Dell: a critique

FERITE.

So, who other than Dell, HP, Lenovo and Mesh makes reasonably priced
PCs?

 

Asus, Acer? Acer have relaunched Gateway in Europe.

http://www.ebuyer.com/search?store=5&cat=190


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KotPT -- "for stupidity above and beyond the call of duty".

 

Why not just buy the parts off Scan and put one together, it'll be
cheaper and you'll get exactly what you want.

 

Me.... but you can't buy them ;-) (Unless you pretend to be a school).

 

Is there any reason why HP are struck off the list?

I've got a HP laptop and a couple of desktops, and they're pretty robust.

 

I haven't built a PC in the thick end of a decade and I didn't enjoy it
much then. I'd rather have something off-the-shelf I can throw at a
vendor when it goes wonky.

Just had another chat with Mr Dell and he's dangling a fairly scorching
Studio XPS in front of my eyes for somewhat less than the price on the
web site so I may have to bite.

 

Wanky combinations of features.

The doris has one, quality seems alright, but to get one with the bits I
want costs stupid money and this higher spec Dell gives me more bang for
the same buck.

<goes off to rationalise some more>

 

FFS.
Just order the bits and build one into your old case.
It really is a piece of piss, these days.

 

Ahh, right.

I built one last year and it was completely hassle free. Took me an
hourt to put together on the kitchen table, including routing the
cabling neatly, job done.

be rude not to.

 

Having looked after site where we ended up spending half our time swapping
out Dell kit due to the same inherent motherboard problems, I'm inclined to
avoid their kit where possible.

Might be worth getting a copy of 'Computer Shopper', although that may well
cloud the issue even more given how many people advertise in there.

Toshiba seem to make half decent kit, at least in terms of laptops.

 

FFS, if I can do it, anyone can. I've built the last 3 machines I've
used.

 

And from your posts on the subject, it sounds like you thoroughly
enjoyed the experience of doing it too.

Whereas I could happily never see the inside of a PC again. Or the
outside of one, for that matter.

 

these jobs always seem less of a chore when "working from home"

 

<bites>

I'll have you know I built it on a weekend.

And working from home isn't all it's cracked up to be, I still reckon
they get a minimum 40 hours of effort out of me (and often more) even
when I take a few hours out of the day here and there. No point going
into an office when I work with people in multiple timezones.

 

yummy, red snapper for supper

 

<hunts back>

Ah, yeah, so you did. I did mean to look at that. Just had a quick look
though, specced up roughly the same spec as what I ended up ordering
from Dell on my nth attempt:

Quad-core Intel Core i7 2.66GHz
4GB DDR3 (12GB max)
2 x 500GB 7200rpm SATA RAID-0
BluRay/DVD/CD Rewriter
512MB ATI Radeon 4870
Vista Ultimate 64bit
Cordless keyboard/mouse

400 quid cheaper from Dell. Not to be sniffed at.

 

I've got an XPS M1330 and also a recently aquired M1730 from the Dell Outlet
for £1,250 off the RRP, complete with 3 years next business day onsite
support. It's completely as new and, for a laptop [1], rather impressively
powerful. They've both being nothing but 100% reliable and I couldn't have
any complaints.



[1] Ha, at 5kg+ and with a full keyboard including numpad it is comically
none-portable - but I bought it as a desktop replacement anyway seeing as I
can't use my PC anymore. Then there's the effect that 2 gfx cards and 2
hard drives have on battery life... About an hour and a half, hour an three
quarters if you're just browsing/msn etc.

 

You could try Mesh, not used them myself but a couple of the guys at
work have bought high spec PCs from them.

http://www.meshcomputers.com/

Their Xtreme Pro i7-920 matches your spec and more for £999

 

I priced up a Mesh box as well. The 999 quid unit is missing the BluRay
recorder, striped discs, uprated video card, upgraded OS and wireless
keyboard/mouse. Adding those to the spec ups the price to £1459.01.