What the f*** ATi, would you let me purchase your damn products please???

[blade2]

thanks for the advice Austin, it may be somewhile till i upgrade this ever so ageing computer-relying on my exam results, good, no rather great results should mean a quite powerful comp.

actually here's a question, would u order the components from a site such as www.komplett.co.uk and then build the comp yourself or would you get the components from the local hardware store and get them to assemble it?

reason is that although buying online is cheaper, it is riskier in that if the components have a fault or a erm...clash with other hardware, there is a slight problem in that well you just dont have the convienence of going back to the shop and getting it fixed, i had a 'slight experience' in that i bought a mobo+athlon bundle from novatech but the mobo was seriously messed up so i returned the post but the bloody royal mail lost it meaning i lost £160 of hardware with only £30 compensation.

 

[AnAndAustin]

I've never had to return anything to Komplett, but Dabs sent a courier to collect the product and was very quick and painless. I have no reservations about buying online as needed, there is a great deal of protection offered by both the credit card (£100+ purchases offers the best cover) and the new distance buying legislation, for the UK at least. If you are in doubt then see just how much more expensive your local computer shop is, it can make returns and incompatabilities a lot less hassle. If there's a large price diff then I would certainly buy online, it's really down to personal choice, but at least see what the price diffs are.

 

[blade2]

hey ive checked out this komplett website, damn cheap, £60 cheaper at least than the local computer hardware shop for a 1800XP, decent Mobo , 256mb ddr ram and heatsink.

damn the prices of ram have shotup from £35 to £55, why the hell does that happen?

 

[AnAndAustin]

blade2, it is a nsty conspiracy I'm afraid. The RAM industry make very small profits and prices keep on a falling, as such every now and again the big companies producing it (Hynix, Micron and Samsung?) get together and decide to allow the demand to overtake the supply, as such prices fly up for a few months (often double) and take 6+ months to come back down, quite profitable for them eh? At least the US Department of Justice (DOJ) is asking most of the big memory manufacturers, the so-called Dramurai, to explain strange and unexpected rises in the prices of memory towards the end of last year. Hopefully DOJ will notice this new hike in prices too, esp since it just happens to coincide with the bust summer market (school/college students as well as education establishments).

The biggest problem this time is attributed to the increased demand for DDR (esp DDR333/PC2700) now that Intel have realised the P4 no longer needs the stupid RAMBUS RAM, of course it isn't like Intel, SIS, VIA etc have been secretive about their backing and mobo production geared towards DDR RAM . As such the biggest players like Dell, HP, IBM etc (and therefore purchasers) have been shifting over from RAMBUS to DDR creating a huge need for more DDR RAM and therefore fabrication plants, it will take a while for production to kick in and for supplies to begin increasing throughout the distribution chain, this could also effect all modern gfx cards which all use DDR too. Of course this has all been forseeable for months now, but then that wouldn't hike the profits now would it? If you need RAM I'd suggest buying it now, I remember RAM prices tripling over an 8 week period a couple of years ago, it took over 12months for prices to return to previous levels, that was back when the prices dropped to £1 per MB.

That's my take on it anyway ... and it really pi$$es me off!

 

[KF]

> Can't speak for anyone else, but I dont mind, and I really don't know anyone else that does either.
>I dont see why there should be a problem, anyone with a halfdecent level of education should be able to read English fairly well.

American companies are told (by experts) to customize their products to the country where they wish sell. One way to do this is to go
through a reseller located there, who is supposed to take care of that, and that adds another level of mark-up to the price.

>As for "American Imperialism", I think far more people get annoyed at 5 minute long scenes in movies where the hero waves a flag before the >cheering crowds, or hold some long speech about god bless this and that.
>Gets boring after the first few movies

They put that sort of thing in movies because people like it. Hollywood despises America. You will seldom hear a star, director or writer who has any use for the US. OTOH, a very few of the very most popular are known to patriotic.

I often wonder why other countries would want to see an American movie, and what they think America must be like after seeing one. Suffice it to say entertainment is designed to take people away from the real world, not to portray it. Do Americans live in mansions, each surrounded by a pleasant private park? Or do they live in graffiti-covered apartments amid roaches and filth? Are Americans all weary detectives tracking down international dope dealers, careening down traffic-filled streets suicidally, and blowing up helicopters with rocket launchers. It is the unfamiliarity of the environment which gives it its entertainment value to Americans. Nevertheless, I think foreigners think they are getting a glimse of Americans through the movies.

Those "America is the best" speeches in movies are usually done nowadays by someone playing the part of what Americans would consider a dim-bulb, pompus redneck, who while loyal and dedicated, is somewhat misguided, reckless and dangerous. Americans would rather have a more sterling example saying it, and less formula-isticly, but at least it's in the movie. I suspect Hollywood cuts the foreign version with that still in because it goes over well there, and people long to see something like that about their own countries in their own movies.

Since you don't live here, you don't know that the mainstream press and TV constantly runs down the US. The US is the source of every evil in the world. Nothing anybody anywhere else does is bad, only the US. The US backs evey viscious, unscrupulous dictator, and opposes every liberator's efforts to better the world. The person they quote defending America is some kind of raving, Nazi bigot who should be in a looney bin. Only in the fantasy world of a movie would you see someone decent having a kind word for the US. You get the idea.

The American public had been cowed by this. A few traditional souls bravely still put out flags on the appropriate holidays. Then the big blast in New York, and people had an excuse to put out a flag. Once people realized it was OK, flags sprung up everywhere. They must have been hidden away.

It isn't polite or considerate to brag. We should keep our mouths shut. OTOH, what we see in the US media constantly is grotesquely negative, and someone should speak up for reality.

I don't mean to dump on you. It is interesting to see what goes on in other countries and this is intended in fun.

I have seen a few British movies and TV programs which were evidently not directed at an American audience. The American characters are fun. Some brash American soldier who never had a care in the world, who seems to be able to do anything, and can't wait to be somebody's savior. An American cousin from Texas, arms around the shoulders of every one he greets, pockets bulging with money which he hands out profusely never bothering to count, who wants to give away to a quiet clerk a suddenly inherited English estate, but has to get back to America next week so he can settle a "big" deal. I think the British see in these portraits something they value in themselves, but, being British, it would be improper to express openly.