Any of you guys have an Alienware? (1 Viewer)

[Lance Nichols]

If you want a gaming box, build it yourself. If you want a box you know what went into it, build it yourself.

Never trust systems that have been built by Dell, Et Al, for gaming. Sure, they have sleek cases and such, but try upgrading them...

I went to drop in an industry standard 1394 PCI card in one of the current crop of Optiplexs and the damn case is too short...

White box all the way for me (well brushed Al case...) and it costs about the same.

 

[Ken Chui]

I second Chris' and Lance's suggestion for a BYO (build your own) PC. There are numerous PC hardware sites with forums that provide step-by-step guides on every aspect of the installation process. The way I see it, if you can set up your HT system, building a PC from scratch isn't that much different or harder. You have greater control over the quality of the components you wish to use, and upgrading is easier and more cost-effective in the long run.

DELL makes good machines (I'm using one at work) and their customer service is better than average, but I would never buy one for myself because the quality of some components are questionable and the proprietary nature of their hardware makes upgrading impossible or non-existent in some cases.

 

[JamesHl]

building a PC from scratch isn't that much different or harder

Well, it's probably an order of magnitude harder, anyway. Things have gotten a lot better, but stuff is still poorly labelled, there's screwdrivers involved, you have to get the bloody heat sink on their right (which if you use the cheapy ones that still use clips instead of screws can be an adventure), etc. I dunno, it's not that hard and I can put a box together in less than an hour these days. But it's still a bit more difficult than just setting up the old ht, which is mostly just plugging some junk in and running a few tests.

Anyhow, it may be easy to us, but some people may not have the same talents, or perhaps they just don't want to jack with it.

 

[Derrik Draven]

they just don't want to jack with it.

Bingo! I'm an aircraft technician. Work the flightline and I have about 1000 hours of avionics/electronics. No problems here with them screwdriver thing-a-ma-jigs.

Just not interested in building from scratch...and, btw; a friend of mine steered me away from Dell and instead was hyping up his new one from here: www.ibuypower.com

...considering it. Prices sure are nice...but, there's usually a hidden reason for such low prices.

 

[Jeffrey Johnson]

What are the addresses for the BYO websites? I'm considering building one, but want to know what I'm getting into before I jump in with both feet.

 

[JamesHl]

I don't know of any websites, but I'll lay out the steps for you:

1) Buy all the stuff. Triple check to make sure you have everything before you get started. Don't cheap out on the case and power supply, get something good, preferably with a removeable tray. Find a good workspace where you can spread all the junk out.

2) Open case, put studs on motherboard tray if necessary, install power supply.

3) Install motherboard, making sure studs align with screwholes properly so that you don't accidentally short your board.

4) Install memory, cpu, and heatsink. Make sure to plug the heatsink fan into the motherboard header or a 4 pin molex connector. I can't stress the importance of this enough, especially for an AMD system. Take care if using heatsink that you have to use the screwdriver to jam on that you do not scrape up the motherboard or anything else. Install expansion cards.

5) Install motherboard tray in case if you're cool and got a case with a removeable tray. Connect annoying horrible headers to the various switch and light wires. Consult manual if necessary. The colored side of the wire is generally positive.

6) Plug in drives via IDE or SATA cables. Ensure that red stripe is on pin one, although most plugs and receptacles are notched these days so it only really goes one way. Make sure you have all the drives set in their master/slave settings properly, and if possible keep the hard disks and cd drives on seperate channels.

7) Plug in your drives and fans to molex connectors from the power supply. Plug the ATX and if necessary the ATX 12V connector into the motherboard.

8) Make damn sure everything is plugged in right. Try to bundle up power cables and get them somewhere out of the way.

9) Pray if you are religious. Plug your input output devices in, plug in the computer, and start it up for the first time.

 

[John_Bonner]

Prices sure are nice...but, there's usually a hidden reason for such low prices.

Just an FYI. One reason the prices are lower at iBUYPower is that when you start off with a system in one of the configurations, it does not include an operating system. If you want to add Windows XP Home edition installed, add $89 to the price.

 

[Mark Soriano]

I just want their new case!

 

[Troy*H]

I would just build your own pc. Friends of mine have had Alienware, Falcon Northwest, and Voodoo computers and none of them would buy from them again. When I went to college I decided just to buy a dell(easier and I was getting out of gaming then so I didn't need to build my self a pc). They said it would be at my door in two weeks. Five weeks later it shows up and does not work. I went over it for a couple hours with tech support (who also couldn't speak very good english) and they said to ship it back. It then took 6 weeks to get the thing back. It did work...but in my opinion I'll just spend the extra time and do it myself. You will get way more computer for your money if you do it that way anyway.

 

[Troy*H]

www.newegg.com

look on sharkeyextreme.com under eaither cpu or ram prices for other discount sites on the net. tomshardware.com might also have some links

 

[MikeAlletto]

Ugh...i think their PC cases are butt ugly. I can't stand cases with doors on them. On a server I can understand, you don't want someone coming by to easily power it off at the switch but a home pc a door just gets in the way. Unfortunately its getting harder and harder to find well built cases that don't have annoying doors or stupid windows or other dumb "features" like those in them.

 

[Chuck C]

Does anyone have experience with ABS computers? They offer some sweet packages (except they don't offer zip drives). How is their cust service?

 

[Tony Genovese]

Go to www.jncs.com and you can specify as little or as much as you like. Customer Service is great and they deliver fast.

 

[Ken Chui]

Does anyone have experience with ABS computers? They offer some sweet packages (except they don't offer zip drives). How is their cust service?

According to ResellerRatings, they seem to be rated quite highly, especially over the last six months. I have no personal experience with them (as I'm a do-it-yourselfer ), but they have been around for a while. You can always buy a ZIP drive seperately and do a self-installation.