Home-Built vs. Store-Bought PCs

Greg Searle asks: "I'm going to be in the market for another PC soon, and have been watching the prices drop and the power go up over the years. There are a lot of 'bargains' out there, but then I heard that the best and least expensive PC's are 'white box' systems that are custom build by small, local companies. This got me thinking, I know how to put together a PC from scratch, why don't I just do it? This should save me quite a few bucks, and I get the exact system I want. My question to you: Where is the best place to order the parts (case, MB, drives, etc.) over the web? I am familiar with sites that sell typical consumer products, but have no idea where to start to get raw parts. I'd prefer one site that sells everything, but wouldn't be surprised if there are some specialty sites that provide the most bang for the buck for a particular piece. What do you think?"

Comments

newegg.com

[BaldingByMicrosoft]

http://www.newegg.com

Re:newegg.com

[Anonymous Coward]

I add a very firm second to this -- you will find a lot of sites with very low prices on one or two components ( see http://www.pricewatch.com ) to attract buyers. But you will spend 4x the money on shipping if you get each part the cheapest you can find. (Shipping has an initial cost, then a cost per lb/kg.) NewEgg has the lowest range of brand-name products across the entire board. You will save $300-400 on a good mid-high end machine by buying all the parts from newegg.

I have built about 8 machines recently, all by buying parts from newegg, and I don't believe there's any cheaper way to get a brand-new machine with quality parts.

The only thing to consider is where to get the monitor from, since it is so heavy, so shipping costs are high. A large local retailer might be better for that. Or use egghead.com, which has (at least used to have) a limit of $9 on shipping for all items.

Re:newegg.com

[ncc74656]

But newegg does not ship by weight. -- Their shipping cost is good on a per-item basis, but when buying multiple items it's pretty bad IMO.

If you're only buying one or two items, they charge a fixed shipping rate per item. If you're buying a bunch of stuff (like all the parts to build a computer, or close to it), you get a break in the shipping rates. I put an order in a couple of months ago for parts for a dual Athlon MP system I built at work...everything except the hard drive, monitor, keyboard, and mouse, which I had on hand. On a subtotal of about $950, shipping was about $45. This was for three boxes, including a fairly heavy Antec mid-tower case, that arrived the next day. (FedEx Express Saver is sold as a three-day service IIRC, but it usually gets stuff from California to Nevada the next day.) $45 seems reasonable enough to me.

Start with pricewatch

[Pyromage]

I start looking at pricewatch.com. They are a lister, they list prices of components.

Keep in mind shipping: its usually cheaper to order a proc & mobo & ram from one place, just to save on shipping.... (otherwise you pay $15 extra per component)...

I've done business with many companies listed there, and been happy every time.

$450 from dell

[fatboy1234]

This isn't worth your time anymore... you can buy a stripped down PC from dell for $450.

check out techbargains.com for the latest dell deals...

start your dell rants.

Re:$450 from dell

[bellings]

Yeah, except the dell comes with ethernet, sound card, video card, speakers, keyboard, mouse, monitor, operating system, tech support, and warranty. In the world I live in, those things cost money too. Maybe you're able to download speakers off the internet or something.

And, of course, if you get the Dell you don't have to dick around for five hours selecting and ordering the parts, finding drivers, putting everything together, and installing the OS. In the world I live in, my time is worth something. Maybe you're able to download time off the internet or something.

Local dealers are still a good option...

[Rorschach1]

I used to work for one, and they can probably get parts cheaper than you'll be able to through the web. There's always a markup to cover the not-inconsiderable expense of maintaining a storefront, but a competent, reputable local dealer is worth the cost especially if you're not comfortable troubleshooting and fixing problems yourself.

I buy from ncix.com

[JebusIsLord]

If you are in Canada (which i assume you are not) You should order from http://www.ncix.com They are out of Vancouver and have great prices / 2 day shipping. Hard to find good stuff online without paying duty from the US.

I shop locally

[tlhIngan]

I prefer to buy it by visiting the local computer shops here (Vancouver, BC, Canada).

They tend to be a bit cheaper, you don't have to worry about shipping... then again, there's the tax. For those of you living in large cities, they are often your best bet for the most common parts rather than trying to hunt through 100 different online vendors, dealing with damaged parcels, etc. Plus, with so many of them along the same road, it's easy to visit another shop if the one doesn't have what you want. And most are online so you can compare prices...

BEST suggestions for building your own computer!!

[Marx_Mrvelous]

Do *not* find the lowest prices on eahc part and use that to spec your system. The absolute worst thing you can do is "cheap out" on parts like RAM, motherboard, and the case. You'll end up with a potentially buggy system that is hard to maintain.

Make sure you only buy *retail* packages and keep all receipts in a folder in case you need to RMA a bad part.

It may cost 10-20% more, but if you do these two simple things, your overall value goes way up for building your own system.

Least expensive? Not always ...

[Osty]

Building your own PC is not always the least expensive proposition. Most configurable, yes, but not least expensive. For starters, all of the prebuilt PC manufacturers get huge bulk discounts. If you want to go buy that P4, it may cost you well over $400 or even $500. These guys can buy in bulks of 10,000 or more, which means significant price drops. Same for the motherboards, cases, power supplies, RAM, ... You're not going to be able to match the prices these companies can get. On top of that, if you're building your own PC, you're probably going to want to put quality parts in it. Don't expect that from a prebuilt company. They skimp where they can (weaker powersupply, flimsy case, off-brand sound card, etc) so they can pass the savings on to you while still making some sort of profit. Nevermind the software you have to buy (assuming you want to run Windows or some other commercial OS and don't wish to steal it). You can sometimes get the OEM discounts on the software if you buy it in conjunction with a mobo or hard drive, but not always.

In short, if price is a concern, don't build it yourself. Oh, sure, with a little due dilligence you can keep the price down. It's just been my experience that that doesn't happen. If you're pinching pennies, buy from a respectable name brand. If you want the ultimate in configuration (and don't mind having no computer-wide warranty support), then build it yourself.

What I did, basically

[wizarddc]

Roughly, when I built my home PC, I started here:

http://arstechnica.com/guide/system/index.html

They regularly update their 3 machine specifications: God Box, Hot Rod Box, and Budget Box, inorder or price and goodies, of course. But what they mostly include is advice on buying what parts, why to buy them, what to look for if you're not buying that exact part, and how to buy the parts you need for the best price. The last part is most important. You can buy the same piece of hardware you need at many places on the net. The key is getting it the cheapest. The price comparison places I've been using are:

http://www.pricegrabber.com/
http://www.mysimon.com/
http://www.pricescan.com/
http://www.dealtime.com/

Some other people said getting your cpu, mem, and mobo from one place. I'd like to say almost that. CPU and mobo, for sure. But I always buy my memory from

http://www.crucial.com

It's just not worth risking on something so cheap.

Pricewatch Cautions

[Wanker]

I stopped shopping Pricewatch a while back since under such severe price pressures companies are forced to shave costs however they can. This means they will:

1) Offer no support
2) Send you broken items and charge a 25% "restocking" to return them
3) Not send anything at all and claim loss in shipping
4) Any number of other sleazy tactics

I suggest that you filter anyone you choose to buy from through Reseller Ratings. I rarely have problems when dealing with people high on their list.

As surprising as it might seem, letting that local shop order components for you and assemble it may actually be cheaper than buying the components yourself. The days of 50% markup over cost on PCs are long gone, now it's more like 2-5%. The shops can buy in volume and get better deals than you can. Come up with a spec on your PC and ask some of the local shops for a quote before buying the components yourself.

A couple more ...

[nosferatu-man]

Also excellent are

http://www.mwave.com

... and, for more esoteric case-related parts,

http://www.directron.com

There's no point in dealing with the hassles that other online retailers will subject you to.

'jfb

For the UK, try dabs.com or overclockers.co.uk

[ranulf]

Anyone who's in the UK should probably look at dabs.com. Everything is very slick, most stuff will be delivered next day even if you order at 6pm, and prices are almost as low as you get. They even do free delivery if the order's over £75 (though it used to be £40 :-( )

I reckon that between my own orders and those from companies I've worked and ordered for, I've placed about £13,000 of orders, of various sizes. Out of all that, everything has been perfect apart from one dead power supply which was replaced next day without returning the defective one, and they've even been happy to take back stuff that we ordered and then didn't want. I can really recommend them.

Another good place that's worth a look is overclockers.co.uk, though the bias is very much on what's en vogue in the gaming market. But they often have good prices on things, although you need quite a large order to offset post and packaging.

But often, I think you'll find that you'll end up spending more in the long run building a PC yourself, as you won't get a cheap OEM deal on Windows (assuming you don't want Linux), and when you realise how crap most of the components are in a pre-build "cheap" box, you'll want to buy higher quality bits for your own box.

Good luck!
Ralf

From scratch?

[newerbob]

I know how to put together a PC from scratch

Really? You'll have a hell of a time designing a 4-layer printed circuit board that won't fail at the memory bus speeds.

It would take many man-years to design the ASICs for the bus controllers, I/O, sound, and CPU support.

And all that fancy equipment you need to do wave soldering would take up a good chunk of you garage.

Back in the Apple ][ days, people still used to build computers from scratch, because they were still 100% off-the-shelf components. I've seen friends from the FSR show me Apple ][ clones they wire-wrapped, part by part, using some chinese clone 6502 chip as the CPU.

Today, of course, building a computer from scratch means only taking about 10 components and shoving them in a case.

My 2c

[TheCrunch]

Well everyone else is suggesting stuff so I figure I will too. I'm looking to buy a PC in the UK sometime soon and for the past couple of months I've kept my eye on the prices. Here's my contribution:

Dabs.com
Tried and trusted. I've bought plenty of stuff from these guys in the past with 100% satisfaction. Their site is a little annoying but they have the widest selection of stock by far. Their prices are very good if not the best. Product information (when available) is not terribly informative so you should know what you're looking for before you arrive.

Aria.co.uk
Only bought a couple of things from these people and had no problems. Less stock than dabs but their prices are good. Specifically, they've got the best prices on Athlon XPs (1800 - 2100). And their CPU coolers & PSUs are cheap too. Product info on this site is poor and the design isn't much better.

Overclockers.co.uk
Bought one thing from here and again no problems. Not a great deal of stock but the stuff they do have is top notch (in most cases). Their prices are slightly off-par, however they've currently got the best price on some CDRWs, HDDs and sound cards. Good product info available. These guys know their stuff. Their site design leaves to be desired.

Overclock.co.uk
Not bought anything from here yet. Their product info is good but have pretty limited stock, mainly geared towards.. well.. you guessed it.. overclocking. Some of their prices are good while others are quite off-par. Their site is navigable but heavily image-laden.

Overclockingstore.co.uk
Not bought anything from here yet. Their prices are reasonable but I've not found anything I wanted cheaper here. A large selection of overclocking stuff available and a pretty poor selection of regular components. Good looking site.

Tekheads.co.uk
Bought stuff from here without any problems. Their site is good and prices vary. Mostly reasonable and sometimes better than dabs. They've currently got best prices on sound cards. Product info available is ok.

Kustom.co.uk
Nasty site but they have a selection of stuff you'll have a hard time finding elsewhere. Mainly oriented towards cases and accessories. Bought a couple of things from these guys, again, without any problems.

Crucial.com/uk
OK, this isn't a retail site, but Crucial sell their RAM online at price up to £30 cheaper than elsewhere. If you're looking for ECC Registered 512MB PC2100 DDR chips like me, then you'll appreciate the £119.69 price tag.

CCLComputers.co.uk
Not bought anything from here yet but I certainly plan to. Simplistic site but very navigable. A good selection of stock and they've got the best prices on some CDRWs, AIW Radeons and the sweet sweet Iiyama Pro 452.

EBuyer.com
Not bought anything from here either. Not too keen on their site but they're one of the few who offer Antec PSUs, with a reasonable price too.

Scan.co.uk
Found this thanks to other posts in this discussion. Have to say I'm very impressed. A tasteful cut-to-the-chase design with decent product information. I was surprised to see just how wide a selection of stock they have. Not as large as dabs but they stock some decent stuff. I was surprised to find the dual Athlon Gigabyte mobo on there. Their selection of hard drives leaves to be desired but the rest is OK. Best prices on Enermax PSUs.

There are other sites out there too, such as Simply.co.uk, Action.com, Globaldirect.co.uk, Dcsplc.co.uk, Stuff-uk.net, Insight.com and Jungle.com but I've yet to be impressed. In particular, Jungle.com is probably worth avoiding. I've heard some horror stories.

So to wrap things up I'd have to say that if you can build your own PC it's definately worth doing so. The pre-built systems you can get may be cheaper and may have an amazing "2GHz P4, 60GB HDD DVD, Scanner etc.. etc..", but on the inside the components will be from Happy Shopper or Value Land and you'll get about as much performance out of your system as a frightened donkey.

However, if you're going to build your own PC you need to know exactly which components you need/want beforehand. These sites will have the stock you want but in most cases won't give you accurate or useful product information. It's a lengthy process but it's worth consulting newsgroups and/or online reviews. Storagereview.com, for example, has a leaderboard where you can get up to date on the decent and not-so-decent hard drives.

There are countless hardware review sites out there. It's worth searching for the product comparisons. Tomshardware.com and Anandtech.com are popular sites worth a look.

Good luck!