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Ask Slashdot: Buy Or Build a High End Gaming PC?
An anonymous reader writes: Looking at some Black Friday ads, I'm seeing some good deals on Alienware and other gaming rigs that would be cheaper than building them from scratch. If you built or were to build a high end gaming rig, what would you suggest? Or would you just get a prebuilt system and customize it to your needs? I'm not looking for cheap, I want best quality and performance, but not overkill that would rival supercomputers and at the same time break my bank account. It would be a Windows system to keep my family happy, but possibly dual boot with Linux to keep me happy. It will be located in the livingroom hooked up to a regular monitor and the big screen TV, replacing a budget PC that's in there now.
The only good way to get what you want is to build one.
It's also a good exercise.
If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.
Next question.
The budget I'm willing to spend is around $2000. And I'm the one that asked this... http://ask.slashdot.org/story/... I decided on both the Playstation 4 AND a gaming PC.
I'm not looking for cheap, I want best quality and performance
Unless you're buying a 'package deal' from a retailer and know down to the last fastener exactly what's going into the box you're buying, always build your own box if you can. Even then, if it's me, I'd end up auditing the entire pre-build anyway, to make sure their tech didn't do something stupid that would end up biting me in the ass down the road. But either way, if you have the capability to do so, spec out and build your system yourself, picking the best quality components and case, so you get exactly what you want, instead of what had the best profit margin for someone else.
Are YOU using the TOOL, or is the TOOL using YOU? Think about it!
I would recommend checking out the reddit forum for building PCs. They often know of deals and resources that can be helpful. People there will also be willing to help you spec out a PC and pick parts / find the cheapest prices.
Also pcpartspicker.com is a great resource.
That said, I've built pretty much all of my PCs for the last 20 years until this week. I found a good deal on an Asus G11 Desktop with an i7-6700 and a GTX 980. I could have saved a little building myself, but I decided to go the pre-built route this time and it's been great so far. Ultimately it comes down to what you prefer. The price is usually upgradability. In my case if I want to add additional components, there's only two PCIe 1x slots on the board that are open, so I'd probably need to get a new motherboard and case if I wanted to do anything other than swap out parts or add hard drives. So consider if you're ok with that before you buy.
I would hit up http://www.logicalincrements.com
I would vote for build, first you can pick around the video card you want, the CPU you want and the mother board you want. Many website like http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/ offer good price/value comparaison chart for component. You may want a SSD drive of 512 gb where your whole machine will run fast and an extra multi-terabytes hard drive for storage (photo, videos...).
Building is also fun + you may received it piece by piece in the mail... more excitement every day :)
I just went through Fry's build service, if your buying most of your parts at Fry's (you can bring in your on Video card or other specialty part) they will happly build the system for $50 (Up to Post) and a bit more if you want them to do the OS install.
One side note, you technically cant install Windows 7 with out a CD rom (I laughed when I ran into this problem).
Several other PC warehouse places offer this kind of service too.
That really is the big issue with a self build: If something goes wrong, you have to track it down and handle all the support. If you get a pre-built from a good vendor, they'll handle it all. Say what you want about Dell, but all you have to do is run their diags (baked in to the UEFI) and call them with the code, they'll send a dude with the parts needed.
So that should be the major thing you think about. If you don't want to do support, then buy it from a vendor that will provide you with support to the level you require. I tend to recommend Dell because their hardware is reasonable and they have support available everywhere. They subcontract it, but it all works well. We use it at work all the time.
If you are willing to do support yourself, then building it gets you precisely what you want. I build my system at home because I have very exacting requirements for what I'm after and nobody has that kind of thing for sale. Like I don't want a "good large power supply", I want a Seasonic Platinum 1000, nothing else.
Also you'll find that generally at the higher end of things you save money building a system. For more consumer/office range stuff it usually is a wash: They build the mass market systems around as cheap as you could afford to. However when you start talking higher end gaming stuff, you can pay a large premium for things.
As an example I just built a system for a good friend of mine. He wanted some very, very high end hardware and pretty specific requirements. Origin PC would get him what he wanted... for about $9,000. I put it together for around $6,000. The gamer stuff often commands a hefty premium.
I'd go with "build" all the time. There's no "good deal" that can top building your own. And if you're getting better deals with prebuilt rigs then you are looking at the wrong stores for parts.
Build it. Reddit has a great community for this, http://www.reddit.com/r/buildapc. http://www.logicalincrements.com/ is also a useful site.
I looked at an alienware once, and the components they were using were about 2 standard deviations away from top of the line, whereas the best price point is about one standard deviation from top of the line. Even at that alienware with lower performance was much more expensive than the build I ended up doing. I built my PC about 4 years ago and it still exceeds my gaming needs. Don't see needing to build a replacement one for at least another 4 or 5 years.
If you are not allowed to question your government then the government has answered your question.
I prefer to build personal computers for myself and brother. I know the technology and expansion capabilities when I buy the motherboard and my computers typically last 3-4 years until I feel the need to upgrade. My current PC has a SSD/HDD combo for acceptable speed and storage requirements at a cost I'm content about so I could see my current system being in place until a major component fails (motherboard or cpu). Just a peace of mind I like to have with my personal computer.
Cliche, I know, but very true in this situation. If you don't want to mess with part specs and tinkering with a scratch build, pick up an ASUS ROG or some Alienware box with good user reviews and be done with it. But if you're like most of us, building is the way to go. You choose the exact parts tailored to your needs, the system is flexible for future upgrades, and you don't have to deal with prepackaged junk (as much). If it were me, I'd fire up the google and Newegg and build from the ground up. It may run a few dollars more, but you're guaranteed to get exactly what you want in a box.
A PC with an integrated face system will be built faster.
As other posters have said - Build!
What I haven't seen noted yet - Skip SLI graphics cards. I went SLI on the gaming machine I built in 2005. What I found was that a top end graphics cards can play games at high settings for a while, and that the extra $450 would've been more effective if spent 50% of the way through the life of the PC (i.e. 2 years later) on another high end card of the next generation.
Even if you are not confident in your ability to put it all together, you'd be better off buying all the parts and having it assembled by a trusted third party who isn't with some established brand computer company. The reason being that companies like Dell are getting worse and worse about installing bloatware on your computer that can create security vulnerabilities and just generally slow your computer more than necessary. Avoid the issue and make it how you want it from the ground up.
You will get more system for your money when you build. However, you'll be doing your own tech support, so if you don't know what you are doing when building a system, you can get burned. i.e. things like making sure you've got the proper cooling and power set up correctly for the parts you use can be an issue. DIY power supplies tend to die faster than the ones used in pre-build big brand systems. You can also run into weirder issues with drivers and component compatibility because you aren't working with a mass production combination of components that has been tested together and had all the kinks worked out. The other cost savings upside is that you can often salvage some of components from your last system when building a new one.
On the whole though, if you are able to select the correct components, you can get a lot more computer for the same or less money than buying it from an OEM. At the expense of not having an 800 number to call and a throat to choke when it doesn't work besides your own.
There are no 'good' deals on pre-built systems. The cost on these hosts is anywhere from 50% to 200% markup on the cost of the components. Mind you there is a good deal of investment on the part of the manufacturer to ensure component integration is without defect, but it isn't guaranteed that some bug will crop up.
If you have the excess cash and don't wish to spend the time researching/building/risk taking involved in building a custom rig then purchase one from a common dealer.
If you would like an affordable system and are willing to add time in both researching building and addressing unforeseen issues then build one.
The markup cost is so great and the advantages just don't seem to be there. I usually will opt to build one and invest some time into research. I no longer actually need to do this, but the miser in me just won't let me purchase a pre-built rig.
Here are my cost saving and stability recommendations:
* Don't worry about overclocking... leave that to the kiddies who want to burn up their shit.
* The cheapest defense is in Herd Immunity or Apple Research. You can lean towards a very popular board on newegg or just buy a hackintosh board. I have found these to be extremly stable and they tend to work when dealing with things like sleep/resume on wake.
* Trailing edge of technology is both affordable and less buggy. I typically purchase the high end components that are being phased out. These will often be very comparable with the latest generation, but at a fraction of the cost.
* Avoid Version A... Never alpha test hardware for a manufacturer. I've seen gigabyte release limited updates for version A's and Asus tends to crap on them as much as possible.
* Read the motherboard compatibility guide. The motherboard manfacturer does a limited amount of tested with existing memory. While I have found compatability issues not really a big of deal as they used to be the old timer in me says just read the book and pick something on the list.
* Be Prepared to RMA
- Kingston and Western Digital have been the friendliest when dealing with RMAs in the past. Corsair used too (this may not be true) would only deal with the retailer for an RMA and most retailers won't deal with returns past 30 days. Make sure you know what the replace and repair process is with the manufacturer. In the event you do have an issue you are able to troubleshoot it can save you anywhere from a 100-200 depending on the component failure.
It may not be 'cheaper', but you can specify the exact parts. And you build it, instead of the 19 year old intern, with 2 weeks on the job, struggling through a monday morning hangover.
Build quality.
It's also a good exercise.
I do three sets of ten computers three times a week. And I cross train by laying fiber optic cable - it's for cardio. Cat 6 when I'm bored or overtrained.
Build it! For all of the reasons previously posted. I've been building mine since it entailed soldering discrete components onto a PC board - it had a hot Z80 CPU and 64K of RAM. :-)
Yeah - it's been a while.
I had this same question a few months ago. What it came down to was: I could get almost everything I wanted in a ready-to-go system, except for 1 or 2 components. Usually it was the video card, and the power supply in the system just couldn't handle it. Other times it was lacking the SSD, or only had an SSD, or the SSD was too small. Ultimately, I built my own and I love it.
Most Alienware computers are not gaming rigs. Or at least, they are so poorly optimized for the role that it would be shameful to call them such.
A gaming rig is a computer defined by its ability to play videogames well. For that, the single most important component is the graphics card or GPU, as most of the work done by a videogame is through the graphics APIs. It also needs a processor powerful enough to feed the graphics card. For modern games (since the late 00's), the processor doesn't need high single-threaded performance (because again, the work is done on the GPU, just needs to feed the GPU), but it is preferable to have more usable threads for some games (like Planetside 2) that track lots of physics.
Alienware computers typically are defined by having very high price tags (more on this later), powerful processors (typically top end i5's and i7's), but relatively weak graphics cards. Because of this, they typically play games at *lower* performance that their components might suggest (and certainly their price tags would). The reason for this bizarre design might have something to do with kickbacks from Intel (at least was true in the past), but also something akin to the MHz Myth for gaming and processor power, which allows Dell to sell PCs while still having a pretty fat profit margin.
When you buy an Alienware, you are paying close to retail (or usually a little more than retail) for the parts, plus some amount for labor, plus a pretty large (40-50%) profit margin on top of that.
Because of those things, you can oftentimes build a BETTER gaming rig for less than *half* the cost of an Alienware if you assemble yourself.
A good first build would have something like a low range i5, an FX-6300, or an FX-8350 combined with the most powerful graphics card you can afford. Right now the market is pretty much dominated by the GTX 960, 970, and 980 because of their amazing power, power/price point and their low power draw (about half the power draw of ATI/AMD's offerings). You can fit 2x GTX 960s plus an FX-6300 and the rest of the computer on a single 500W PSU, which is pretty remarkable.
while(1) attack(People.Sandy);
Gaming in the living room? Dual boot? Tv?
This computer will never be ready to dd what you want. By the time you dual boot into linux someone will want to watch Netflix. Turn down that stupid gam, we are trying to watch TV over here. Dad, I need the computer for homework.
Honey what happened to my recipes and what does Ubuntu mean?
It wont work. Its a fools errand. She who must be obeyed will put her foot down. Buy her some nice-ish computer and sneak the gamer in later.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
I've used the same midi case for the last 4 builds - the main difference over that time is the space being made available. Luckily I knew back when I bought this case not to buy anything that would become embarrassing with stupid symbols, crappy lights and plastic windows . I've worked in a few facilities that buy pre built machines in the hundreds of units and it made very little difference to trouble shooting issues. Forum bashing for help is marginally easier if you know all your parts first hand.
1. You get the chance to overspec case silencing components, slow running fans / fanless configuration. You woun't care about noise - until you do
2. You get to specify memory specs / hard drive specs / processors
3. You get the chance to specify your graphics card - especially useful if you're dual booting Linux
4. You get the chance to specify a case size that you can work with / no tool assembly
5 If it breaks, you get to keep both pieces - but you can also upgrade at your own pace
Some of the component shops around here have PC-builders, basically you pick (from their approved selection) case, psu, mobo, cpu, ram, graphics card(s), disks etc. and they'll assemble and test it for you. If you want to start fresh and not use any parts from your existing setup that's a quite practical way to getting the parts you want without fiddling with screws and cables and DOA components (well unless they fail during shipping). Personally I rarely start over from scratch though, it's rare that everything is so outdated it's best to start over.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Building your own PC can only ever be an issue if you are on a limited budget. For smart, capable people, creating a great PC at minimal cost is a wonderful challenge, but for the average Joe (which includes most people here) it is more trouble than it is worth.
But when money is no object, one can choose the very best components- which means components which need the least amount of smarts or experience to use. You get to buy an over-priced case with all the bells and whistles that makes placement and cooling a snap. An over-priced Intel i7 and over-priced OEM cooling that ensures tons of CPU power for gaming. A big high-end SSD drive that is so much easier to fit/use than a HDD. A very strong GPU from Nvidia or AMD that has all the super cooling (and a reduced card size if that matters) that one could ever want.
A PSU that will power a room of computers, let alone just your build. And then you get to pick YOUR choice of monitor, keyboard and mouse- and sound options too.
Only going budget (for very good reasons given the bargains out there) make a PC build 'hard'. But if you can walk and chew gum at the same time, you can build a high-end, no expense spared gaming PC.
Seriously though, the only way to get what you want is to go custom. I'd consider a pre-made box only if it was a shockingly good deal. Every time I run the numbers though, I always see that what I can build myself is usually cheaper than what someone else sells pre-made.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
They are a nice mixture of built it yourself in that they allow for a lot of customization and picking of parts while you don't have to do the building yourself. They are very reasonably priced. iBuyPower seems to be a sister company and they too build custom stuff. One word of warning. They don't let you start from a base-system and build up. You start with a base and have to select custom parts from that. That means different bases with the same parts may have a different price (as much as 300 dollars in my experience) and that some base models won't have the things you want. For example, if you choose a AMD-style computer, you won't be able to get a Intel I7. Even major CPU models vary. They are always running specials and I have found that while the extras vary (And sometimes that is in your favor and sometimes it is not), but you will never see 50% off sales. I have heard some bad reviews on support, but the one time I had a support issue (they didn't install all the ram they should have), they handled it well. Last but not least, iBuyPower (stupid name!) only has water-cooled systems while CyberPowerPC has fan-cooled as well, if that matters to you.
https://www.cyberpowerpc.com
http://www.ibuypower.com/
Seriously, are you new here? Asking Slashdot whether you should build your own PC? What do you think the answer is going to be?
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
Do you want to spend time or money to assemble the parts? That's basically the question. Do you want to hire someone to put your parts together or do you want to do it yourself?
We're not talking about pre-built PCs loaded with bloatware. That's not an option, at all.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Putting a "gaming" PC in the living room often is not well received by the family. If you really think you can get away with it, make sure you go out of your way to make it as unobtrusive as possible; muted colors, quiet fans, minimal external cabling, etc. If you can fit it in some kind of cabinet or other structure where you can close the doors to hide it completely, that would be even better yet.
A lot of those important bits are counter to how a lot of people - and companies - like to build "gaming" PCs.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
The WORST aspect of a pre-built system is support. 100% of their profit goes down the drain the first time your supplier has to seriously support your computer- hence the FACT they they will do everything they can to screw you over on any support deal.
Modern PC parts are INSANELY reliable. Pre-built systems are notorious for using SHIT components, with SHIT cooling and SHIT drivers. 99% of the problems that need 'support' with a pre-built system come down to this fact. And obviously I'm talking about SINGLE systems, not a company buying a shed-load of PCs from Dell under a corporate support deal.
Your own build, if using expensive components from high profile suppliers, has amazing repair and replace deals on key components. Defective parts are swapped out at the manufacturers expensive if they fail under warranty. With LESS argument than you'll get from the pre-built PC companies. This obviously does NOT apply to home built budget PCs.
Windows 10 AUTOMATICALLY supports all high profile high-end hardware. When you've assembled the PC, installing the OS just does all the work these days. Companies have fallen over themselves to automate the software driver issue online. Now us PC experts would NEVER use a horrible OS like Win10 in "do everything for the ill informed user automatically" mode- but for the dumb-dumbs who want a brainless build, this automation is a godsend.
If you a starting out with a build, the do-everything approach of MS can give you confidence, until you learn how to do more yourself, and turn off all the nasty MS crap. And your own build will lake the CRAPWARE that all the major pre-build makers take money from Intel to include. Games run like SHIT when Intel anti-virus crap is running in the background. But Intel owns the WORST anti-virus company in the world, and pushes this software onto as many PCs as possible.
A pre-built gaming rig needs a complete software FLUSH before it is fit for purpose, and that takes real expertise. Many people with gaming pre-builds never know they are only getting 60% or less of the potential of their hardware, because of Intel anti-virus and the like.
On how much time you want to spend maintaining it. I personally don't want to spend any time fiddling with the hardware. I want to pay for somebody to do it for me (i.e. pay for warranty, on-site repair etc.). In any case I'd say buy an entire PC from some manufacturer. I bet the individual parts (mobo/disk etc.) will be of better quality than those you buy retail.
If it's for standard office use or similar, just buy a pre-built one. You can get nifty tiny, silent cases that are vastly overpowered for anything you might want to do with it. If you need more power, I would select the components myself, but leave the grunt work of building to a retailer. Where I live that costs about 75 euro and gets you three years of warranty, so it's a great deal.
Pre-built gaming systems tend to be unbalanced, throwing lots of money at high-end components where only very marginal gains can be expected in actual real-life performance. You don't need "black" CPUs or hand-picked memory, and you don't need dual graphics cards either - unless you enjoy paying through the nose for a problematic component that will be outgunned six months down the road anyway.
As for the notion that you need to build one yourself to prove your manhood: look buddy, unless you soldered your own graphics card or whatever, all you are doing is clicking together some premade components. A monkey could do it.
There's nothing like getting exactly the parts you want, though that also comes with the risk of incompatibility. Also, as you upgrade you can potentially save money by reusing parts like the case, PSU, heatsink + fans, drives, cables and possibly even the Windows license.
However, if you're starting fresh and want to make things a little easier, consider that the graphics card is the only major difference between a gaming and non-gaming PC. Buying a decent desktop and adding upgrades (video card, decent PSU, possibly a SSD) will often be cheaper and more reliable than assembling everything from scratch.
If you're not experienced assembling and troubleshooting PCs at all, consider one of the frequent 'HP Envy Phoenix' deals. For the past six months they've been selling very decent gaming rigs for below the cost of components; for instance, a couple weeks ago they were offering a system complete with i7-4790K and GTX 980Ti for ~$970, which is about what you'd pay for those two parts alone. Check Slickdeals or your favorite deal site for more information.
How can I believe you when you tell me what I don't want to hear?
Long ago, it was *much* cheaper to build than buy. Then Dell came. Dell sold computers for below the retail cost of the components. It became cheaper to buy. It has since remained cheaper to buy, if you match a pre-built system. It's cheaper to build if you spec a system that nobody sells. Systems rarely have vastly different level components. I built myself a gaming rig. It was built to compete with a friend's I spec'ed the best gaming video card for the budget, and did everything else as cheap as possible (while still of acceptable quality). The result was a computer $200 less than my friend's brand new computer, with better FPS for every game we tried. It was much slower at video encoding, but played games better.
Bought computers are hard to get anything that's not "cheap" "middle" "workstation" or "gamer". You can't have a gamer card in a cheap system, or vice versa. Building is good for flexibility, and picking components. Another time I built, I saw the CPUs as having a poor bang per buck, so I built a good system with the cheapest CPU I could find. 2 years later, when the system was pretty bad, I upgraded the CPU and had what would have been a top-end (out of my price range) computer for budget price, though a little late.
So the decision is personal and fluid, though many here think everyone should do as they do, rather than think for themselves.
Learn to love Alaska
The main benefit is building is getting to decide where you want to spend extra money, and where you're willing to cut corners.
A second massive benefit is that you can ensure that you're getting standard parts. That makes fixing an expensive piece of equipment cheaper and easier, while facilitating upgrades to increase the longevity of your investment.
You'll also know exactly what you're getting. Prebuilt systems tend to provide partial specifications, highlighting selling points while glossing over or even ignoring everything else. Compare that to building your own. You're typically getting far more complete specifications for each component. In some cases, you can even go deeper (e.g. researching the chipset on a mainboard).
Gaming PCs aren't like gaming consoles. Even if you're satisfied with the systems performance and stability, you may be spending between two and ten times as much while expecting to keep up with contemporary games (i.e. game developers are constantly raising the bar on PC games). You may as well do it right.
A clueless person doing a budget build, like yourself, will always hit issues. You use bad cases with bad cooling. Then you are dumb enough to push the parts beyond their happy working stats, or use cheap pre-overclocked rubbish that never works stably at the over-clock.
SMART budget builders know the nature of the hardware, and frequently DOWN-CLOCK the budget components a little to gain total stability. IDIOTS scream "this dammed card says it can run at 1.2 GHZ, so I'm damn well going to run it at 1.2 GHZ", even when the card is cheap and clearly has poor cooling and power components.
And of course, some parts from cheapo suppliers are just know faulty crap in the first place. Even quite expensive motherboards, for instance, may have a list of know issues with various functions, like their non-main SATA ports, or their non-main USB ports. A smart pre-build person knows this from the support forums, and lives with the issues by only relying on the outputs/inputs/functions that work properly.
The ONLY serious unfixable hardware issues I've seen have been with pre-builds - home builds that use components based on a little research avoid this.
The only good way to get what you want is to build one.
Absolutely, you get the exact parts that you want. Pre-built always seems to involve some compromise in one part or another.
Careful selection of parts is also very helpful if you want to do something like dual boot Linux.
Building your own is no longer the money saver that it once was though. But quality and compatibility are reason enough.
You have more time on your hands than is healthy. Purposely designed consoles game playing consuls have customised graphics processing units that make the image look real. They are purposely designed to perform one function and that is for playing games. The PC does not even know about its own electronic components without software drivers. The PC is old and it has add-ons to help it perform functions with software drivers. If you need to build a PC for playing games then you need to get a life or get a girlfriend or boyfriend or a Japanese sex doll.
the answer to that question, please turn in your geek card.
Overclocking is fine if its only a gaming PC but if it is also used for anything serious, anything where the correct results are important ... do *not* overclock.
... are all variable and will change from one specific CPU to another. Hence the inability to reliably test for overclocking errors. The errors manifest different on every CPU, and the required conditions manifest differently, and these conditions may include being immediately preceded certain instructions or certain data patterns. Instructions and data patterns that also differ CPU to CPU.
... its best to avoid overclocking.
Overclocking errors are not some black and white easy to recognize situation. It is literally a progression through various shades of gray. At the lightest shades of gray, where overclocking errors begin, at perhaps quite modest overclocking settings, the errors are subtle. Literally it may simply give the wrong answer, the wrong numeric value, no crash or anything dramatic. And what instruction yields this simple wrong answer, and beginning at what overclocking setting, and what instructions must precede it if any
So if a PC is just for gaming and other casual use, overclocking does little harm. However if the computer is also used for serious numeric work, software development, etc
Alienware is a "wrapper". You can buy a Sager for half the price and all the performance.
A much better option is a "client" with a great instance on Amazon.
- server scale performance, so no max.
- the instance is very close to the "backbone" so last mile latency is about display, not about decision.
- it does require a decent connection, but you would need that anyway
Articles on the subject:
- http://lg.io/2015/07/05/revised-and-much-faster-run-your-own-highend-cloud-gaming-service-on-ec2.html
- http://techcrunch.com/2013/11/05/amazon-launches-new-ec2-gpu-instances-for-high-performance-3d-graphics-in-the-cloud/
A Beowulf cluster of these babies might work, and it's cheap, too!
(no, I'm not being serious, not for a typical gaming rig anyway)
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
For "quiet" video cards you sometimes have to look for a previous generation design that has gone through a new manufacturing process (same circuitry but laid out at a smaller scale, a process with fewer nanometers (nm)). These may get smaller or slower speed fans. Might even go passively cooled if it was a modest GPU to begin with. Of course you won't get the greatest performance but perhaps something good enough for play.
For what its worth I tend to install auxiliary low-RPM fans that blow directly on passively cooled motherboard chipsets (often under a heat sink) and on passively cooled GPUs.
... then you can't afford a "high end" gaming rig.
Dual-boot is NOT where you want to go with a gaming machine, you'll be fighting drivers on the Linux side every time you get a fresh-off-the-shelf expensive hardware component. If you care enough about gaming performance to even consider building a machine from scratch, then commit to that - rather than trying to make it a jack of all trades.
I've been using Linux since 1992, Windows a few years longer. In that time, I've built up dozens of machines. My suggestion: build a Linux box with components that you know will work with Linux - for example, I stay clear of nVidia because many of those cards are a nightmare on Linux. On my gaming machine I run a $300 nVidia card, etc etc.
Hardware is cheap. What's your time worth?
Support microSD: in a post 9/11 world, it is unwise to carry your data on media that you cannot comfortably swallow.
Building your own can be an important part of learning enough to no longer be a noob. Research too, not just the build and debugging.
Build.
Having bought an Alienware Aurora R4 in 2012 I've found it to be a good machine, but not without consistent issues. Keyboard/mouse died. Video card died. Other random quirks like randomly not booting for a week (thought the MB died, but then just started working after being unplugged for several days), one weird windows issues that i suspect was a combination of hardware/software. etc...
I had built many systems prior but thought I'd splurge and try an Alienware to get everything in a single box.
For the Alienware machine I bought, which included a monitor and nice Bose speakers, I got a "good deal" via my employer's partner discount, speaking with financing at the right time who dropped the price further by opting for interest free financing vs. credit card (paid in full before interest kicked in). But it still worked out to be 1.5 - 2x the amount I would have paid for a self-build with better quality parts.
Dell bundles and scrimps where they can so the no-name accessories and components will not be the same as if you bought direct from EVGA/ASUS/Gigabyte in my opinion.
Perhaps the only benefit of a high-end alienware is the default watercooling setup (which does not cover the video card mind you) and the potentially comprehensive warranty, but if you are considering build vs. buy the warranty is not worth much anyway.
You're generally saving yourself trouble in the long run by building it yourself. As other have said, buying a pre-built system means you're going to have to worry about bloatware, firmware issues, and dealing with support if something goes wrong.
While it's true that you can find gaming systems for cheaper than you can build something yourself, it's almost impossible to beat the value of building it yourself. You can pick which components to spend big on, and which to scale back on. Pre-built systems will often have odd scaling issues between different parts.
For example, moving from a "medium" system to a "high-end" system may involve upgrading the video card and the CPU for $500. While it can be true that adding those two components individually does indeed add up to $500, you may get 90% of the performance increase from the video card. By building yourself, you can find the price/performance/features sweet spot for each individual component.
Good luck with your build!
I've looked at this question numerous times and the answer is always the same .... for me.
For the most part I do my own support but it has sometimes proven convenient to punt the question over to big corporate entity. It has been rare and I can count the number of times using my thumbs ( 3!). My last machine was a custom and the other two active machines are corporate, I'm thinking another custom might be in the offing but am still undecided.
That said if the parts you decide on happen to be the same or extremely similar to big corporate entity's then the self build is usually more expensive. Something about bulk purchasing power and economies of scale.
On the other hand if you want to go further out towards and/or past the point of diminishing returns then a custom build, either your self or a local custom system assembler is the only way to go since big corporate entity doesn't go there. If you know what you're doing then DYI is the best in this case.
Black Friday is either for impulse buying or you already have your parts list in hand and know what or if its a sweet deal. If you are starting right now you are too late, wait till boxing day.
The current upper-mid to top end cards can just barely keep up with 4k right now, if the OP wants to go that route. You're better off with two mid-range cards in SLI if you want to do 4k at the highest settings.
My Other Computer Is A Data General Nova III.
Without a general comprehensive warranty, the first hardware problem you see will be met with "It must be the motherboard manufacturer, ask them" then "it must be the RAM manufacturer, ask them." If you have at least two of everything, you can swap parts and find out what the real faulty part is. Of course this is more expensive.
One point I haven't read in the contents so far it's:
Building your own system gives you access to higher quality parts ON YOUR PARTS. Most systems you buy will overspend on the CPU, because people buy based on 'the mega hurts' and pull budget away from things that User doesn't think about, like the power supply. Nearly every single issue that a nerd needs to tech support around family and friends comes down to a piece of hardware unable to deal with signal/power fluctuations that better components could handle just fine, AND that higher quality components would fix outright so as not to wear down components further in.
The point about support is important, above. Home builders should only buy components like the Asus "pro" series, that have warranties of their own. Not that you want to use them, but that you CAN use them makes the engineers pay closer attention and the company invest in failsafes.
I've always looked at SLI as either of the following:
a) Rich person with too much money to spend overdoes it on a machine (think of the big, lifted pick-up stereotype).
2) Poor person who doesn't have the money for a current-gen video card, but can find a good deal on a second one of his 3-gens-behind video card and will get a little bang for the buck from it.
The former doesn't care about cost, the latter will never meet the cost. And from my understanding of it, the performance increase does not justify the cost in either camp (unless the latter can find something used on ebay).
Had a friend who is quite bright, but inexperienced with root cause elimination. 6 months ago, he went down the path of "building" his own home theatre/PC gaming rig. After several rounds of buying what the online rags suggested as the best bang for the buck, he had three collections of incompatible parts and not one working PC.
I'd done him a couple of favors in the past and he was emotionally defeated with the whole project. He ended up giving me the whole lot. The one thing all his platforms had in common was Gigabyte motherboards with a high density buzz words on the spec sheet and rave online reviews. I've not yet diagnosed all the problems, but I now have a heck of a HPC system after swagging the Gigabyte board for a ASRock that actually retails for 40% less. Turns out that dual bios feature of Gigabyte boards, is REALLY flaky.
https://www.google.com/search?...
At the end of the day, unless you are ready to learn troubleshooting skills related to the tasks, you probably ought to buy something you can box up and ship back if it doesn't work.
Nothing evolves faster than the word of god in the minds of men who think themselves divinely inspired.
2) Will you enjoy building it? Then chances are you should build it yourself. Screw the money, go for the XP!
3) Is your time valuable? Because if you won't enjoy it and want to save the money, then chances are any cash you do save will not be worth your time.
Basically, if this sounds like a fun time, then do it. But don't expect to make a monetary profit.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
I think you'll need more than one machine, and I think it would be best to buy the one for the living room and build the one for you.
If you're looking for something to be a gaming and media rig for the living room (and you don't do console gaming) you'll either be disappointed with the experience or have an awesome machine that's mostly doing what a $500 consumer grade system could do. I've tried PC gaming in the living room and it isn't as nice as sitting in a comfy chair in a private room. The whole keyboard and mouse thing just doesn't work well for gaming on the couch like you might think, plus sitting on a couch trying to play PC games for hours at a time is bad for your posture/back. In the living room you are also in the center of everything in your house and trying to do something other than media consumption or console gaming is just damn difficult. You also don't want to be switching display devices all the time nor do you really want to sit in the living room trying to do non-game or media related things with your computer. It's a headache in a family setting.
I'd buy something mid-range for the living room as a media device and for some limited (i.e., non AAA type) gaming. There are several vendors that have very capable machines in the $500-$600 range. I'd go with Intel Core i5 or higher and a minimum of 8 GB of RAM. The Intel HD graphics are surprisingly capable for most gaming and media needs. This device for the living room should be something that has a warranty and can be fixed quickly should something go wrong. This is the family machine and anyone and everyone in the family should be able to use it and call in a trouble ticket should something go wrong.
As for the gaming rig that you would also want to dual boot Linux and play around with, that's something I'd suggest you build and keep out of the living room or at least not connected to the entertainment system permanently. That's going to be the serious computer, the one used for personal business, homework and high-end gaming. Spend the money on this system and have it on a shorter upgrade path. Others have made good suggestions on this above.
I would also suggest getting a backup device if you don't already have one or aren't using an online service. There are some nice RAID 1 (at least) NAS boxes out there that can be used to backup both the machine images for restoration and convenience and any important files.
Have a great holiday!
4k is a very real reason for it
For items where you can get the benefit of OEM pricing (e.g. for Windows) while customizing a system, it may make sense to purchase the bare-bones of what you'll want from someplace like Dell where you can customize, then add other items like graphics cards and SSDs on your own. If you don't care much about the motherboard details, power supply, case, etc. this may be the way to go.
On the other hand, you'll get an overall better system if you build from components - brand power supply, possibly a better case (though the manufacturers target easy/quick assembly and maintenance to keep labor costs down), etc. Take a look at the Logical Increments Guide at http://www.logicalincrements.com/ for reasonable recommendations at various price points.
If you know what you're looking for and can spread your purchasing over 2-3 weeks you can also get a lot of components at good discounts by watching sites like SlickDeals and possibly FatWallet for sales - SlickDeals has a lot of component sale announcements in the forums, not sure about other sites.
fencepost
just a little off
most games are just the same games they made 20 years ago with new skins on top.
They need to make better games not burn GPU's through motherboards screaming THE ARISTOCRATS
They could start with dynamic bones and skins similar to the LOTR massive system, or possibly some of the multi-threaded processing from HL2.
Also the interface needs serious work, I do not understand why we still use lazer mice and keyboards. We should have simple cheap versatile gloves to wear.
I don't know where this myth comes from, but it's bullshit. If you properly test the system, you'll catch any error producing instability before depending on it. A bit flipped is a bit flipped. They happen on stock systems too. This is why any sane system handling critical data has built in sanity checks.
It's a question of if you're willing to put in the many, many hours of work and troubleshooting that'll be required by assembling a machine from scratch. It goes beyond just assembling the physical components-- I spent a lot of time getting drivers installed, hooking up software, etc. However, I spent about $3,000 on my machine all told, and there's immense satisfaction in knowing that I built this machine /just/ the way I liked it-- water cooled, SLI linked GTX 970s, Asus Formula VII mobo. I can run Witcher 3 on max res across 3 monitors and have room to spare. But it was about a month of work to get it done, after you factor in wait times for returning/exchanging components, and then it took me weeks to get it configured to a stable setting. Also, I had to gamble big on not breaking something like a video card, because I had to void the warranty to hook the waterblocks up. Amazon.com made it super easy to return a lot of excess components, but I still wasted at least two hundred bucks on non-returnable components and shipping and stuff.
Look what you want in a self build system and then look if you can buy anything like it. If not, you build it.
That said, I always build because I like doing it. But then I only upgrade and not buy a new machine. So to me that means:
New Mobo, CPU and memory if I need a new machine. And when I need a new videocard, I just add that.
I have 3 videocards, 4 monitors, so I do not have a standard setup that I can just buy and I only run Linux.
http://pcpartpicker.com/ can be a nice place to start.
Advantage of pre-build and running Windows is that the PCs are full of shareware who pay for your Licence. Companies get money to put their crap on your PC.
And to be honest, instead of dualboot, I would go with two systems, unless thye both need to be gaming systems.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
Even in 2015, the current state of debugging a new PC is still pathetic.
If your new PC doesn't run or boot the first time, you have *no way* of knowing whether the
problem is the motherboard, CPU, or RAM. And these are the most expensive components in a new PC.
Have you ever wondered why PC makers don't make it easier for people to actually test their
damn boards? Because they are all greedy bastards. All of their testing tools are external,
and they never build them into the boards. Instead we get a fucking beep beep speaker from the 1980s.
Is that a kick in the teeth or what?
Paid less than 900€ for a better rig than you can get for 1600€ at the store. You must be really rich if you'd rather pay 700€ to avoid 3-4 hours of fun tinkering.
i.e. game developers are constantly raising the bar on PC games
But you can turn down the detail level in options. The effort to also sell on PS3 was encouraging developers to make available settings suitable for a 2006 GPU, and this is continuing on PS4 which has essentially a laptop chipset.
To stay on the bleeding edge of technology, you need to build your own PC with the latest hardware.
And the latest hardware always has tons of compatibility problems in the first few months.
So open your wallet, step in line, and become some PC board manufacturer's guinea pig.
You better be damn sure their support is top of the line, as you will be on the phone or
on their support forums night and day waiting for answer.
But can consoles play anything but the vanilla version of a game? Many PC games have plenty of community-made mods that extend the game's replay value.
Never skimp on a power supply. It is the single most important component that can affect the life of your system because it touches every internal component. A cheap supply will cause immense, random headaches, and can easily fry components. Poor 12v regulation? There goes a harddrive, or random drive errors. Cheap caps? Might blow or not sufficiently filter and stabilize the incoming power. Poor line filtering.... The list goes on.
I've had a couple of Alienware PCs over the years. They used to be pretty good, but I wouldn't touch them these days. The "headline" parts (CPU, RAM, graphics card) might look ok, but they cheap out like crazy on everything else. Even their highest-end PCs tend to have fairly nasty motherboards and the storage drives will be the cheapest and most failure-prone around.
As others above have said, self-build is the optimum choice if you have the time, expertise and confidence. But if you don't have any of the above, there are still decent pre-built options, though some of them will be highly region-specific.
I decided I couldn't be bothered with self-build for the latest machine and went to a UK company called Novatech. They let me choose the parts pretty much down to the last screw in the case. When it arrived, I whipped the side off the case and did some fiddling; I wasn't 100% happy with how they'd arranged some of the cables and did a bit of tidying, but it was basically a well-built machine. The price was maybe the equivalent of $100 above a self-build (for a very, very expensive PC).
Now that's a UK-specific vendor, but I've found that there are lots of regional variants on that theme around the world.
If building a machine, which is by far majority component research and minority assembly, sounds ok or even remotely fun, build. I did, and not only will you get the affection of construction (check some research), you can build a machine which dollar-for-dollar will last you longer than a machine you might buy for the similar price. By "last longer", I mean "will still be relevant and able to run modern software acceptably".
else, buy.
I've gone build lately and aside from some early snags, it's been great. Some advice:
0. Don't be in a hurry. You need patience for delivery, bad parts that need to be RMAed, system set up, check out/ burn-in. If you're in a rush, building your first PC won't be fun.
1. Follow the compatibility charts for MOBOs etc. If you do this, you'll save yourself some headaches.
2. For your first build, don't overclock. Get the thing running and the satisfaction of "I made something stable" ASAP, you can always get another cooler and OC in a couple months if you want to. I've seen people start with a heavy OC and end up getting frustrated at building, when really they started at too advanced of a level.
3. Did I mention read the compatibility, QVL charts for the MOBO? For CPUs and RAM especially this can help.
4. Don't buy a MOBO which is part of a new architecture/ family for at least 6 months. The early rev boards and firmware are never as good, and for your first build this isn't a good hassle to deal with.
5. Check periodically (put a calendar note) for new firmware for your BIOS, storage, SATA, other drivers. These can really help your performance! I had a system which would crash maybe once every few weeks with an obscure memory fault. A newer firmware had better support for RAM, and I was running slightly overclocked RAM, then the system went rock solid, never saw that crash again (remember the note on OC?)
6. Don't skimp on the case. Get one with rounded inside edges. The case is probably the one thing which you'll be able to reuse for the longest time. A cheap case can literally cut the piss out of your hands when you're working. For your first build, that's one thing you don't need to deal with.
Hope you decide to BUILD. It really should be called "plan" or "research" a machine, because it's by far more research and planning than building.
One thing I forgot:
Regarding your "dual boot" comment Win/Lin.
You will have a MUCH awesome-er time if you look at the virtualization options in the CPU you're selecting. Get one with the good options (usually for intel these are the ones which DO NOT have a "K" at the end of their names). Then you can run linux in a VM on your windows machine with great performance. For a brand new machine, this is far better than dual booting. You can even run both at the same time! Grub with windows 8+ just sucks so bad, but linux in a VM is awesome.
If you're worried that you'll not build your PC correctly and it'll fail to work, then one alternative to that is to find a good whitebox shifter that lets you customise everything. Of course, you'll have to check they'll not overcharge for components (they sneakily don't put the absolute price for each one up, instead picking a "default" component and then displaying the +/- delta price difference between the default and each alternative you can pick from a list).
You will be restricted to what components they let you pick of course, so make sure there's nothing too restrictive. At the end of the day, you'll get a well-tested box that can be purchased without an OS if you're only going to run Linux on it. My "trick" is to order the best bang for buck components that can't be easily replaced (CPU is the scariest - I know you'll say it's easy, but it's just too frightening to change IMHO simply because of the high chance of damage of what's often the most expensive component) and then get the minimum of what can be easily swapped out/upgraded later (disk, RAM, graphics cards and the like).
Oh and I'm fussy about keeping my PCs quiet - I think there should be a decibel rating for all components and an overall one for the final built PC. There's nothing worse than firing up a PC and having it sound like a jumbo jet on the runway. I order silent/quiet components for as much as I can and add soundproofing if the case doesn't come with it (make sure that's an option for your whitebox shifter). The acid test is: can you sleep overnight in the same room as your running PC? I can with my current PC from a whitebox shifter...
Oculus Rift requires high end single cards to get adequate performance but for smooth, stutter free VR SLI is a must.
For all intensive porpoises your a bunch of rediculous loosers
I had to make this decision about five years ago and I had a buddy at the office willing to help me pick out components and put it together. I ordered the components and we did some of the work of putting it together in my office. I did most of the work but had somebody to ask questions if I didn't know what to do. The downside was that the motherboard was recalled shortly after I put it together so I had to take it apart and put it back together again but I am glad that I went through the experience. I'd recommend doing it with someone that has some experience, either in-person or online. If you're in a forum that has a section or thread for building a computer - so much the better. You might find someone that you already know online that can help you out. On family PCs - I think things work out better when everyone has their own system as you don't have contention issues. The skills that you get building your own are useful with other systems at work, with friends and with relatives in that you should wind up better at diagnosing problems and potentially fixing hardware issues.
The last time I "built" (actually just spec'd the components) a "custom" machine was well over 10 years ago, about when nVidia SLI came out. It seemed much easier then or maybe I'm just older and stupeder now.
What kind of stupid question is this for /. You know what the answer will be. Is this useless clickbait or have the questions for Ask Slashdot been pulled from a local mental institution?
Pre-built is cheaper for the same hardware. Build your own avoids custom case, space limitations, proprietary bits like power supply allowing you to upgrade easily in the future.
I don't know where this myth comes from, but it's bullshit. If you properly test the system, you'll catch any error producing instability before depending on it. A bit flipped is a bit flipped. They happen on stock systems too. This is why any sane system handling critical data has built in sanity checks.
No, the BS myth is that you can test for instability. Every manufactured CPU is unique. Its weaknesses unique. The point and manner that it fails unique. Some failing with a modest amount of overclocking, other not failing until much greater overclocking. And again, the failure is not necessarily something resulting in a crash. The mildest of overclocking errors can simply be an erroneous result of a mathematical operation.
Where a bit flips will vary from one CPU to the next. How can you test for that? And in a specific case when a bit flips in an instruction may depend upon the preceding sequence of instructions and upon a specific data pattern. How can you test for that, the prerequisites are unknown and vary one individual CPU to the next?
Testing by a manufacturer can involve things far more probative than running a software test. So a CPU rated for a certain speed can be confidently run at that speed. However once overclocked the confidence is lost. How much tolerance there is for overclocking can vary from one design to the next, one manufacturing process to the next, and from one individual CPU to the next.
As has been said so much already, build it. What I havn't seen being said is that you should just use the integraded graphics from an Intel CPU for a couple more months (or an old graphics card you already have) and wait for the new cards that are coming out in the next 6-7 months.
The existing cards are all still being built on the 28nm process, which has been in use for over 3 years now. Delays and problems have kept the graphics cards from being built on modern process nodes for the last 1.5 years. The next set of cards due out in the first half of 2016 are going to be using 16nm FinFet. The current high end graphics card from Nvidia, Titan X, has 8 million transistors in it. The next generation cards have been leaked to have 17 million transistors. Transistor count has in the past almost always been associated very closely with performance. We are really looking at the next generation of graphics cards having at least double the performance of the current generation, which is something that hasn't happened in about 7 years.
We were all warned a long time ago that MS products sucked, remember the Magic 8 Ball said, "Outlook not so good"
See subject: You get HUGE jumps in power/performance & a far better 'bang for the buck' (been doing it since 486 days here) if you DO NOT GO for "the very top end (insert component here)" but rather go for the next one to it (usually only what? 10% slower?? Not even humanly noticeable & overclocks can get you that back along with OS + game tunings)!
E.G./I.E. with examples of performance gains in the hardware alone I've gotten over my last machine's major components (CPU, Video, disks):
ASUS B85-E Motherboard
Intel Core I7 4790k CPU (vs. my last CPU Core I7 920 -> http://www.anandtech.com/bench... )
EVGA/NVidia GeForce 970 GTX video OC stock-oem (+140mhz) 4gb GDDR5 RAM (vs. my last vidcard 470 GTX -> http://www.anandtech.com/bench... )
Intel 530 240gb Flash SSD (SATA 6) - strictly OS & Program disk - latest 3.32 firmware & trim tools (vs. my WD Velociraptor -> http://www.anandtech.com/bench... )
Western Digital 10,000 rpm 8mb buffer Velociraptor 150gb (SATA II) - strictly for backup & programming data
Promise Ex-8350 128mb ECC ram caching raid sata 1/2 controller (SATA 1/2) - for backup WD Velociraptor
GigaByte IRAM 4gb DDR2-Ram based SSD (SATA I) - strictly for PageFile placement
Western Digital 7,200 rpm 8mb buffer 1tb (SATA 6) - strictly for downloads
HP DVD+-RW Dvd 1265i Burner (SATA 3)
8gb Kingston DDR-3 RAM (1gb for 64-bit NTFS Compressed Software RamDrive = webbrowser cache, hosts file location, print spooler, %TEMP% ops, + %COMSPEC% location)
* :)
(So, utter agreement here, albeit with minor "caveats" only as to how often to do it...)
APK
P.S.=> I've found that holding off to doing it once every 4++ or so years on average works out the best & you also got the best out of your last one that way too... apk
Given the games aren't exactly demanding the top of line cards, i would focus on making something with low noise and high reliability rather than going for high expensive performance that will not have anything to use in a sane fashion for the next 4 years or so.
I'm a proponent of usually building your own gaming PC rig, BUT the fact is, the whole warranty thing is dicey at best these days, regardless of buying individual components and building it yourself.
For example, I bought a high-end video card made by Gigabyte last year. Right out of the box, it would freeze up the PC or cause a random reboot within 2-5 minutes of playing anything using 3D graphics. Just running standard 2D applications though, it'd run fine all day long. Everyone told me I needed a bigger/better power supply, or I needed to take off the heat-sink and fan, add better heatsink compound and re-seat it, or I just needed to try other versions of the ATI drivers, or I had an overheating problem because my case wasn't cooling well enough..... I forked out some $'s for a great power supply, and nope -- same issue. Also tried a few different driver versions but clearly that wasn't the answer. So after wasting all of that time + money, I requested an RMA from Gigabyte and sent it back in.
Well, Gigabyte sat on my card for about 3 months, meaning I had a non-working system that whole time while I waited for it. When I finally got it back one day? It looked like nobody even touched it. It just had a note in the box stating the RMA had been "processed" - with no explanation of it defects were actually found. I tried it out, and same issue!
Ultimately, I wound up trading it plus $100 cash to another computer enthusiast for his nVidia 3D card. (He wanted to tinker with re-flashing the BIOS on it and so forth, to see if he could get it going, and he didn't like his nVidia GTX series card for some reason.) Last I heard, he had to RMA the card again and is in the same boat I was in originally, where there's no word on when it'll get repaired/replaced and Gigabyte is just sitting on it again.
Given my whole fiasco? I almost surely would have been better off buying a pre-built PC, so a failure like this would have hopefully been resolved by swapping out my whole computer or troubleshooting it and replacing the defective card, minus all that uncertainty about power supply wattage/type and so on.
I still prefer the customization made possible only by building your own PC. With cases alone, there are SO many options.... But I'm not completely down on the idea of getting a good pre-made system from a known reputable vendor either.
and more to do with sneaking a gaming PC into married life. A friend of a friend used to buy every console that came out and went to great lengths to hide said purchase from the other half. At least for long enough to him to say, "That old thing? I've had it for ages". These new consoles are a god send, they look like just another piece of home entertainment gear. They can pass for a set top box :).
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
With build you can find good quality parts at low local prices.
Find the good RAM, CPU, GPU with features and a quality power supply. A motherboard with the modern fast storage options and amount and quality of fast connections without going over budget. Run power as needed and for later upgrades. Fit well made fans that are well designed for air flow and at a low sound level.
Depending on the brand you have the option not to pay a premium for over clocking support.
When you buy your avoiding the need to install a cpu, fit a better cooler and that press down feel.
Go for a self build just to save on quality parts and get exactly what is needed at a fair price. Buy if a system needs to be ready and tested without the need to install a cpu. Ensure that the product is well supported for the price.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
I'm going to break from the majority here and say it could possibly go either way.
For a higher-end system, I wouldn't bother with any builder who won't tell you the exact parts they're using. I don't know what the situation is with Alienware these days in the Dell era, but if they don't say or use custom parts in key places I say skip 'em.
Something like a custom but still ATX standard case is fine, but a proprietary motherboard or GPU is no good IMO.
From there, just do the math. Look up what the same or an equivalent machine would cost you to build, then figure out how you value a central source for warranty support and the time you'd take to build it yourself.
I've only seen this on the low end rather than the high, but its certainly possible that the volume OEM gets better prices on parts than you do to a point that they can sell you a prebuilt that's either cheaper than you could build on your own or a better value due to the warranty and personal time issues.
All that said, I personally enjoy the process and the ability to select exactly the parts I want to a point that I doubt I'd ever buy a prebuilt for my own use outside of a few appliance-type machines where I can't easily replicate it.
I used to get high on life, but I developed a tolerance. Now I need something stronger.
You are getting the PC for fun (gaming) right? So consider the process of building the hardware and customizing software part of that fun. You get to learn about various technologies available in 2015 and the art of putting them together. If you go with Linux and spend effort to customize your system, you are also getting marketable CS knowledge. All in all, the enjoyment of the process is worth the price of a few games even if you can't compete with Dell purely on price.
For a computer that's not for your own use, or that will be relied upon, you're smarter to buy a brand name and customize, for ease of maintenance.
A one-of-a-kind computer comes with one-of-a-kind quirks to troubleshoot, and it's a gamble that Google will help.
A brand name computer with added components will have quirks, but there are hundreds of other folk with the same config who have had to sort out the same issues, and some of them will have posted their questions on forums.
For quiet, I go fanless. I am not a gamer, so my power supply, 460-500W is fanless. And so is the video card.
I use this old card, an Nvidia -ASUS 210 fanless. Newegg pulls up over two hundred fanless cards. Obviously not the bleeding edge fps
I have not shopped much prebuilt, but ocan you get fanless components on pre built?
How many vid card fans have you had go bad? i have had at least two that had to get new fans.
So whats left to make noise, use a SSD,
I use a big slow cooler fan on the CPU. The systems are nearly silent.
You can do quiet if you pay attention, get a decent case, go fanless components where possible, and otherwise a few 120mm -140mm fans turning slowly keeps temps moderate in silence or near silence.
Because black-friday gamerdads are more likely to kick your ass than hardware nerds.
This perpetual motion machine Lisa made is a joke, it just keeps getting faster and faster. - Homer
Testing by a manufacturer can involve things far more probative than running a software test.
It can, but AFAIK they test with software that's pretty much like the software that's available to everyone else.
So your paranoia applies to non-overclocked CPUs as well (which by the way do fail, although very rarely, and about just as rarely as *properly* overclocked ones).
How much tolerance there is for overclocking can vary from one design to the next, one manufacturing process to the next, and from one individual CPU to the next.
Of course. You need to test every CPU individually, nobody is suggesting otherwise.
Be darn sure to thoroughly research boards and their BIOS/UEFI compatibliity with Linux. I ended up being forced to run Ubuntu because no other newer distros would play nice and could not run the newest Ubuntu either. In the end despite my plans I had to install as full UEFI system. What a scam UEFI is. having had dualbooting systems since 2001 working perfectly I would have expected UEFI hell was an over and done with chapter. But alas no so stuck on a Linux I did not really want and with a system not playing nice. Better build from scratch ensuring full compatibility and control and thus not support vendors that are tied into the OS mafia
then buy, don't build. Now go back to reddit.
There is a great article by Jeff Atwood on building a system: http://blog.codinghorror.com/t... If you aren't familiar, he's developer that has been blogging for about a decade and is read by a number of developers.
In this article, he references a series of articles wrote back in 2007, when he was building his previous development machine. It includes a section on Overclocking: http://blog.codinghorror.com/b...
The take-away: there is a risk of stability, but it's considered low enough in the the cost/performance ratio that he advocates overclocking his development box.
...For what its worth I tend to install auxiliary low-RPM fans that blow directly on passively cooled motherboard chipsets ...
I do the same thing. Sometimes it is not a case of needing more air flowing through the case, but more directed airflow within the case. I then just assure there's enough airflow through the case to keep the internal temperature where I want it.
That's because they use parts that are inferior to what you'd use if you built it yourself. That is NOT a benefit.
I just built a mid-grade gaming PC. Skylake i5-6500, ASUS H170 PRO gaming motherboard, 8 GB RAM, 250 GB SSD, 1 TB WD Blue Hard drive, Antec 650W 80+ gold PS, Bluray burner and a Radeon 7970 with 3 GB.
I built it for $741.
How did I do it? I went on pcpartpicker, researched and made a list of the parts I wanted. I availed myself of the 25% off at jet.com and scoured buildapcsales on reddit. I even scoped out new parts on Ebay. In the end, I did not settle at all. I got all the parts I wanted for much cheaper than it would cost to buy a pre-built system with those specs.
Hi personally built my own custom pc at a point I was really "grown up" (30) but admittedly it was a great experience and something unforgettable. :)
I never had a chance to buy branded gaming pc though and I know they cost a lot which is another factor I stay away from those. One important thing comes to my mind is warranty factor. Usually those branded pcs have 1 year standard warranty unless you purchase more by paying extra. However, if you built your own pcs then each component can have individual warranties which might start from 2 years + (HD), PSU (3+), CPU(3), MB (3+), Ram (Lifetime) etc.
For me its important that I have paid for something which is backed by support. Also pre-built pcs seems to not have good airflow or cooling system and manufacture quality of components is not as good because of made on large scale in order to cut costs (if you are interested in buying basic pc and want customizing it).
As you mentioned you do not want to pay a lot or do not want extra-ordinary system. I would recommend making your own and it would be a plus if you could get good offers/deals on whole packages (MB+CPU+Ram or whatever available).
Other than a few sandbox games that will run on less than awesome hardware there is virtually no reason not to take the gaming to the console. Building your own machine sounds great, but when you have a problem it is _YOUR_ problem. I experienced this myself several times and the other way to look at it is - you are down not playing games and screwing with the machine. You will probably be playing your console while the money or parts arrive. You can have quite a few XBOX Ones and PS4s for that money... I can't really see the point... other than... like..Warcraft or something that is PC only and doesn't require the best hardware. PC gaming used to be cheap and unique, now it's expensive and the consoles are just as good for most things.
A gaming PC, no matter how high end, will have problems with various games, if not now then someday. There will always be that one odd game that doesn't work right. Game developers often have ridiculously overpowered gear that you simply can't compete with. Their games will always be ahead of market. In practice, this can mean you won't be able to run your favorite game with maximum settings.
I've played this "game" for 15 years until I realized that it just isn't worth it. Consoles are completely hassle-free and everything works right out of the box. I would never ever return to PC gaming. My PC now is a cheap low-power computer that's sufficient for my desktop needs.
I'm not sure what distribution you're using, but here I am typing into my custom dual-boot gaming/performance PC. I had zero problems running my high-end graphics card.
I've had far fewer problems with Linux (in my case, Ubuntu) than Windows 7 or Windows 10. I can hibernate on Linux but not Windows.
There's a certain amount of discipline enforced when confronted with the grub boot menu: do I want to play (select Windows), or do I want to Get Shit Done (Linux).
Its not just cost/performance. In addition to possibly wasting your time debugging something that is an overclocking induced error, there is the ethics of delivering possibly faulty code to your customers. Real bugs are troublesome enough, no need to plague your customers with a flipped bit in an indexed operation or something.
Also the fact that he believes that testing software indicates stability indicates he doesn't fully understand the failure modes of overclocking. You can gradually increase speed until the software indicates a failure and then reduce speed so that the software runs flawlessly for hours, and there remains a chance that your system has errors. All you may have changed is the prerequisites for an error. At the higher speed the instruction may fail universally, at the slightly lower speed it may only fail selectively depending on preceding instructions and data patterns. Instruction sequences and data patterns that the testing software does not include and can't really be predicted anyway.
Again for casual use not a problem, you only inconvenience yourself. The cost in the cost/performance tradeoff is only paid by you. But for software development you are possibly putting a cost on your customers too. That is unethical.
1) motherboard $239.99
ASUS MAXIMUS VIII HERO ATX DDR3 2600 LGA 1150 Motherboards MAXIMUS VII HERO
http://www.amazon.ca/ASUS-MAXIMUS-VII-HERO-Motherboards/dp/B00K2MASE4/ref=sr_1_1?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1420760125&sr=1-1&keywords=asus+motherboard
2) Processor $261.34
Intel Core i7-4690K Processor (6M Cache, upto 3.9 GHz) FC-LGA12C
http://www.amazon.ca/Intel-i5-4690K-Processor-Cache-FC-LGA12C/dp/B00KPRWB9G/ref=sr_1_1?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1421193273&sr=1-1&keywords=i5+4690k
3) CPU Cooler $124
http://www.amazon.ca/Corsair-Extreme-Performance-Liquid-Cooler/dp/B009ZN2NH6/ref=sr_1_5?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1420391474&sr=1-5&keywords=cpu+cooler+corsair
4) Memory 8GB $114.99
Corsair Vengeance Pro 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 2133 MHz (PC3 17000) Desktop, Red
http://www.amazon.ca/Corsair-Vengeance-2x4GB-17000-Desktop/dp/B00D6Y8DAQ/ref=sr_1_4?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1421193447&sr=1-4&keywords=Corsair+Vengeance+Pro+8GB
5) Power Supply $100
http://www.amazon.ca/Corsair-Modular-Bronze-ATX12V-EPS12V/dp/B00ALK3KEM/ref=sr_1_1?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1420391658&sr=1-1&keywords=corsair+power+supply+750w
6) Case $160
http://www.amazon.ca/Corsair-Carbide-High-Airflow-CC-9011030-WW/dp/B00D6GINF4/ref=sr_1_9?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1420391748&sr=1-9&keywords=corsair+case
7) Video Card $719.06
ASUS STRIX GeForce GTX 980TI
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B011ERJTYU/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pd_S_ttl?_encoding=UTF8&colid=1LOYIN5ONNGQ2&coliid=I2H8ZMVR7FHZRM
8) SSD $230
http://www.amazon.ca/Crucial-MX100-adapter-Internal-CT512MX100SSD1/dp/B00KFAGCUM/ref=sr_1_4?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1420392015&sr=1-4&keywords=ssd
9) Dvd-Rom $66
http://www.amazon.ca/Bd-Rom-Dvd-Rom-Internal-Blu-Ray-BC-12B1ST/dp/B004SUO068/ref=sr_1_cc_1?s=aps&ie=UTF8&qid=1420760698&sr=1-1-catcorr&keywords=computer+internal+dvd+rom
10) Windows 8 pro $205
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The "myth" situation was due to chips produced to handle a higher speed than they were tested at and sold as while items in the same batch were tested and sold for the higher speed. The "slower" chips were not rejected at the higher speed since they were never even tested for that speed. Thus things like a Pentium II 450MHz being sold at well under half price as a Celeron 300MHz - needing just the same heatsink as the expensive version to run solid as a rock at the same speed.
Fast forward to today and some people think that situation still exists.
However for a gaming PC the benefit of extra speed may be more important than the CPU doing weird stuff on rare occasions so most failures may not actually matter.
alienware where fine until it was bought by dell
i'm pretty much doing the same and going the build way (uATX size wanted and nothing commercialy availlable to support a home hypervisor)
Hello what you want is to build it your self. Do not buy Hp all that you will do is waist your money, a Dell may be. What you will need is a minimum of 4 cores for CPU 2.3 GHz. AMD or Intel. A minimum of 8 GB Ram, Minimum 650 Power Supply. Video card at least a 970 TI Nvidia or 980 AMD. At least $ 42.00 air cooler for CPU, and minimum 1 TB hard drive. The case well that is up to you. Just make sure you have room to work with and expand, good air flow is a must. If you have Windows 7 use it, install it on a 300 GB partition. The rest you partition later for Linux and a 2ND NTFS partition for your Windows files. Use the TV as the Monitor use the HDMI out put from your video card. On Windows scale fonts to 200 for better viewing. If you have a low budget use ninite.com to install other programs free of spam. Like Teracopy, Revo, Malwarebites, and other applications. And to cut the cord use Kodi on Windows or Linux. The specs will give you at least 3 years of use, and room to expand or update. Hope this helps.
Testing by a manufacturer can involve things far more probative than running a software test.
It can, but AFAIK they test with software that's pretty much like the software that's available to everyone else. So your paranoia applies to non-overclocked CPUs as well (which by the way do fail, although very rarely, and about just as rarely as *properly* overclocked ones).
A friend of a friend works at an Intel fab, no they are not merely running software like any consumer can.
How much tolerance there is for overclocking can vary from one design to the next, one manufacturing process to the next, and from one individual CPU to the next.
Of course. You need to test every CPU individually, nobody is suggesting otherwise.
I don't think you understood. The uniqueness of each individual CPU includes variable and unpredictable things like sequence of instructions or specific types of data. You can't simply test an instruction and verify the expected results. You can't predict the prerequisites necessary, if any, to cause the instruction to fail at the current speed. And the unpredictability is high even at modest amounts of overclocking.
No, the BS myth is that you can test for instability. Every manufactured CPU is unique. Its weaknesses unique. The point and manner that it fails unique. Some failing with a modest amount of overclocking, other not failing until much greater overclocking. And again, the failure is not necessarily something resulting in a crash. The mildest of overclocking errors can simply be an erroneous result of a mathematical operation.
Prime95 is the go to software of choice for most overclockers. Not only does it push all of your CPU cores to the limit, but it verifies that both floating point and integer calculations are correct. It's typically run for 24 hours on an overclock and logs any error in calculation that it comes across. It also heavily tests the cache as well. You'll want to run some temperature monitoring software as well to ensure the temps don't go out of bounds.
The reality is that CPUs aren't a mystical, magical unit, but a engineered piece of equipment that can be tested like any other piece of equipment with the right tools
No, the BS myth is that you can test for instability. Every manufactured CPU is unique. Its weaknesses unique. The point and manner that it fails unique. Some failing with a modest amount of overclocking, other not failing until much greater overclocking. And again, the failure is not necessarily something resulting in a crash. The mildest of overclocking errors can simply be an erroneous result of a mathematical operation.
Prime95 is the go to software of choice for most overclockers. Not only does it push all of your CPU cores to the limit, but it verifies that both floating point and integer calculations are correct. It's typically run for 24 hours on an overclock and logs any error in calculation that it comes across. It also heavily tests the cache as well. You'll want to run some temperature monitoring software as well to ensure the temps don't go out of bounds.
You do not understand the problem. You can test a particular CPU at increasing settings until the software finds an error in calculation. Then you can back off those settings and get back to a point where it runs flawlessly for hours. The CPU may very well still be failing, its failure mode is merely much more complex, probably involving a specific series of instructions or data. And these instructions and data will vary from one CPU to the next. Your software is not testing all the permutation and prerequisites of failure. You simply do not understand how CPUs can fail.
The reality is that CPUs aren't a mystical, magical unit, but a engineered piece of equipment that can be tested like any other piece of equipment with the right tools
It can be tested effectively by the CPU manufacturer, not so much by the CPU end user.