Is pc building a dying trend?

[Arkaign]

You can't just look at one prebuilt though, would you just look at one car?

For instance:

HP Z230
I7-4790 quad core 3.6ghz
8gb ram PC3-12800
1TB 7200rpm sata-600
dvdrw
win7 pro
3 year next business day warranty
$815

Add a video card and an SSD.


Versus newegg pricing:
i7 4790 $309
MB MSI H81M-E33 $47
8GB crucial ram $68
random 1TB 7200 rpm drive ~$50
random dvdrw ~$25
random case ~$50
Win7 pro $139

This is already at $688 and missing some things like a power supply. There are also other considerations like noise level. I know first hand that the z230 workstations are basically silent in a noiseless room and the case is big enough to fit a radeon 6990 (12.5"?).

I'm just trying to make the point that not all prebuilt machines are crap to be instantly dismissed when considering a new rig.

Definitely the workstation systems can be a win for people that can find the right deals.

Gaming prebuilts OTOH are almost always complete ripoffs compared to customs, which was my observation.

I have often suggested finding a deal on the outlet Dell XPS boxes, and adding a GPU, as some great value can be had. But for joe blow walking into Best Buy, look out lol.

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/cybertro...&skuId=1625416

It's got a big plasticky aggressive looking case lol.

So for $900, you get :

AMD FX 8320
16GB (?? why ??) DDR3
1GB Nvidia 650 non-TI GPU (lol)
1TB HDD 7200RPM
DVDRW
Windows 8

Ugh. And this is fairly prevalent with retail 'gaming' PCs.

Going way up in price also brings you to similar bizarre configs that are poor value and allocation of resources :

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/cybertro...&skuId=2611152

$2400, 4770K, 32GB DDR3 (why), 2TB HDD, 3GB Single 780 (non-Ti!), Bluray, Liquid Cooling Setup (why?)

Something custom built could be hugely better either way. I'll do a $900 build for the heck of it :

Win 8.1 $99
4690K $239.99
Asrock Z97 Pro3 $74.99
8GB DDR3 2133 $69.99
EVGA 600W PSU $49.99
Gigabyte MidATX Case $29.99
DVDRW $14.99
1TB 7200 HDD $54.99
R9 290 4GB $259.99

Have to add kb/mouse, but that would be so much better of a gaming box than the Best Buy $900 one that it defies belief. FX 8320 + Nvidia 650 1GB (non-Ti), vs i5 4690K + R9 290 4GB.

Buying a custom WS or outlet Dell and adding a GPU as you say is also a great deal if you find the right one as well.

TLDR : people that don't do research and just buy whatever is off the shelf get boned.

 

[Red Squirrel]

I've never overclocked, other than just to try it. I have enough random issues with computers as is without throwing variables into the mix.

 

[Arkaign]

Hell, that $900 custom build would perform really close to the $2400 system lol.

 

[Eug]

In 2015 it is moronic to overclock RAM. It made some sense 15 years ago but that's because the memory speed depended upon the FSB speed.

 

[StrangerGuy]

Gamers avoid using embedded graphics because they are not meant for ANY serious gamer. Dell, HP, ect knows that 90+% of what they sell is not going to be used for gaming enthusiast so they use the on-board graphics. Thing is it's not so simple as just buying a decent video card and stuffing it in a Dell because Dell will NOT have a beefy enough PS to power it so you would need to replace that as well, (if possible as OEM manufacturers are do not care about ATX standard sized PS's and it might not be possible to install a higher-output unit).

Research before buying right? Do I have really have to spell it out...

My point its pretty stupid to reject a fantastic prebuilt deal when it comes up just because it's a prebuilt or it lacks useless to near useless enthusiast features.

 

[Bill Brasky]

Nobody wants these big behemoths of pcs. We want nice tiddy laptops tablets and phones

I don't have space for a huge tower in my apartment. My 3930 rig is sitting in a closet in Kansas. :'(

 

[Subyman]

I remember building PC's back in the late 90's when I was a youth. I can't say I was very aware of how big the PC building scene was and I didn't know many people that built them to save money. You could save maybe a hundred or so dollars on a non-gaming build, but for many people it wasn't worth the hassle or lack of support.

I remember customization used to be nonexistent unless you had a dremel tool and some small metal working tools. To do anything extreme like water cooling I had to go down to auto zone and get a heater core from a car, get tubing from ace, and an aquarium pump. Now there are endless water-cooling options.

I'm not sure how going more into the adult-oriented super customizable market has affected the industry. I'd think the non-essential parts like water-cooling and high end GPUs/CPUs have insane profit margins compared to the consumer-grade stuff sold back in the late 90's and early 2000's. The market has shifted, but the amount of money spent may be the same.

 

[rsbennett00]

TLDR : people that don't do research and just buy whatever is off the shelf get boned.

Truer words have never been typed.

 

[rsbennett00]

Gamers avoid using embedded graphics because they are not meant for ANY serious gamer. Dell, HP, ect knows that 90+% of what they sell is not going to be used for gaming enthusiast so they use the on-board graphics. Thing is it's not so simple as just buying a decent video card and stuffing it in a Dell because Dell will NOT have a beefy enough PS to power it so you would need to replace that as well, (if possible as OEM manufacturers are do not care about ATX standard sized PS's and it might not be possible to install a higher-output unit).

This goes back to what Arkaign said, do some research. My HP came with a 620 watt PS and without a video card. It has powered a radeon 6990 and a gtx 970. Unless I'm mistaken, or you want crossfire/sli, not much sucks more power than a 6990. You are correct that it's not an atx power supply, but who cares as long as it outputs enough power?

 

[StrangerGuy]

I remember building PC's back in the late 90's when I was a youth. I can't say I was very aware of how big the PC building scene was and I didn't know many people that built them to save money. You could save maybe a hundred or so dollars on a non-gaming build, but for many people it wasn't worth the hassle or lack of support.

I remember customization used to be nonexistent unless you had a dremel tool and some small metal working tools. To do anything extreme like water cooling I had to go down to auto zone and get a heater core from a car, get tubing from ace, and an aquarium pump. Now there are endless water-cooling options.

I'm not sure how going more into the adult-oriented super customizable market has affected the industry. I'd think the non-essential parts like water-cooling and high end GPUs/CPUs have insane profit margins compared to the consumer-grade stuff sold back in the late 90's and early 2000's. The market has shifted, but the amount of money spent may be the same.

In the Wild West in the early 2000s and before, you really had to pay attention in choosing a mobo because there were only a few golden eggs (which is usually made by Abit) in a sea of mediocre to junk. Now anyone can just slap a 4790K and GTX980 onto the cheapest Asrock board and expect it to be bulletproof.

 

[SP33Demon]

I built a non-gaming Mini-ITX rig with custom quality parts that is around 2 years old and it's still pretty kickass. Takes up 1/4 the space of an ATX, 1/10 the wattage and can still compile code just as well as my old gaming rig.

So to answer the OP, no I don't think custom builds are going away. It may slow down over time since most people who know what they're doing won't have to rebuild for 3-5 years, but it's probably going to be at a constant rate. Most people who build their own know that it's cheaper and more fun than going with a Dell commercial rig.

One thing to note is that my new Droid Turbo is actually zippier than my desktop now, so mobile phones could very well replace non-gaming desktops if they haven't already. For gaming however, I don't think the mobile arena will ever compete.

 

[Red Squirrel]

This goes back to what Arkaign said, do some research. My HP came with a 620 watt PS and without a video card. It has powered a radeon 6990 and a gtx 970. Unless I'm mistaken, or you want crossfire/sli, not much sucks more power than a 6990. You are correct that it's not an atx power supply, but who cares as long as it outputs enough power?

And if it fails, then you're screwed, unless you know enough about SMPSes to fix it yourself. That's why you want standard parts.

Then again PSUs don't really fail all that often if they're half decent quality. OEM ones typically wont be though.

 

[BlahBlahYouToo]

That's more of a political reason and more dictated by management. Basically the company wants to have an external company to blame if something goes wrong. It's actually really childish, but it's how things work. Rather than custom building everything and getting your IT staff to do... IT work, you have everything prebuilt and setup by contractors/vendors and IT only do the dirty work that revolves around that like connecting the keyboard and mouse, or the typical stuff like backups and system maintenance, and then the rest is all meetings and other management crap. Heck, all the places I worked IT was not even allowed to touch code. Most programming is outsourced these days and they usually have contracts stopping anyone from doing anything in house.

I like Google's approach, most of their stuff is in house, they even use consumer grade hard drives for their server stuff. While some of the vendor stuff like Dell and IBM have crazy warranties that you simply can't get with prebuilt components, they charge so much and lock you into proprietary stuff that you're better off going in-house and just building more redundancy into your system and having more spares.

On other thought, custom building actual PCs for the company would probably be unrealistic unless it's a small company. Servers on the other hand are more realistic as you wont have as many. The biggest issue would be trying to source out parts that are all the same. Go on any site like Newegg and they might have 1-10 of a specific motherboard in stock only, then if you order more you get another revision or completely different motherboard because they only make so many till they change to another model. You simply can't pick a specific motherboard or other component and order 1000+ of them. No sites will have that many in stock or even let you, as a lot of them have limits of how much per person.

you must work for a really small shop that operates completely different than every company out there in the real because I disagree with almost everything posted here.

no one uses 3rd parties because they're playing the blame game. it's far easier and cost effective to use a company like hp/dell for PCs and professional services. that's why those companies exist. they have a manufacturing line that can churn out systems, imaged OS, etc. more efficiently than an in-house IT dept can.

how much would it cost you to hire someone that just sits in the backroom putting together PCs?
if multiple parts go bad, how many different vendors do you have to contact to get an RMA process going? who wants to deal with that headache?

it's cheaper to buy cat6 in bulk and crimp your own to length as well, but no company does that.

and servers are more realistic to build your own? that's the most absurd thing I've heard. I have not heard of any company, big or small, that builds their own servers.
and i'd venture to guess that many medium sized companies have more servers than workstations. VDI? that's a server.
dev, uat, qa, prod clusters/farms? even on VMware, that's multiple servers for multiple environments.

 

[MongGrel]

My wife prefers laptops so obviously we buy those. Everyone has been a Dell and not one of them has had a problem. Just took her 5 or so year old Studio 17 and added an SSD and Windows 8.1. I had previously added more RAM and a second 500GB hdd. It runs fine for her and she loves it.

I prefer gaming desktops. I build those. For $1.5k-$2k I can build a rig that would cost $2k-$3k from a vendor. And I get exactly what I want.

My last build was a gaming set up I built into a HTPC case so I could put it into my entertainment center. I use my 60" plasma as my monitor.

For friends and family, I recommend they buy pre-built. That way I don't have to be tech support.

Sounds like me, I've done most of the above.

The wife still using one of my old gamer rigs though.

I just built the HTPC in a small HAF though I guess.

I did build one gamer rig for my sister-in-law and I'm tech support there, but she lives close and has only needed me about 3 times over many years.

 

[Markbnj]

From an article on ransomware in today's NYT...

Even after reading through numerous descriptions of CryptoWall 2.0 as “the largest and most destructive ransomware threat on the Internet” and “an enormous danger for computer users,” I still couldn’t help thinking this was mainly a problem for moms who persist in using big, boxy PC computers and small-town police departments.

Lol.

 

[Remobz]

I bought some computer parts almost 3 years ago to build a gaming system that is still non-existent. I don't have the time, patience and desire to finish it so it just sits and collect dust these days.

 

[KeithTalent]

I bought some computer parts almost 3 years ago to build a gaming system that is still non-existent. I don't have the time, patience and desire to finish it so it just sits and collect dust these days.

I've had a new SSD that is four times the size of my current SSD sitting on my desk for over six months. Just too lazy to install it, even though I keep having to move stuff off my current SSD to my old platter drive since my current SSD is too small.

<-- lazy idiot

KT

 

[rsbennett00]

And if it fails, then you're screwed, unless you know enough about SMPSes to fix it yourself. That's why you want standard parts.

Then again PSUs don't really fail all that often if they're half decent quality. OEM ones typically wont be though.

If it fails after the 3 year next business day on-site warranty expires you mean?

 

[OBLAMA2009]

i dont think anyone builds to save money, you build to get something with better specs and durability. pre built comps have cruddy power supplies and crap cpus (like dual core "i5's)

 

[rsbennett00]

i dont think anyone builds to save money, you build to get something with better specs and durability. pre built comps have cruddy power supplies and crap cpus (like dual core "i5's)

You should stop spreading lies or at least clarify you mean "some" and not imply all.

 

[mizzou]

I haven't been much interested in doing a new PC build because of the complete lack of enthusiast hardware advances. It's all about efficiency gains, not performance gains.

I probably won't upgrade my current PC until we get some crazy new architecture coming into the pipelines.

Back in 1998-2005 or so, I felt like the gains in performance were awesome with each build I had.

 

[Dr. Zaus]

Apple builds fine PCs with amazing customer service: so I don't see why I should build my own anymore.

 

[rsbennett00]

Apple builds fine PCs with amazing customer service: so I don't see why I should build my own anymore.

Troll attempt is way too obvious.

 

[Dr. Zaus]

Troll attempt is way too obvious.

I'm very serious about this troll. I've had amazing customer service from apple. I recently had a hard drive go out. If it was a personal build I would have RMAed it, perhaps purchased something new online. So either a week out of a computer during RMA or a day out and $300.

Instead I brought my mac to apple. They replaced the hard drive, for free, AND had the operating system re-installed for me THAT DAY.

All in all the mac cost $300 more than I would have paid for the parts to build my own PC but I get the spectacular OS-X along with amazing customer service, and all in very sexy box.

 

[Freejack2]

PCs are dying. for the person who uses the internet for things such as Facebook, their $100 to $200 under contract smartphone is just fine. If they want a bigger screen $50 to $600 gets them a tablet.
People who buy a desktop want something that a smartphone or tablet doesn't offer, or don't know any better.
For most in this category, a pre-built Dell, Lenovo, HP, or whatever is fine.

I suspect the PC building market is kept alive by PC gamers and people who want just want to custom build their system. Take myself for example, I prefer to control what goes into my system, and I've found what I want in premade gaming systems, such as Alienware, is more expensive.