a lifetime warranty rather than the 90 day.

 

avoid wasting money and get a RELIABLE desktop PC by purchasing an iMac Remixer

never again will you have to tolerate system freezes, daily updates and too many other nuisances to list

 

Trolling ?

 

I know a certain Dutch person who would nod in supreme agreement with you, Caustic.

Take an Apple PC/laptop, throw Linux on it and he'll promise heaven on earth for you.

Besides, I will never buy Apple.

Ever.

 

...didn't read through the whole thread. However, I've built many machines in my past and I would much rather do that. Then again, not everyone shares that interest. Looks decent, none the less. You'll enjoy it.

 

Haha wow Remixer, that is one halluva system lol. I just recently built mine within the last year or so, it's got:

Gigabyte motherboard
8GB 1333MHz RipJaws RAM
Intel Core i5 4570K 3.8GHz Quad-core CPU with unlocked upward multiplier for overclocking
EVGA nVidia SuperSuperClocked 1GB GeForce 650 TI
256GB Corsair Neutron boot drive
320GB IDE drive for storage
23" Dell Monitor ($105 refurbished at CedarPC.com)
Bunch of crazy lights inside.

Not near as fancy as yours, but I mostly built it with components and bundles on sale at NewEgg.com for about $600 or so total.

Extra points if anyone recognizes my screensaver in the picture...

 

I don't wanna be that guy, but are you actually running an SSD in conjunction with an IDE drive?
That's like buying a higher-class sports car, outfitting it with high-quality wheels and tires in the rear, and spare-tire-donut-type wheels in the front. Slower, older technology, not really able to take a beating, and probably going to give out within the next couple of weeks/months.
Just seems kinda silly to me, especially given the low price-per-gigabyte ratio that you can get with SATA drives nowadays.

 

Well, I didn't get the Alienware anyway. Got meself a custom-built one back then.

The specs are:

Intel i7-2700K (@ 3.9 GHz)
Kingston 8GB RAM
Zotac GeForce GTX680 - 3GB GDDR5
Crucial 240GB SSD
Western Digital 2TB SATA
23" Samsung LED

I'm looking to replace the current PC in 6-9 months. Probably gonna look something like this:

Intel i7 (6- or 8-core; >4.5 GHz)
32 GB RAM
2 x GeForce GTX Titan Black
Samsung/Intel 1TB SSD
2 x 2TB SATA
31" LED Display

 

Do people still buy/use desktops?