Looking to buy a new PC.

[Krazy]

My first laptop was made by Alienware and it was the worst laptop I've ever owned. So Alienware gets a hard pass from me.

[Melena]

I don't work at a Chinese slave factory so my time is worth more than the paltry sum I would "save" by devoting my life to building a machine I use to look at pictures of cats and play video games, but to each their own. If you want to do your own plumbing that's fine but I'd rather call a plumber

Chinese slave factory workers must be pretty well paid to equal my pay and benefits.

[Kalmado]

For my own knowledge I'm going to learn how to properly ship an entire build and the right ways to go about insurance and what's the best service. I've heard horror stories about UPS not covering stuff even when they were the ones that packed the box. I'm sure /r/buildapc will have some tips.

[Churchill]

Took me an hour to build my PC, saved probably 500+$.

While I am pretty great I don't make 500$/h yet.

[Arkanna]

My first laptop was made by Alienware and it was the worst laptop I've ever owned. So Alienware gets a hard pass from me.

http://www.quickmeme.com/img/64/6494...011a212df0.jpg

[Boyiee]

I actually got an Alienware m11x for black friday a few years ago. It was a great deal. Needed a small portable laptop for school but wanted to play a game on it here or there if I went over a friend's house. It was the core2duo model which had great battery life. Best laptop I've ever owned, ran battlefield fine and I would bring it everywhere.

Everything else they make is garbage though.

[Gredival]

I don't think I've ever met a person who bought an Alienware and didn't regret it less then a year later.

I have had positive experiences with two Alienware laptops, but I'd never buy a desktop or buy Alienware at sticker price.

[Krazy]

Okay, so I've been looking around for deals and found these:
http://slickdeals.net/f/8510057-hp-d...?src=catpagev2

I'm looking at config 3 specifically. http://slickdeals.net/?pno=179213&sd...=1&mon=1&ref=1

To me, it looks decent and the ram is actually DDR4, not DDR3, it's a typo on the slickdeals link. Getting 30% off on all this is pretty nice, but I had a few questions other than "is this good?"

Is it worth upgrading the processor to option 2 for $100?


I'm gonna go with option 4 for the video card unless the cost doesn't seem worth it to you peeps.


And I've got an inside look at it, the comments said it runs a little warm, that's not really a big deal, is it? Most people seem to be generally happy with it overall. Even if it's a little noisy, that doesn't bug me. The first PC I had made a clicking noise about every 20 seconds and I kept that thing for like three years (though I did fix it eventually).

Spoiler: show

I should be able to replace the fan in there just fine if it getting warm does end up being an issue, yeah? Like, spacewise. It doesn't have an SSD in the config I'm going for because I figure I can wait and get a cheaper one if I hunt around. I've replaced a HDD before, so I know I can pop one in. I think that's all I wanted to say at the moment, I probably forgot something.

[Kalmado]

Only reason to get the K chip is if you're overclocking. But in that build and the tight case with whatever generic fan they're probably using it's not going to matter. I'd save the money. If only gaming an I7 isn't needed. I'd definitely get the best gpu offered, but in the case it will run hot even for Nvidia. You sure you don't want to commission one of us?!

[Krazy]

It's not like I'm not interested in having one of you put it together, but I'm just kinda weary about buying the parts, sending them to someone and hoping I get a PC back. Know what I mean? lol

[Zetanio]

There's a pretty strong whitelist of people on BG who do this for a living and also have a track record.

[orinthia]

The only problem I'd have with it is the fact that HP tends to skimp in other places in order to get that price down as much as it is (I'd be weary of the power supply included with it), but it's a fair price for a prebuilt. The price on the nvidia 970 they quote is pretty close to normal retail as well. Folks say it runs a little hotter since there's not much airflow within the case itself (they really messed with it by flipping the motherboard mounting around, and not in a good way).

Also note how long it'll take for hp to make it. Hopefully you're not stuck for a couple months waiting on this thing, but it's an okay deal for the parts involved if you decide to get it.

add: Folks here could part together something but it will be a little more expensive than this deal, including windows and any potential building/shipping fees (I wouldn't do this for free for any random person, but I'm a heartless dolphin). Difference will be in using "better" parts and potentially having someone you can chat with do all the ironing out of any problems in system building (there's always something, usually minor, but always something), though just because some part might be highly rated on amazon/newegg/etc doesn't mean other parts can never last. Up to you guy.

[Krazy]

With the discount, it ends up being like $890, so I figure even having someone else here put it together I'm not gonna be saving a ton of money (just a guess). I'm gonna mull on it a bit more and try to make up my mind by tonight. I'm still considering holding off altogether until those price drops happen that Tymon mentioned in the second post. The comments mentioned this type of PC goes on sale like every 2-4 weeks, so I could always get a similar (or even better) deal later.

[Arkanna]

Nothing wrong with buying pre-built. Kal and I are both completely trustworthy, but I wouldn't do it for free for a random guy either. The machine you posted isn't bad and wouldn't be sold if the thermals (or anything else) were a problem.

[Boyiee]

This kinda brings up a question I've been meaning to ask.

I've always built my own pcs and people always ask me to do it for them or for their friends. If for a friend I usually just go over there and do it, but word of mouth etc, more randoms ask for it and I would want to charge the fuck out of them.

How much would you guys think is a good rate to put a pc together for some random? I was thinking 200$ to put it together. I'd want to price it for as much as I could get away with. There's also a possibility of people wanting me to do the whole process: order the parts put it together, give them completed product and advertising it as a gaming pc alternative. What do you think that's worth? 500? Basically whatever they'd save from buying it from Dell or some company.

[Arkanna]

You're probably asking for too much, and would be pricing yourself out of contention imo. I guess it depends on the customer.

I will build them for free for my personal friends, but friends-of-a-friend I will do for $100 for a less-complicated build (not much hardware, 1 video card, air cooling, etc), or $150 for a more complicated build (multiple internal drives, SLI/Crossfire, water cooling) or $200 for something far more outside of normal (exotic cooling including custom closed-loop, etc). I've had people ask me for case mods before, which I would do on a case-by-case basis.

I've had people bail on me if I was asking for $150 or more though. People seem to tolerate $100.

*edit*

And I should add, I don't handle the whole process for anyone. Either people buy their parts themselves and I build it, or nothing. I don't have the capital banked away to be able to afford getting stuck with a box someone commissioned me to build but bailed on. Also, that puts the onus of replacement parts/warranty on you, whereas I prefer to just pass along the individual warranty stuff on to the owner.

[Gredival]

This kinda brings up a question I've been meaning to ask.

I've always built my own pcs and people always ask me to do it for them or for their friends. If for a friend I usually just go over there and do it, but word of mouth etc, more randoms ask for it and I would want to charge the fuck out of them.

How much would you guys think is a good rate to put a pc together for some random? I was thinking 200$ to put it together. I'd want to price it for as much as I could get away with. There's also a possibility of people wanting me to do the whole process: order the parts put it together, give them completed product and advertising it as a gaming pc alternative. What do you think that's worth? 500? Basically whatever they'd save from buying it from Dell or some company.

If you're going to go the whole mile and give them tech support after the fact if something goes wrong and handle RMA of parts and putting in replacement installations, I'd charge ALMOST as much as a company premium and argue that the benefit of going with you is the higher quality parts and the lower base price of components.

If the only thing you guarantee is that you get it running to start with, I think 200-300 is a fair premium depending on difficulty.

[Silenka]

I don't know if my story is going to help, but I hope so. Building a PC really isn't the scary thing some people make it out to be. I found that out firsthand when I was in a similar position as Krazy is now.

I bought my first computer from DELL - but I promptly fucked up and bought a Slim version on accident. The video card I bought to put in it wouldn't even fit in the case, so I had to spend extra $ to get a case that would fit and had my bf, who was more computer savvy than I, migrate all the parts into the new case. I also had to replace the power supply with a new one because the DELL one was way too small (250w tiny thing) and at the end of the day I ended up spending way more than I should have by buying prebuilt. Granted, part of it was my fault. But at the time I wasn't confident enough to build a PC.

Fast forward to 2014, I need a new PC. I'm looking at DELL, Alienware, PowerWhateverit'scalled, and all these prebuilts have me eyeing them warily. I know I'm paying way more than I should be on all of these, and I'm a broke college kid. If I want to spend less, I'm going to get a shittier PC than what I should have. If I want to spend more, the price jumps exponentially for every good part that's in there. I almost, almost buy a prebuild from PowerWhatever, but rethink it at the last second because in the end I don't know how trustworthy they are and I hear horror stories about their customer service/products.

I know there's a MicroCenter across town with i5 processors on a pretty good sale and I mull it over for a couple days but in the end I know that I have to man up and build my own PC. Because I need the experience of doing it, and because it's going to be the best option hands-down. I get to personally price and quality check everything I put in there. It's going to be awesome, and it's going to end up meeting my budget because I have all the choices. I set $1k as my limit, that's the most I can spend.

I know everything I need to put in there, but I made a list. From the top: Case, Motherboard, processor, Graphics card, hard drive, CD/DVD drive, Power supply, RAM, a copy of Windows. At Microcenter, there was a very helpful guy (on commission to help people out, of course) who helped recommend parts to me, but it wasn't anything I didn't already figure out from researching reviews and comparison tests online. I picked a cool red case I liked, the i5 processor that was on sale, a 3TB hard drive because why not, a graphics card I researched beforehand, a popular motherboard that could handle the awesomeness of the parts I was picking, a super cheap basic CD/DVD drive, some basic RAM equalling 8GB, and a copy of Windows 7. My power supply was a Corsair 750 I had from my last PC. The total? Exactly $1k. Now all I had to do was take it home and put it all together.

I will admit I felt slight apprehension here. I know how everything plugs into each other - it's clear as day, it really couldn't be any easier. The square peg goes into the square hole, the round peg goes into the round hole. I was more worried about manhandling the parts and possibly breaking them. You have to get a really good pressure on some things to get them to snap in properly. However, there were clear instructions included with nearly every part, and the ones that didn't have instructions were painfully obvious anyway. Well, it turns out a lot of these parts have quite a bit of give and I shouldn't be so apprehensive of breaking them, as long as I was careful I could put quite a bit of pressure on without breaking anything vital. Mostly it was snapping the motherboard into the case and then the processor onto the mobo. After that it was smooth sailing.

It's pretty satisfying to turn your new computer on after having done all the research and parts buying. You know you created it and that's pretty cool. You had complete customization control, everything is exactly how you want it with no compromises, and you didn't pay anyone to do it for you.

Next computer I build, I'll probably wait for deals on separate parts online rather than buying everything in a physical store, as the tax was pretty enormous. However I was kind of impatient at the time and just wanted to go for it. It turned out to be a great decision and learning opportunity. As long as you research your parts online beforehand through reviews and comparison charts, you will know exactly what you need and how much it's going to cost you. Don't let the massive quantities of numbers and letters appended to every part throw you off. Research is your best friend and from that you'll be able to decide exactly what you should be getting, or at least narrow it down to two or three likely candidates.

tl;dr I was a premade buyer and then I got fed up with it and built my first computer pretty recently. It's easy, rewarding and way more satisfying than buying a prebuilt.

[Kalmado]

I'm a little different where I gather my parts one by one based on deals and then will build something and put it up on Craigslist. I sell based on what's currently up for sale. I always start with an extremely high price though so I have negotiating room. As an example my last build netted me roughly $175. And worse case scenario I'll sell the parts on Amazon.

[Boyiee]

There's no microcenter within an hour of me I feel like building a pc here and there for people would be a good extra few dollars a month.