Where do you buy your computer?

[Dreamer]

I'm researching the best place to buy a computer.
That's what has been suggested to me so far by acquaintances:
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Anybody have a better suggestion?

[Jakalwarrior]

Built it with parts from about 5 or more different sites.

ncix usually has pretty good prices on parts for canadians, not sure on their complete system prices though. All of the parts in them seem marked up and I guess that is where they are making the proffit, but I wish they would just give good prices on the pats and mark an assembly fee or something. Then again, I dont know canadian prices that well.

[notoppings]

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I have used these guys, they are great and offer fantastic customer service and if you are not happy they even pay for return shipping.

[ScottH]

I generally buy from mwave.com and newegg.com. newegg has better prices, but mwave has nice pre-assembly options for mobo/cpu stuff, which I prefer not to do.

[Tenacious B]

I built mine from parts purchased at newegg, and I'd do it again.

[HackerX]

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Not the absolute cheapest, but still pretty damn cheap. For me it's a convenience thing though and it's not worth the extra $ for fuel to save $2

[Vayate]

I built my desktop from stuff at Newegg, but I only buy Toshiba laptops. Other brands tend to have massive hardware failure; Toshibas only have AC adapters that die every year or so. They also still have an option to have XP from the factory, and the only major cleanup to do to the default Windows installaton is running MCPR to get rid of Mcafee. ACER is a good brand too. Avoid HP/Compaq and low-end Dells at all costs; they come with junk hard drives that will slow your computer down with seek errors and eventually suffer fatal problems.

[Monte314]

When I buy a new machine, it's because something breaks, so it's never planned. I just go to some outlet store and pick up whatever is on the shelf.

[Bioplasmoid]

I built my desktop from stuff at Newegg, but I only buy Toshiba laptops. Other brands tend to have massive hardware failure; Toshibas only have AC adapters that die every year or so. They also still have an option to have XP from the factory, and the only major cleanup to do to the default Windows installaton is running MCPR to get rid of Mcafee. ACER is a good brand too. Avoid HP/Compaq and low-end Dells at all costs; they come with junk hard drives that will slow your computer down with seek errors and eventually suffer fatal problems. Im in total agreement with you there, regarding the HP/Compaq hard drives. It seems to be the number one fault I see/'fix' in machines of this brand. I recall reading about a large class action lawsuit in the US, over this issue. Heres hoping the consumers won for once!

I build my PCs from the cheapest parts here To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts. and 'hand rear' them with heavy weights until the cheap cases and fans stop over-resonating with beat frequencies, and driving me nuts. :p

[AresX9]

Once you know, you NewEgg. (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.)

Wow, just sounded like an advertisement post.

But seriously, NewEgg = Win.

I've been using them for about 5 years.

[Cicatrix]

In Australia MSY (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.) is about the cheapest you can get. They are pretty funny though, all asian dudes serving and english is limited. They expect you to know your shit before you come in. Ordering a new hard drive I felt a bit like ordering from the soup nazi! Once I asked for a discount (but seriously these guys are already much cheaper than anyone else) and the asian guy said "you van fuckin dik-count you go Harvie Norman" (Harvey Norman is an electrical discounter in Australia). Man I love these guys. Zero customer service, Zero effort in displaying stock, Zero advertising. But their prices rock and is a bit of entertainment each time you buy something. I love it.

[SmartOne]

I used to build my own until I decided to de clutter my study. I now purchase from Apple any bits and pieces I need for my beautiful mac book pro.

[xtremegeek]

I'm researching the best place to buy a computer.
That's what has been suggested to me so far by acquaintances:
To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

Anybody have a better suggestion?

I walk into Best Buy. I go up to the Geek counter and say, "I want to build my own laptop." I grab a cart and a geek and we go shopping. I pick out the laptop shell (always a Toshiba) then I pick out the OS (don't go with Windows Vista yet) and all the software and peripheral devices I want. We go back to the Geek counter and I have them install everything for me while we haggle over price (yes you can haggle with the Geeks.) Within 90 minutes, I have a laptop with everything imaged on it that I want and for about $500 dollars less that I could have paid otherwise.

[nickasummers]

Always assembled from parts bought at newegg.com. it is the ONLY way!

[HackerX]

In Australia MSY (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.) is about the cheapest you can get. They are pretty funny though, all asian dudes serving and english is limited. They expect you to know your shit before you come in. Ordering a new hard drive I felt a bit like ordering from the soup nazi! Once I asked for a discount (but seriously these guys are already much cheaper than anyone else) and the asian guy said "you van fuckin dik-count you go Harvie Norman" (Harvey Norman is an electrical discounter in Australia). Man I love these guys. Zero customer service, Zero effort in displaying stock, Zero advertising. But their prices rock and is a bit of entertainment each time you buy something. I love it.

Ha, MSY run margins so low I'd be surprised they didn't boot you out because you asking a question just cost them their margin.

[Saint]

Once you know, you NewEgg. (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.)

Wow, just sounded like an advertisement post.

But seriously, NewEgg = Win.

I've been using them for about 5 years.

+1

[Terian]

Apple.com

[Saint]

designer hardware?

why?

[reb]

i am NOT a techie, but i'll give you my experience, having burned up or shot a number of cpus....printers...keyboards...meece...you name it, i've ruined it. once even had to carry a burning monitor to the window in the office and throw it into the parking lot! lol! lookout below...

tiger is good; fair to me.

macofalltrades..no.

will have to try newegg

latest iteration came from local shop; emachines case, amd chip, lots of unknown provenance parts. works. xp (no vista, pleasee no veeessstaaaa!); made a few minor changes to it...have two western digitals, and a philips dvd drive mined from other monsters...frankenstein rules, especially if it's a full stein...

my electric is not reliable; lots of surges, lots of blackouts. killed a mac, have dialup, this kills things too, if i forget and don't unplug the whole rig phone line and all. as a consequence, i have no intention of ever buying an expensive or new computer again...so i flop around the parts sites, and keep in touch with my local tech. who, btw, told me how to tell if a surge protector is dead or failing...the voltage will show low on the meter. if the voltage shows high, then it's the box breaker...all this is extremely important if you don't live where the voltage regulation is half decent. dc would be better, mr. edison...imo. use three surgers in series...piggyback...kill one ever so often. depends on your needs...assess them carefully. mine are simple.
reb

[burazekun]

Newegg.com, I build computers too, more people come to me then I ever went to people to have a computer built for me. I can only recall 30 builds for other people, and 13 for me... But I used to use tigerdirect. Then newegg got smart, also updated their site. Yeah, it's good.

[primarysuspect]

I usually build mine (isn't that the stock, im smarter than you IT guy answer lol), but recently just bought mine from the dell's outlet.

I have now purchased 7 PC's through the outlet and its been an amazing process.

I bought a Quad Core q6600 with 4 GB of ram 300 GB HD and Geforce 8600 (plus dvd/rw, memory card reader and the like) for just under $500 shipped.

Its a mecca of hardware.

[lisakki]

I think if you're buying a new computer, you should consider if the computer is the right fit for you more than the price. Given that you know how to maintain a computer, it can last you 5, maybe 8 years. Price really shouldn't be that big an issue for something that you're going to be using probably everyday for that long of a time.

[thatfox]

I buy all my computers from the Apple Store. Although for external hard drives, monitors, etc. I buy from To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts. To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts. and To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

[Jaxx]

I've had my IBM T42 laptop for over four years now and nothing has broken on it.

Granted, I've had to re-install the OS a few times but IBM has a 'factory reset' button that makes an OS install super easy. One push, a few clicks, I walk away, it does it's thing.


But I managed to get the laptop before their whole hardware division got bought out by the commies. I have no clue if it's gone down/up in quality.

[Webweasel]

In the UK I would advise Scan

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Prices are average, but they have excellent customer service and returns policy.

If your an enthusiast then they are the online store for you.

[metamagnet]

If possible, I highly recommend building your own. It's always cheaper plus maintaining it is A LOT easier.

If you go through Dell, Gateway, etc, they will butter you up....until you buy one of their pieces of machinery. After that, it's all down hill. If something breaks, you have to endure hours of phone calls to get it fixed. They have to verify that its actually broken and they make you go through tons of diagnostics and the like.

Once they get your money, they are only concerned with giving as little back as possible. They are extremely reluctant to do any fixing.

When you build your own...if something breaks, you take out the part, mail it to the manufacturer, and they send you a new one. Simple.

[AnotherNormal]

I also recommend building your own. I go with newegg.com

Plus they have a site for Canada and another for China in addition to their US site.

I've been looking at the new i7 cpu ... yea it's over kill for most things :)

[ClydeB]

Yes. Building your own is fun, and swapping parts is easy enough. But there is a learning curve involved. For those who do not enjoy putting things together I do recommend going to the Dell's and IBM's of the world to get your equipment. Just educate yourself as to what is going to happen if something breaks. I personally recommend buying a support contract. You can get them to come to your house and fix it onsite if you are willing to pay the price for it. Having to send it back, then wait for a few weeks, well, sucks ass in my book.

BTW. Stay away from Best Buy and the Geek Squad if that is available in your area. I hear more bad stories about their warranty support than anyone else.

[pyrofyr]

The upside to buying from Dell (All of my non-made PCs and laptops are from Dell) is their excellent support over the phone. I've had problems with HP and Toshiba for example, but with Dell none so far.

Building your own however is by far the best option, and a bit funner. The money saved by making it is amazing. With help from a few friends I got a PC setup to be built for 770 bucks off of Newegg, it's equivalent with be about 1,700 on Dell.

[schmidt]

I usually go for laptop only for all around use, I do have a couple more computers around here but for specific tasks (one Dell server and one homebuilt miditower soon to be HTPC).

And I bought it at To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts. custom built with some options and the choice to not have any OS installed (as a GNU person, I prefer no Windows tax).

[AJB]

I've used tigerdirect.com for several years and have had great experiences with them. The only times I've ever been frustrated with them were when visiting the outlet stores (poor service and long waits most likely due to staffing and the constant number of visitors). I even had a line of credit with them for several years.

However, they have just recently purchased the failed CompUSA and are dropping the TigerDirect name for CompUSA. In my opinion a dumb ass move because I (and most others) equate CompUSA to over priced parts and service ala Best Buy.

I may be making a permanent switch to newegg...

[Snowdragon]

Any place that doesn't have rabid salesman.

[Visum]

I went to an online company that builds very high end trading machines and looked at all the stats for one I liked. I then just googled all of the parts and found the best prices and then assembled it at home. Newegg, TigerDirect, Provantage, to name a few. Oh, and I saved about $2,000. :thumbsup:

[Sesshoumaru]

NewEgg.

Previously VelocityMicro though, I quite liked them, it's just that I felt like upgrading my VelocityMicro and ended up deciding to just build my own instead so I bought all the parts from NewEgg.

[hauteur]

I've bought most of my PCs from Best Buy, actually. Although I bought this one from Microcenter. I'm usually too impatient to buy "toys" online. I like to take it home immediately and start playing with it.

[Ytterbium]

I buy parts and assemble myself, usually from different sources. However this time I bought everything from Komplett (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.).

[altoid]

My current computer is from the Apple store, but when it goes I'll likely hit Microcenter and build my own.

[epiccentury]

As far as computers go I've owned tons of Apple systems. If I'm going to buy a PC to run what ever OS, I'll build it from parts bought at tigerdirect and newegg.

That's the only way to go as far as I'm concerned.

[Algol]

The only reason to go with a desktop these days is if you do gaming or intensive graphics work. For the former you're probably better off building your own and putting XP on it; for the latter you can just get a Mac Pro.

For everything else, you can get a laptop. I personally have an X200s from Lenovo that I love (2.5 lb baby!) and bought at valleyseek.com (pre-configured model which happened to have everything I wanted for around $1500).

[sifu]

Like many others, I build my own. I like being able to customize everything for gaming. Sadly, I don't game like I used to so my next rig will be a notebook.

[WaeV]

I have used TigerDirect for my first PC, and more recently Newegg for my second (the old one died). I prefer Newegg not only because they seem to have lower prices, but because they have excellent sets of reviews.

[Zombicide]

I purchased my main computer from Best Buy, they claimed it was a high end gaming computer. . .it was not :(

but it's more than good enough for everything else.

[Reganon]

I got mine from the HP website.

[Nexus]

I've always bought my price from NewEgg. They're cheap, reliable, fast, and have a lot of great specials. TigerDirect is okay, but it's usually more expensive. I would recommend trying to buy your parts from as few sellers as possible. If you can, try and buy most (if not all) of your parts from one store.

[Sheepdog]

Newegg, zipzoomfly and the comparable are totally cool for custom PC builds. This is provided that you know your parts and how to configure them in a new system. They can save a bunch of $$$ to a comparable pre-built system. Definitely the way to go for performance and value for the dollar.

[Shinqui]

I go down to china town, walk from little computer parts store to little computer parts store, picking up what I want for the best price, then build it myself.

You can't really knock companies like Dell, HP, etc, most people are lost when their PC doesn't work properly and if they don't have a support contract with a large company they end up getting fleeced by repair shops.

The total cost of ownership (TCO) of a computer is far, far more than the cost of it's parts.

[azelismia]

My most recent computer is a standard issue from Dell. I got the one before it as components from tigerdirect.

[Sheepdog]

The only reason to go with a desktop these days is if you do gaming or intensive graphics work.

That's quite true these days given the increase in speed of laptops and their relatively low costs. A dual core laptop could easily handle MS office type applications and even some games with decent integrated video.

Of course for the custom tweekers, nothing beats assembling your own parts and overclocking it to insane speeds. :)

[WaeV]

The total cost of ownership (TCO) of a computer is far, far more than the cost of it's parts.

How do you figure? I used my old XP Cd, linux, and I guess I pay for the power.

[reb]

i'm about to have 'computer issues'. running a sawtooth on dsl now-the xp went to the shop, as it has ram issues. does anyone know of a book i could read and get more knowledgeable about 'building my own'? sick of books that claim to be 'the source' and they leave out big hunks of necessary info. also sick of 'the shop' who never does what he says he'll do.

i'm not 'illiterate', but combining parts won't necessarily make a cpu run....once you put the parts together in the case, the board and chip don't have 'dos' like character to open dvd drive and load op sys, do they? jeez....i shoulda learned this a long time ago....

pm, please....so i don't miss the post. thanks.

[Shinqui]

How do you figure? I used my old XP Cd, linux, and I guess I pay for the power.

Just even being aware of the existence of linux takes you out of the group I was speaking to.

For example, I spent 6 hours fighting with a friends piece of crap e-machine the other day. You could build another one for what I should bill for that kind of time.

[AnotherNormal]

i'm about to have 'computer issues'. running a sawtooth on dsl now-the xp went to the shop, as it has ram issues. does anyone know of a book i could read and get more knowledgeable about 'building my own'? sick of books that claim to be 'the source' and they leave out big hunks of necessary info. also sick of 'the shop' who never does what he says he'll do.

i'm not 'illiterate', but combining parts won't necessarily make a cpu run....once you put the parts together in the case, the board and chip don't have 'dos' like character to open dvd drive and load op sys, do they? jeez....i shoulda learned this a long time ago....

pm, please....so i don't miss the post. thanks.


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I'm a little excited about your post in a geek sort of way. The first thing to realize - it's pretty easy to build your own puter. But at the same time I can understand the first time might be a little interesting.

Steps -
1. Planning - research your parts. Make a list in a spreadsheet.
2. Order the parts, wait impatiently for them to arrive.
3. Get organized, lay all the parts out on a table, put it together.
4. Hit the power button, press the "Delete" key - this will get you into the bios. Set the boot options so it boots from the CD ROM ( the physical device will probably be a Dvd burner ).
5. At the same time as #4 put the OS in the Dvd burner.
6. Save and exit the bios ( F10 on my machine ) At this point the puter will restart, then boot from Dvd.

The above is an outline. Don't be afraid to ask questions, I bet some other people would like to build their own too.

[alphawolf]

I've only bought one computer, back in 1992. Kept it for about a year, completely disassembled it a few times, then started building my own. I've probably built 15 or so since then.

These days, I am quite a fan of the mini-itx epia mainboards.

[reb]

AnotherNormal,

lol! i'm a little excited about it in a geek sort of way, too! everytime i dive into something deeper than i have before, i learn a lot.

i got a phone call from the local guy, but it was too late to get back to him. if he keeps the memory upgrade to less than $50, i'm going to 'do a build' as a long term project, and let him put in some extra ram.

if he goes over $100, i'm going to bring the 'frankenstein' home, and use it as is. it's got xp, an amd chip, a new vid card, but it's an 'emachines' chassis. funky little thang...woont recognize the 'extra' ddrII 512 ram i put in it, which is why it went to the shop that refurbed it.

this sawtooth g4 will work in the meantime, and do the wordprocessing/net i need, as will 'frankenstein', but i would really like something i can swap out parts and hot rod...but i have the tendency to mess with almost everything that's messable.

thanks....those little 'tweaks' like going to delete, then to the bios...that's what is difficult to find. i have had to 'make a lot of pcs work', but never from 'a pile of parts'.

in 'tit for tat' trade (may be common knowledge for all i know), i had an electrical engineer tell me 'why the pooter won't boot' sometimes; i use several surge protectors...bad ground here. he said that under 113 volts, one of the surge strips is 'burnt'. over 125, it's likely your breaker. processors, per him, need somewhere between 113-123 or so to work 'correctly'. the multimeter will tell you where to look for the problem-have had one strip go out since the guy told me that, and it's true-in series, with a close enough strike or surge, one of the strips won't stand the strain.

i kinda hope he says '$150', as that's enough to kick me into starting planning for a new cpu. thanks again. bookmarked the site.

[Anumidium]

Apple.. Building is fun, but when I get a laptop I want something sturdy that will last, no cheap plastic case. My Macbook pro fits this requirement very well. If I ever get another desktop I'll build it from Newegg and install OS X on it. :P

[walden]

Once you know, you NewEgg. (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.)

Wow, just sounded like an advertisement post.

But seriously, NewEgg = Win.

I've been using them for about 5 years.

NewEgg is like heaven. I've bought the parts for all three of my computers from them. Simply the best.

[Synapse]

I bought my initial computer at Best Buy then modified it with aftermarket stuff.

[1VG]

I used to build my own - I built a dual-processor liquid cooled PC with Linux when I was 14 years old, so that was fun.

Now I prefer the aluminum case and portability of the Macbook Pro + Macbook Air, so I buy Apple. I still get to keep my Terminal in OS X, so I feel right at home.

[Snowdragon]

Walmart.

[RBM]

@ reb

What about a UPS ?

Newegg else mWave, or tigerdirect in that order.

[LaoTzu]

I usually buy the parts separately and set it up... better quality that way.

But my last one, I was feeling remarkably lazy, and bought one from a 'computer store'....

never again....