First thing on my list would be a shiny new I7 Sandy Bridge.
First thing on my list would be a shiny new I7 Sandy Bridge.
Cruncher Status
Kuro Chan: Offline Glacies: Online P/T
Hey, don't be pissed, YOU are the smart one!
Yo-
At least it was an HP and not a Dell. The Dell would've been far worse.
And if you were to use the exact same parts, you can build that exact same computer for far less than what he paid for it, even without rebates or combo deals. Pre-built computers are a joke.
At least the HD was a Western Digital. Dell would've used...well...who knows.
Also be careul at places that sell pre-built computers *cough*BestBuy*cough*
They still sell SATA hard drives. Not SATA III or even SATA II. SATA. And for full price. They assume anyone that would buy a prebuilt computer won't know the difference anyway. And sad to say, they're probably right.
My folks bought a Dell a couple of year back from Best Buy (NOT MY FAULT!!) and within a week, HDD failed. Best Buy said "not our problem, talk to Dell".
We use Dells at work and they crap out all the time. They seem to be good for about 3 years and then they start going down hill. I had one that was running just fine one day, the next day it wouldn't boot. Something went amiss with the HD, though the computer itself still runs. I was able to save the important data from the drive, but I don't trust the computer to not do something bad to another drive if I replace it.
I replaced that computer with one of my own personal computers that's been running for 5 years now without issue. It's an HP SR1903-WM. Though its expandability is somewhat limited (only one PCI-E slot) and the power supply was only a 235 watter, with a new Ultra 650 watt PS that I had to shoehorn in and a 5970 to replace the onboard video, it crunches quite nicely. Oh yeah, I replaced the Sempron in it with a 3800+. It'll support a 4800+ and the 512m memory with 3g.
So basically, I bought a MB, case, CD reader/writer, mouse and keyboard for about $380. One thing I can say for it, is that its been a rock solid system.
Yo-
Alot of people have issues trying to upgrade the PSU in Dells too. They use non-standard sizes in many of their computers, forcing you to purchase another one through Dell, which charges a very substantial premium for having the monopoly on these PSUs.
Not to mention their 'system specific' RAM. For example, they charge you $80 for this 2GB stick of RAM, when you could something just as good at Newegg for $22. Also notice how Dell doesn't want to tell you the CAS Latency (or any of the other timings) of their 'special' RAM.
On the bright side I did get something out of it. He wanted to get even more ram for it so he had me replace his 4 2GB modules for 4 3GB modules. I got to keep the old ones so I was able to double Cassandra's (for you newer guy's here, thats the name of my build) ram from 4GB to 8GB. I don't get why he thinks he needs 12GB of ram. He's not into editing or anything, just games. Oh well, more for me!
Cruncher Status
Kuro Chan: Offline Glacies: Online P/T