People in the know...

[lee_sufc]

Looking at purchasing a new PC and went to the Dell website and picked the top option for everything (to see how much it would cost).

Could people who know what they're talking about, have a look at the following specs and let me know if £2400 is a good price for:

PROCESSOR Intel® Core® 2 Duo® E6700 Processor (2.66GHz, 1066MHz, 4MB)
OPERATING SYSTEM Genuine Windows® XP Media Center Edition 2005 (Does not include Operating System Re-installation CD)
VISTA UPGRADE MCE to Vista Premium Upgrade on: www.dellvistaupgrade.productorder.com before 03/31/07
SUPPORT SERVICES Collect & Return, 1 Year Service only
MEMORY 2048MB Dual Channel DDR2 667MHz [4x512] Memory
HARD DRIVE 1 TB Serial ATA RAID 0 Stripe [2x500GB 7200rpm drives with DataBurst™ cache]
OPTICAL DRIVE(S) 16X DVD+/-RW Drive
GRAPHICS CARD 1GB nVidia™ GeForce™ 7950GX2 Single GPU graphics card
PHYSICS PCI CARD 128MB Ageia™ PhysX™ PCI Card edit
Accessories
MONITOR Dell™ 19" Value Flat Panel (E197FP)
SOUND CARDS Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Music card,PCI w/Dolby Digital,7.1 speaker surround and THX certification edit
TV TUNERS AverMedia DVB-T USB 2.0 TV Tuner (MCE compatible)

 

[jstallan]

That's a lot of money for a PC... Depreciation will be rapid.. Shame they only bundle the 'value' TFT and not the 'Ultrasharp' version.

What are you using it for ?

 

[The 4th man]

For that money no its terrible. . If yo uwant to spend that (go for an HD plasma telly at that price as well ;) )

Alienware or ABS computers (http://tomshardware.co.uk/2006/10/17/game_on_with_the_ultimate_x9_from_abs_computers_uk/)

Your taking fantastic systems

 

[Bielzibubz]

Those are high end specs they are. Are they warrented?

If your not going to be playing the latest intensive hi res games, multiple memory/processor hungry aps at the same time or storing hours and hours of DVD quality video you really aren't going to need the specs you stated. IMHO very few people would ever need those kind of specs in a home PC.

 

[lee_sufc]

OK, taking the above advice into consideration, how about this for the same price:

Operating System: Genuine Windows® XP Home Edition UK with SP2 - English
Warranty: AlienCare 1-Year Free Phone 24/7 and Collect & Return
Chassis: Alienware® P2 Chassis - Conspiracy Blue
Chassis Upgrades: Alienware® AlienIce™ 3.0 Video Cooling - Fusion Red
Power Supply: 700 Watt Alienware® Approved Multi-GPU Power Supply
Motherboard: Alienware® Approved NVIDIA nForce™ 4 SLI Motherboard
Processor: Intel® Core™ 2 Duo E6700 2.66GHz 4MB Cache 1066MHz FSB
Memory: 2GB DDR2 PC-6400 SDRAM at 800MHz - 2 x 1024MB
Video Card: 1024MB NVIDIA® GeForce™ 7950 GX2
Video Optimiser: AlienAdrenaline: Video Performance
System Drive: Extreme Performance - RAID 0 - 300 GB Serial ATA 1.5Gb/s, 10,000 rpm with 32MB Cache (2 x 150GB)
Optical Drive One: Premium 16x Dual Layer DVD±R/W Recorder
Sound Card: High-Definition 7.1 Performance Audio - Standard
Network Card: Integrated High Performance Intel Gigabit Ethernet Adapter (DSL-ready)
Floppy Drive: 1.44 MB Floppy Drive - Black
Monitor: 19" Dell UltraSharp 1907FP Black Flat Panel LCD Monitor - Quantity 1
Mouse: Logitech® MX™518 Gaming-Grade™ Optical Mouse
Security Software: Kaspersky Anti-Virus Personal Professional - English
Alienware Extras: AlienWiring - Exclusive Internal Wire Management - £50 Value - FREE!
Alienware Extras: AlienInspection - Exclusive Integration and Inspection - £50 Value - FREE!
Alienware Extras: Alienware® T-Shirt - FREE!
Alienware Extras: Exclusive AlienGUIse Theme Manager - FREE!

 

[The Artful Shrimper]

Based on my calamity with computers this year. (Still a sore subject) I would not entertain any dealer unless they showed confidence in their product and offered me a 3 year warranty. For free.

 

[The Fitter]

Had a quick look at http://www.komplett.co.uk which is one of the places I have used in the past for pc bits and pieces. Can recomend as when I had a video card go pop 2 years after I bought from them they replaced it no questions with a higher spec one.
Any way priced up roughly like for like with your Dell and got the price way below 2 grand. Sure you have to build yourself but it 'aint rocket science. Also power is the way to go if you want to play games with all the eye candy on but would you really need 2 500gig drives

. If you have that sort of cash to play with can I suggest looking on http://www.guru3d.com go to the forum and speak to the good folk on there. Very helpfull. Or else pick your own choice of geek site. Dell are quite cheap for ready built but you can save mega bucks and build a pc to your specs if you pick and choose.

Good luck

 

[steveo1]

Seems a lot of money for a PC these days.

As discussed in a previous thread, why not buy the bits and make one? If you were to take an old one apart you will see that once you remove the PSU and all the wires that go with it, its not as complicaed as it looks. have a look at http://www.overclockers.co.uk and price uo the bits separately.

 

[Mr Plow]

Quick spec of a PC from www.overclockers.co.uk, tbh you dont need to spend out on getting a high end CPU as they overclock to 3Ghz+ anyway (I've put a E6700 in here as you specified it above). Added WinXP but Vista is due out fairly soon so may want to borrow a copy and make do until you can buy Vista. Not added any speakers, no clue what ones are good these days apart from mid-high end speakers (I use Klipsch Promedia THX Certified 2.1s).

Dread to think how much that Alienware would cost.

Shopping Cart (Prices in British Pounds)

Intel Core 2 DUO E6700 "LGA775 Conroe" 2.67GHz (1066FSB) - Retail £314.99
Asus P5W64-WS Pro Intel 975X (Socket LGA775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £159.99
Western Digital Raptor 150GB WD1500ADFD 10,000RPM SATA 16MB Cache - OEM £142.99
Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 320GB ST3320620AS SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM £62.99
ATI Radeon X1950 XT-X ***Crossfire/Master Edition*** SILENT Heatpipe 512MB GDDR4 (PCI-Express) - Retail £249.99
GeIL 2GB (2x1GB) PC6400C4 800MHz Ultra Low Latency DDR2 Dual Channel Kit £164.99
Antec P180 Advanced Super Midi Tower Case - No PSU (Black) £77.99
Enermax Liberty 620W ELT620AWT ATX2.2 Modular SLI Compliant PSU £89.99
Pioneer DVR-111BK 16x16 DVD±RW Dual Layer ReWriter - (Black) OEM £20.99
Dell Ultrasharp 2007WFP 20" Widescreen LCD Monitor - Midnight Grey £289.99
Logitech MX518 Gaming-Grade Optical Mouse - Retail £29.99
Creative X-Fi Xtreme Gamer Soundcard - Retail £59.99
Microsoft Windows XP Media Centre 2005 Edition - OEM - 1Pk £65.99

Subtotal £1,730.87
VAT £302.91
Total £2,033.78

 

[shrimperman]

Quote[/b] (lee_sufc @ Oct. 30 2006,18:57)]OK, taking the above advice into consideration, how about this for the same price:

Operating System: Genuine Windows® XP Home Edition UK with SP2 - English
Warranty: AlienCare 1-Year Free Phone 24/7 and Collect & Return
Chassis: Alienware® P2 Chassis - Conspiracy Blue
Chassis Upgrades: Alienware® AlienIce™ 3.0 Video Cooling - Fusion Red
Power Supply: 700 Watt Alienware® Approved Multi-GPU Power Supply
Motherboard: Alienware® Approved NVIDIA nForce™ 4 SLI Motherboard
Processor: Intel® Core™ 2 Duo E6700 2.66GHz 4MB Cache 1066MHz FSB
Memory: 2GB DDR2 PC-6400 SDRAM at 800MHz - 2 x 1024MB
Video Card: 1024MB NVIDIA® GeForce™ 7950 GX2
Video Optimiser: AlienAdrenaline: Video Performance
System Drive: Extreme Performance - RAID 0 - 300 GB Serial ATA 1.5Gb/s, 10,000 rpm with 32MB Cache (2 x 150GB)
Optical Drive One: Premium 16x Dual Layer DVD±R/W Recorder
Sound Card: High-Definition 7.1 Performance Audio - Standard
Network Card: Integrated High Performance Intel Gigabit Ethernet Adapter (DSL-ready)
Floppy Drive: 1.44 MB Floppy Drive - Black
Monitor: 19" Dell UltraSharp 1907FP Black Flat Panel LCD Monitor - Quantity 1
Mouse: Logitech® MX™518 Gaming-Grade™ Optical Mouse
Security Software: Kaspersky Anti-Virus Personal Professional - English
Alienware Extras: AlienWiring - Exclusive Internal Wire Management - £50 Value - FREE!
Alienware Extras: AlienInspection - Exclusive Integration and Inspection - £50 Value - FREE!
Alienware Extras: Alienware® T-Shirt - FREE!
Alienware Extras: Exclusive AlienGUIse Theme Manager - FREE!

Makes all the difference

 

[jstallan]

Dell Outlet can have some great systems and rock bottom prices.. You need to know the spec you want and monitor it for a while until the right system comes up. They have some systems on there earlier that were pretty close to your spec (only 256 video card tho) for £900 plus vat (and TFT)... So perhaps saving you a grand...



Dell Outlet

 

[Mad Cyril]

Do you really need a physics card as well?

 

[SARF]

Buy an apple, plug it in, switch it on.. start using it..

 

[Mad Cyril]

Quote[/b] (SARF @ Oct. 31 2006,10:22)]Buy an apple, plug it in, switch it on..  start using it..  

Moan because you can only use a subset of the software that your friends with a PC can.

 

[SARF]

Quote[/b] (Mad Cyril @ Oct. 31 2006,10:23)]

Quote[/b] (SARF @ Oct. 31 2006,10:22)]Buy an apple, plug it in, switch it on..  start using it..  

Moan because you can only use a subset of the software that your friends with a PC can.

Worry because you have no idea what 'subset of software' means but relax because your ipod is easy to update and you dont have to run 7 hours of anti virus programs all day..

 

[sufcintheprem]

Having bought a high end computer I would highly recommend against it unless you have a lot of spare cash. If value is a measure of performance per pound then as a general rule, the value falls with every extra pound you spend over some point (probably about a thousand pounds, may well be less). What's more this fall is exponential.

You'll be paying a high premium for technology so it's essential that you would need that technology. Unless you are a specialist in some sort of area, it's highly unlikely. I bought my computer in 1999 and it still deals with virtually everything on the Internet, iTunes, handles wireless and the whole Microsoft Professional office suite from 2001.

In summary, I'd suggest you go for something around a grand or less and stick the difference in a savings account of some description. In two years time, you can then use this money, almost undoubtedly, to buy a superior computer to the one you are looking at now with plenty of cash to spare.

 

[steveo1]

Quote[/b] ]Buy an apple, plug it in, switch it on.. start using it..

I had a look at changing to Apple and was reasonably impressed with their internet advertising.
However, one of the things they were emphasising is that you can now run windows on the latest Macs. So are they saying Windows is a better OS?

 

[Hong Kong Blue]

Don't know much about computers, but I'd suggest if you need to ask questions about high end computers then you don't need a high end computer.

 

[The Fitter]

Quote[/b] (Hong Kong Blue @ Oct. 31 2006,11:35)]Don't know much about computers, but I'd suggest if you need to ask questions about high end computers then you don't need a high end computer.

No, no, no.

It's all about games. Sure you can play games with an aging pc but if you want to be playing Crysis with everything looking sweet and not turn your pc into a slide show you need high end.

If you want to browse the internet and type emails save your cash.

 

[The 4th man]

Ok some quickys on the subjects mentioned here.

Alienswear and ABS makes optomised systems . They use water cooling and understand the flow of air and coolantent into your system.
This is the most important part of any system to make sure it runs at its most efficent . Also the enviroment your going to place it in ~(yes your carpets lovely 2 months later the insides have fluff and dead skin in )

Second point building your own system , like building a car is about knowing your parts and how they work together .
Do you need a physics card no... The software isnt optomized for it and standered graphics cards (PCIie express currently the fastest (check www.tomshardware.com for details)) . Even 64 bit processers and dual core system s do not yet have specificly optomized software in a home enviroment to take advantage . So your memory (speed, timing (how it syncs with your CPU)). Hard drive its speed how quickly it receves and moves data , and finally the grpahics card itself are now the most important factors (oh yes and a reliable power supply that is self regulating about 500W+ is recommended).

Anyone who tries to sell you on just the cpu or figures a lone ignore them ;)