I've got a friend who wants to buy a computer. He wants to get it from a reputable brand/store. Building one is not an option. Any suggestions as to brand? He's currently looking at Alienware.
I was gonna say that but I didn't want to get slammed
Btw, why is building one is not an option?
It's not that hard.
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Straight_ManGeeky, in my own wayNaples, FLIcrontian
edited November 2003
For Business, Dell, For gaming, Falcon Northwest or Alienware or even Monarch Computer. Monarch has been around a couple decades, not hugely know nationwide, VERY reliable, mid-price range, and they have 4 grades of precanned game systems to choose from.
John.
_________
Who has discovered he CAN read with 1.25 reading magnifiers out of LEFT eye only-- so I am back to posting. Right eye needs 1.00 or LESS and left eye horizontally distorts things at 1.00. Weird results these lenses give, and you do not want to KNOW the monitor OSD settings and planar turn angle combo I am using.
I'll have him check out Falcon NW and Monarch. I won't in good conscious reccomend Dell.
I refuse to build computers for my friends. I will gladly help them do it, but I take that whole not mixing friends and money thing seriously. (Two friends of mine had a huge falling out after one built a computer for the other and the computer wouldn't work right)
If its a gaming computer then well I wouldn't recommend Dell. You didn't say what he was going to be doing with it, so I assumed just like school stuff or business stuff, since most gamers like custom stuff (yeah I generalize alot, so what :P).
Alienware is a bit pricey. FalconNW looks nice.
Never bought a retail comptuer though, ever since my Packard Bell P90 my Dad got me for school.
They're a local company (for me), and my grandparents' business has done easily $25,000+ worth of business with them, and they've yet to screw anything up. They don't have the greatest selection in the world, but the prices are pretty good, and the tech support is outstanding, IMO.
Barring them, Falcon Northwest or VoodooPC are both excellent, but Voodoo is only really an option if your friend has an unlimited budget.
The new AMD Athlon E-Machines can be made into decent machines with a few upgrades (video card, PS, some case fans, CPU cooling) but I don't know that that's what they want to do.
Polywell is supposed to be good, and ABS PC has an excellent reputation. I suggest you pick up an issue of Maximum PC and check out the advertisers in it.
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LeonardoWake up and smell the glaciersEagle River, AlaskaIcrontian
edited November 2003
I would also agree with Ageek on Monarch Computers, but without the drama that marked Thrax's concurrence.
As far as high-end off-the-shelf gaming rigs - I don't know enough about those other makes to comment.
Straight_ManGeeky, in my own wayNaples, FLIcrontian
edited November 2003
Well, Monarch is going more and more into the graphics\multimedia processing high end with the gaming line, and doing that deliberately in part because they DO buy AMD stuff by the ton rather than the bushel basket and have good relationships with Corsair as well, and with some mfrs that make nVidia boards and video cards also.
Let's look at gaming versus business boxes. Graphics eats RAM and FPU more than traditional business apps other than things like folding that ARE FPU intense but chunked into small frame stesp so they do not pull as much RAM needs as traditional business apps like DataBases which can have huge relational loads and need huge RAM and very little FPU-- both games and relational DBs need large amounts of total storage volume, and this is because not only do graphically intense games need large storage areas for the graphics alone but they also use relational rule sets to balance
the decisions as to what to make as a graphical reaction. In storage needs alone they need lots of cactive stroage to react well, and also HUGE amounts of physical or removable media storage, but they also need a significant amount of CPU ALU overhead to balance to DB rule setted decisions whihc can be relational and interrelational (an AI changes not BASE rules, but the interrelationships between them to change balance points dynamically, and games are approaching this kind of technoogly changes (this is related to balancing importance of objects relative to one another based on balancing interaction and that takes huge amount of resources). Thus, what the game cannot grok period becomes ipso facto illegal, the range it can react in needs to be dynamically variable based on user action, and balance is to see how well user reacts given base rules defining what is good in any present instance.
So, what happens here in summary??? (yes, here are the Cliff's Notes) The game box needs more graphic and audio capability and storage than a business workstation, and a server needs almost as much storage but maybe very little graphics and audio capability than a gaming box. So, hyper-highend boxes are needed for gaming but would react faster than the user in most business apps that do not use AI or OOPS Data Mining techniques, and THOSE servers still do not need the pure 3D as much as games, instead they need heavy 2D and little audio comparatively.
So, to get a multimedia\gaming box, you add graphics, faster processor by 1.7-2.0X, and about 2 X to 3X the RAM compared to most business workstations and treble to quadruple the HD space as versus the business workstation(depends on how much of game can run from HD and be installed to it (speaking about whether to treble or quadruple), HDs can seek faster than DVDs of 8X or 12X speed and burst almost as fast, so the game DB and most common used graphics should be on HD ideally).
MoXon had this to say I've got a friend who wants to buy a computer. He wants to get it from a reputable brand/store. Building one is not an option. Any suggestions as to brand? He's currently looking at Alienware.
Alienware is OK but I don't like their cases, they don't give you alot of options, and they're kind of pricey. Dell gives you one of the better bangs for the buck...lots of options but some of their OEM video and sound cards are stripped down (e.g., Soundblaster cards are not supported by Creative and the ATi 9800XT is missing the Overdrive option). ABS gives you the best bang for the buck. But my favorite is Velocity Micro...well made machines, top-end devices, the price is somewhere b/t Dell and Alienware, and they have a Voodoopc-like upgrade program.
BDR had this to say Why can't your friend build it for himself?
I'm just curious.
If I can build them, I think almost anyone can.
I'm sure he could. But the middle of the school year is not the time to sign up for "Random Troubleshooting 101"
You could do one better, and have him sign up here at the forum.;)
Random troubleshooting, that's this forum's middle name, isn't it?
All joking aside- if he really wants to buy instead of build, that's ok. I just think he may be dissapointed later on when he finds out he could have built his own, to his own requirements for about the same amount of money.
The real disapointment will be when he finds that he didn't get what he really thought he was getting. Falcon sells a good box, but it still takes extra care in making them spell out exactly what equipment they are using.
If he doesn't mind buying an OK system and upgrading later he should be fine. Then all he needs is a good mobo and he is in business.
When I ordered my Dell back in 2000 it was a great machine, and my Soundblaster and GeForce were fullly-featured. The universal hatred for Dell wasn't around back then either. I'm not sure what's happened in the last 3 1/2 years to make everyone hate them, but I was really happy with my purchase. My experience with customer service was replacing a broken HD - I had a new one, twice the size and faster RPM, in less than 24 hours
Just be careful of their marketing spin. When I was young and stupid, I thought RDRAM with a P3 was cool... :banghead:
Using second hand components for replacements is one of the things that annoy people the most. Send it in because it is broke, they will give you a refurb instead. Nice higher chance of it failing....
NS
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BlackHawkBible music connoisseurThere's no place like 127.0.0.1Icrontian
edited November 2003
I can say that like a 35% of the refurbished stuff I've used from Dell have failed. Everything else has been working fine and I still got some 20gb HDD's around that have been going for like 3yrs without a problem. It's rare cases when they give new stuff .
Gargoyle had this to say My experience with customer service was replacing a broken HD - I had a new one, twice the size and faster RPM, in less than 24 hours
I have a Dell Dimension 8300 (please, no flames). Up until about 2 months ago, I had an 8250 and the fan motor went up in flames. Called tech support and within a week I had an 8300 with an upgraded everything (cpu, hd, video card, dvd, cd, the works). After I set it up, I was having problems with the video card and 2 days later a tech came out ot my house and replaced it. So, I can't complain about their support and the machine runs great. I'd like to upgrade to something better and faster but I'm going to hold on for a while and wait for the newer technologies (PCI Express, Grantsdale, 10k rpm hd's, etc.) to evolve. Except for the AMD64, everything else right now is pretty much near the end of its technological lifespan. The way I see it, the computing landscape is going to be a whole lot different a year from now.
The problem that I have had with retail boxes is that you get a mobo with limited use. The biso setting, intalling new sound/video/other and other update operations may be very different for the OEM mobo than for a retail one.
On a couple of boxes I started the upgrade process by just replacing the mobo and psu. I swapped everything else over. Then I started replacing what needed it.
If you can buy a box with a standard mobo, go for it.
Comments
Their systems usually end up being faster, and often less expensive.
I was gonna say that but I didn't want to get slammed
Btw, why is building one is not an option?
It's not that hard.
John.
_________
Who has discovered he CAN read with 1.25 reading magnifiers out of LEFT eye only-- so I am back to posting. Right eye needs 1.00 or LESS and left eye horizontally distorts things at 1.00. Weird results these lenses give, and you do not want to KNOW the monitor OSD settings and planar turn angle combo I am using.
Dark colors covering vision, air hard to get...The world....Thrown off its axis. Volcanos..Locusts..Flooding. Dark ember skies... -gasps-
I refuse to build computers for my friends. I will gladly help them do it, but I take that whole not mixing friends and money thing seriously. (Two friends of mine had a huge falling out after one built a computer for the other and the computer wouldn't work right)
Alienware is a bit pricey. FalconNW looks nice.
Never bought a retail comptuer though, ever since my Packard Bell P90 my Dad got me for school.
I'm just curious.
If I can build them, I think almost anyone can.
NS
They're a local company (for me), and my grandparents' business has done easily $25,000+ worth of business with them, and they've yet to screw anything up. They don't have the greatest selection in the world, but the prices are pretty good, and the tech support is outstanding, IMO.
Barring them, Falcon Northwest or VoodooPC are both excellent, but Voodoo is only really an option if your friend has an unlimited budget.
The new AMD Athlon E-Machines can be made into decent machines with a few upgrades (video card, PS, some case fans, CPU cooling) but I don't know that that's what they want to do.
Polywell is supposed to be good, and ABS PC has an excellent reputation. I suggest you pick up an issue of Maximum PC and check out the advertisers in it.
As far as high-end off-the-shelf gaming rigs - I don't know enough about those other makes to comment.
<i>-GASP-</i>
Let's look at gaming versus business boxes. Graphics eats RAM and FPU more than traditional business apps other than things like folding that ARE FPU intense but chunked into small frame stesp so they do not pull as much RAM needs as traditional business apps like DataBases which can have huge relational loads and need huge RAM and very little FPU-- both games and relational DBs need large amounts of total storage volume, and this is because not only do graphically intense games need large storage areas for the graphics alone but they also use relational rule sets to balance
the decisions as to what to make as a graphical reaction. In storage needs alone they need lots of cactive stroage to react well, and also HUGE amounts of physical or removable media storage, but they also need a significant amount of CPU ALU overhead to balance to DB rule setted decisions whihc can be relational and interrelational (an AI changes not BASE rules, but the interrelationships between them to change balance points dynamically, and games are approaching this kind of technoogly changes (this is related to balancing importance of objects relative to one another based on balancing interaction and that takes huge amount of resources). Thus, what the game cannot grok period becomes ipso facto illegal, the range it can react in needs to be dynamically variable based on user action, and balance is to see how well user reacts given base rules defining what is good in any present instance.
So, what happens here in summary??? (yes, here are the Cliff's Notes) The game box needs more graphic and audio capability and storage than a business workstation, and a server needs almost as much storage but maybe very little graphics and audio capability than a gaming box. So, hyper-highend boxes are needed for gaming but would react faster than the user in most business apps that do not use AI or OOPS Data Mining techniques, and THOSE servers still do not need the pure 3D as much as games, instead they need heavy 2D and little audio comparatively.
So, to get a multimedia\gaming box, you add graphics, faster processor by 1.7-2.0X, and about 2 X to 3X the RAM compared to most business workstations and treble to quadruple the HD space as versus the business workstation(depends on how much of game can run from HD and be installed to it (speaking about whether to treble or quadruple), HDs can seek faster than DVDs of 8X or 12X speed and burst almost as fast, so the game DB and most common used graphics should be on HD ideally).
John.
As opposed to installing the game to a.... CD? (because we all do that)...
If you were making some other point there, I think I missed it.
NS
Image the play disc and run it of f a virtual drive?
I'm sure he could. But the middle of the school year is not the time to sign up for "Random Troubleshooting 101"
/end shameless short-media self-promotion
Alienware is OK but I don't like their cases, they don't give you alot of options, and they're kind of pricey. Dell gives you one of the better bangs for the buck...lots of options but some of their OEM video and sound cards are stripped down (e.g., Soundblaster cards are not supported by Creative and the ATi 9800XT is missing the Overdrive option). ABS gives you the best bang for the buck. But my favorite is Velocity Micro...well made machines, top-end devices, the price is somewhere b/t Dell and Alienware, and they have a Voodoopc-like upgrade program.
You could do one better, and have him sign up here at the forum.;)
Random troubleshooting, that's this forum's middle name, isn't it?
All joking aside- if he really wants to buy instead of build, that's ok. I just think he may be dissapointed later on when he finds out he could have built his own, to his own requirements for about the same amount of money.
If he doesn't mind buying an OK system and upgrading later he should be fine. Then all he needs is a good mobo and he is in business.
Just be careful of their marketing spin. When I was young and stupid, I thought RDRAM with a P3 was cool... :banghead:
NS
I have a Dell Dimension 8300 (please, no flames). Up until about 2 months ago, I had an 8250 and the fan motor went up in flames. Called tech support and within a week I had an 8300 with an upgraded everything (cpu, hd, video card, dvd, cd, the works). After I set it up, I was having problems with the video card and 2 days later a tech came out ot my house and replaced it. So, I can't complain about their support and the machine runs great. I'd like to upgrade to something better and faster but I'm going to hold on for a while and wait for the newer technologies (PCI Express, Grantsdale, 10k rpm hd's, etc.) to evolve. Except for the AMD64, everything else right now is pretty much near the end of its technological lifespan. The way I see it, the computing landscape is going to be a whole lot different a year from now.
On a couple of boxes I started the upgrade process by just replacing the mobo and psu. I swapped everything else over. Then I started replacing what needed it.
If you can buy a box with a standard mobo, go for it.