building my own pc.

[Guest]

Good points. I always deal with a local supplier that I can physically access, rather than an online one. I avoid the large chains that only employ unkknowledgable commission floor staff.

 

Then when the inevitable defective piece of hardware arrives, one can, almost always, go down and make an exchange......... today.

Find where the gamers shop. They know who has the best gear, and usually the best return policies. Find a Chinese gamer and he will lead you to all the above, and the very best prices.

 

PS...... if you know more than the guy you are buying from ...... find another shop.

[Guest]

No doubt that is a cool PC. But just as heavy as mine. I got the idea from some service techs I worked with in the high arctic. They serviced the DEW line sites and hauled these along. They called them "Lunch Boxes".

 

Any idea what your guy paid for his? (I just want to feel good about I spent on mine )

[BaronTT]

I make YOU feel old????? I know I'm older than you, we've met.

 

Now it's "my dad's tougher than your dad" time....

 

I won't go into when I first started with computers, but as far as dealing with personal computer hardware mods, I first took a soldering iron to an AT era mobo, like you. Replaced the crystal in several mobos, also soldered some resistors into another mobo, etc etc

 

I could go on and on about the ancient computer stuff I used to play with....

[JJsushi]

LaoHuLi said:

BTW, there is no difference between OEM and retail products other than the lack of additional software and possibly some basic connectors. So judge accordingly. If adding 3rd party components like CPU fans etc. get the OEM and save some $$.

 

I think in this case he should buy retail boxed parts and not OEM since he is a novice builder, is building a high end media machine with the latest componenets and he has a large budget.

The difference in the warrranties can be signidficant for example: an OEM HD will have a warranty of about 1 yr vs a retail box which will be about 3-5yrs. the extra $10-20 for the longer warranty will be worth it.

[Guest]

while that may be the case in some products JJ, I have not found it to be true IME. I buy OEM and get the same warrantries as retail. Only thing I don't get is the useless freebie software. If you can find CPUs at the OEM level, they don't come with the heatsink/fan, but if you are upgrading that component anyway, then it is not of concern.

Of course individual shops may be different, so one should inquire.

 

BTW, I get the full 3-5 year warranty on my OEM HDs (Seagate)

[JJsushi]

LaoHuLi said:

while that may be the case in some products JJ, I have not found it to be true IME. I buy OEM and get the same warrantries as retail. Only thing I don't get is the useless freebie software. If you can find CPUs at the OEM level, they don't come with the heatsink/fan, but if you are upgrading that component anyway, then it is not of concern.

Of course individual shops may be different, so one should inquire.

 

BTW, I get the full 3-5 year warranty on my OEM HDs (Seagate)

 

I wonder if manufacturers have different warranties for different countries, it would be interesting to know.

[Guest]

No doubt they do, and different product lines as well. There is some neat stuff available in Japan for instance that we can't get over here. But the US/Canada stuff is pretty much the same, although there are some product differences.

 

Overall though there is not much of an upcost to retail in many items. Sometimes however one can get additional 'bonuses' if you buy a 'system' OEM. Usually something like a cheap OS. And that is one area where OEM vs retail has some huge $$ differences. Also different versions. EG.... OEM WindowsXP is different to Retail XP, especially in the support area. The 2 versions won't even reinstall over each other so I have to carry 5 versions of the OS.

[gummigut]

Heh, my second PC was an AST 286. The memories

 

As for others questioning what you do with "bad" or "incompatible" components... If you stick with quality stuff (considering what's being shelled out here, that's whats going to be bought) then incompatible or conflict issues shouldn't be too bad. If something is bad out of the box, it can be swapped for another. That's why I suggest having someone whose done this before ride shotgun while he puts it together.

 

PC's are really not that hard. There's nothing like the old days of troubleshooting IRQ's, dma's and conflicting memory by reading hexadecimal. Generally what you do nowadays is futz around a little bit in the Bios if necessary (unless you are overclocking, then you may be futzing a lot and benchmarking, heh).

 

<<burp>>

[BaronTT]

The ATs were the first I modded with a soldering iron. I started long with PCs before the ATs came out. (And before that, minicomputers.) The AT was a screamer!

 

Remember Trash 80's? PET? There was an IBM "portable' before even the Pet, but I don't remember the model number.

 

Yes, the mamories!

[Khun_Kong]

BaronTT said:

 

 

Remember Trash 80's? PET? There was an IBM "portable' before even the Pet, but I don't remember the model number.

 

Yes, the mamories!

 

I remember when I was allowed to take one of the high-end Trash 80's home from work on the weekends.

 

The high-end model had 8 MB RAM!

 

Data storage was on tape. I played a game called Robot Attack. If you played the tape for the game, you would hear the squealie data noise, except for the data used right before an attack. There, the tape would clearly speak, "Robot Attack".

 

The data storage on the first machine that I ever[/i] used was a narrow, pale yellow roll of paper, in which holes would be punched- not cards, but something more like ticker tape. You would carefully roll it up and then feed the end back into the machine to reload your work. God help you ifg you wrinkled or ripped your piece of paper strip!

 

Yes, I'm 147 years old.