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All PCs sold in stores are crapFollow

#1 Mar 11 2011 at 9:11 PM Rating: Decent
This is the feeling I've gotten. This is a rant.

You know those sexy, sleek systems you see online? The ones at NewEgg or TigerDirect? Yeah, turns out, TigerDirect doesn't have most of those systems available at their retail stores, even with a warehouse attached. (I drove 54 miles to learn this sorry fact.) And places like Best Buy don't have anything even close. They put the junk out there for the mundanes and leave the svelte stuff online for the enthusiasts.

Best Buy has not, in fact, figured out how to totally lock down their PCs, so I was able to run the Windows User Experience yada yada on their display PCs and compare apples to apples. They had for sale an $800 system that had a lower base score than my $400 laptop. I wanted to laugh. My current dying PC has a score of 4.9; it is difficult to score above 5.5 without a SSD or RAID or 10K RPM HD, but the subscores are still quite useful for determining how powerful a PC is. Their $800 system scored a 4.1, thanks to its integrated graphics. My $400 laptop has a 4.7!

Anyway, I was fully prepared to drop upwards of $600 on a DIY kit or a bare bones PC or hell even a new OEM that had the right specs. There was nothing, NOTHING in my price range that I liked at any of the stores I visited.

So I said **** it, came home, found a DIY kit from NewEgg, added in a mid-level video card (Radeon 5670), and got away with paying $370 without tax or shipping. (I have a clean copy of Win7 64 bit already - this system is getting downgraded to WinXP when it is retired to become a media center system.) I'm walking away with a quad core box for less than half the price BB wanted to stick me with for a significantly weaker system. And I get the pleasure of putting it together myself.

Take that, Best Buy.
#2 Mar 16 2011 at 12:10 AM Rating: Decent
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as i tell any one if you can build it do so, if you cant find some one who can. i charge $100(+parts cost) to assemble a computer.

the computers i build destroy anything at best buy, an is usually the same price sometimes a bit more
#3 Mar 16 2011 at 4:09 AM Rating: Decent
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On the rare occasion I go to BB to look at systems, I tell the associate to unlock the system so I can check the specs or I'm not buying. I would say 9 times out of 10 the system is built on the lowest model MoBo possible to run the CPU, leaving little room for upgrading, or so cram packed full of worthless crap that I could easily shave off $500 worth of stuff I would replace before I even turned the thing on.

These days if you want an enthusiast PC without all the worthless crap, you have to build it yourself.

As far as the TigerDirect B&M, assuming you're talking about the one in Schaumburg, I'll never step foot into that place again. A friend of mine went and grabbed two gig of memory for his old XP system. They told him DDR 400 would work fine in a MoBo that only supported up to DDR 266. Conveniently, that DDR 400 was just under $50 per stick. When he took it back they tried charging him a restocking fee. I've never had a problem with their website, but the B&M, never again.
#4 Mar 16 2011 at 5:32 AM Rating: Good
Naw, the brand new one they just opened in Jefferson, GA. I get the feeling they are all the same.
#5 Mar 16 2011 at 1:16 PM Rating: Excellent
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Raolan wrote:
As far as the TigerDirect B&M, assuming you're talking about the one in Schaumburg, I'll never step foot into that place again.

I go to the warehouse in Naperville, IL and have good luck. Of course, I know what I want before making the trip and just order it at the warehouse window. As for ordering computers, it says on the website if it's Online Only or allows you to check stores for availability (I just went to their site and looked at ten systems to check).
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Belkira wrote:
Wow. Regular ol' Joph fan club in here.
#6 Mar 16 2011 at 8:27 PM Rating: Good
I built my PC about the same time FFXIV launched.

My Windows User Experience is 5.9...

Processor: 7.5 (Intel(R) Core(TM) i7 CPU 950 @ 3.07GHz)(non-OCed)
Memory (RAM): 7.6 (12.0 GBs)
Graphics: 7.9 (NVIDIA GeForce GTX 480)
Gaming Graphics: 7.9 (4095 MB Total available graphics memory)
Primary Hard Disk: 5.9 (DOH!) (150GB primary... I honestly don't remember what model of WD, but not the SSID or whatever)

I bought everything from Newegg.com in parts. I wouldn't buy a brick and mortar store PC any more unless it was for a relative.
#7 Mar 17 2011 at 9:03 AM Rating: Good
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catwho wrote:
You know those sexy, sleek systems you see online? The ones at NewEgg or TigerDirect? Yeah, turns out, TigerDirect doesn't have most of those systems available at their retail stores, even with a warehouse attached. (I drove 54 miles to learn this sorry fact.)

If you go 54 miles to check without even bothering to call ahead, you probably deserve it.
#8 Mar 17 2011 at 7:16 PM Rating: Good
Hey, they're the ones with the big "Pay our online prices at our retail stores!" on their website, and signs for 100 miles down I-85 advertising their HUGE LIEK XBOX warehouse.

Its all good. The new PC is up and running and I'm about to put it through a burn-in test overnight at my boss's suggestion (good thing I talked to him about this project.)
#9 Mar 22 2011 at 11:46 AM Rating: Good
I bought my Asus G73 (laptop) from a Best Buy, I'm pretty happy with it :p Was the last one they had to.
I don't like putting comps together. It isn't that I don't know how, I just like buying something that is "ready to go" the moment I get home with it.
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#10 Mar 22 2011 at 12:10 PM Rating: Good
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Laptops are kind of a different animal, since there aren't very many choices for putting one together yourself.

Personally, I also think it can be a matter of price range and legality. It can be hard to beat a doorbuster special from Dell or whomever if you're actually buying a legal Windows license and so on for it. Even if you can, it probably means compromising on quality parts to do it, which to me is part of the reason I build my own to start with. The higher end you go, the bigger the margins, and the more you can save by building.
#12 Mar 23 2011 at 2:33 PM Rating: Excellent
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Sandinmygum the Stupendous wrote:
I bought my Asus G73 (laptop) from a Best Buy, I'm pretty happy with it :p Was the last one they had to.
I don't like putting comps together. It isn't that I don't know how, I just like buying something that is "ready to go" the moment I get home with it.


With all my new parts, took less than an hour to get it built and win7 installed. I am thinking more like 30 minutes tbh.

My new Darqflameware rig comes in at 7.9. I wonder if I can draw handcuffs on the alien heads... hrmm...
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#13 Mar 23 2011 at 3:12 PM Rating: Good
If I had gone with the SSD OS drive option like someone suggested, I think I'd have 7+ across the board. My 7200 HDD drive limits it to 5.9.

Next thing I have to do is get a new USB keyboard. I'm tired of changing the batteries every week on the wireless one.
#14 Mar 23 2011 at 3:42 PM Rating: Good
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catwho wrote:
If I had gone with the SSD OS drive option like someone suggested, I think I'd have 7+ across the board. My 7200 HDD drive limits it to 5.9.

Next thing I have to do is get a new USB keyboard. I'm tired of changing the batteries every week on the wireless one.
Get an Apple keyboard. Not because it's an Apple product but because the keys feel great and it's very comfortable and it looks nice to boot.
#15 Mar 24 2011 at 7:46 AM Rating: Good
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Eh, new Apple ones are a matter of taste at best. Stupid chiclet keys. Older ones...sure...typing on one now.

Unless you're concerned about n-key rollover and/or want a mechanical keyboard.
#16 Mar 24 2011 at 10:39 AM Rating: Good
I'm actually considering an ergonomic keyboard. I have a sprained wrist and typing for extended periods of time is a painful endeavor with my splint on. Using a mouse is worse, so maybe I need one of those ergo-mice as well.
#17 Mar 24 2011 at 11:51 AM Rating: Good
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7,129 posts
Funny thing is that I actually had a ganglion cyst develop on the top of my right wrist during college, and had it last through that - all the while, I was using MS Natural keyboards for my primary desktop. When I went back to standard ones, it went away, go figure.

'course, if you've got your wrist set straight, then yeah, it'd probably prove easier to use.
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