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When was the last time you bought an off-the-shelf computer?

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My first PC was one my mom ordered from a catalog in 1996. It was one of those slow but nice-looking black Acer Aspire systems that was styled ahead of its time. Every other one for myself was a custom build or a laptop, though I have been involved in shelf purchases for friends and family.
 
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DAGTA said:
Desktop, bought a Dell back in 2005 or 2006.

I've actually been thinking about buying a new laptop lately and was looking at this one this morning:

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/Asus---1...specifications

If any ATOTers know of a better deal on a gaming laptop, I'd appreciate hearing about it. 🙂
Click to expand...

It's good for the money, but it's going to be sloooow for gaming load times (read 5400rpm HDD), check out sager notebooks, they are an established company and for maybe 100-200 more you can get something similar with a good HDD and better build quality.
 
A Dell from like 2000. It was the worst possible time to purchase a new computer. It came with windows Me, a socket 423 1.5ghz pentium 4 with rambus ram. It also had a geforce mmx which basically was code name for shit, but I didn't know at all.

A year later I built my first computer.
 
Last spring. Bought a Dell for use as an HTPC. In the $500 realm its hard to beat store bought IMHO.

Prior to that was a Dell in 2002. Parents are still using that one. Only upgrade is additional ram. In between its all been laptops but we don't tend to buy computers very often. Wife's laptop was bought in '08 and I'm using a freebie circa 2010 or so.
 
My first PC (after the C-64) was a refurbe'd 386=SX in 1989, back in the day when we all poured through "Computer Shopper" looking for deals, after that all home-built..
 
Me personally:Never.

My mom and dad bought me a Compaq K6-2 400 Mhz desktop back in 1999 or so.
After that,I had a HP 1.6 Ghz P4 desktop bought by Mom and Dad in 2002.It got replaced by an Ibuypower 2.4 Ghz P4 in 2004.

Since then,no off-the-shelf PCs have been in my family.All custom-built PCs since 2004.
 
Was going to say last year with a laptop, but not counting that, it'd be a Gateway 2000 Pentium machine from around 1995.
 
Never bought one myself. Last pre-built computer I had was a Dell desktop circa 2004 for college. Built all of my own after that.
 
The first desktop I bought was the only off the shelf desktop I have ever had. It was about 1997 and it was a Gateway. Seems it had a Pentium 450 and a 10GB hdd. Computer, monitor and printer was about $2800.
I've built all my desktops since then.
I do buy my wife off the shelf Dell laptops.
 
darkxshade said:
Members of AT are likely to be ones who hasn't in a while but the rest of the world are still filled with people who don't know any better.
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I wouldn't call ignorance of the situation a bad thing. Most just don't care enough. There are examples of this across many industries. I don't cook with every ingredient made by myself; I just don't have the desire to. I know the benefits though and to some people who do I would be considered ignorant. Is that a bad thing?

There's nothing wrong with buying a pre-built desktop.
 
1994 Tandy from Radio shack- it was a 486sx 33, 2MB ram. I had to go to Incredible Universe to buy the CD-ROM and Modem lol
 
This thread needs a Poll.... 🙂

I haven't ever purchased a "boxed" computer. My parents did many moons ago though when I was in elementary school.
 
Wife got a Dell in 2005. I've always built my own but she wanted something basic with support. Now she just gets my old PC's when I upgrade.
 
Atari 800
Epson 286 around 1988

Built many since then but did buy an HP (gasp) refurb about 6 months ago for the Office. Possibly the best $350 Ive ever spent on 'Puters.

HP Pavilion P7-1235 Desktop PC with AMD Quad-Core A8-5500 Accelerated Processor, 8GB Memory, 1TB Hard Drive, blue tooth, wifi and Windows 7 Home Premium
 
Samsung laptop 2013?

The buy off the shelf market is all about laptops now. Go to BBY, mostly laptops on display. I don't really see the problem. Alive and well IMO.
 
in 2000 was the only time ive purchased a desktop

when i went to college it was easier to just order one from one of the billion internet sites selling them. it was not a name brand like Dell or Gateway. after that ive built every one myself

i got a Dell Laptop earlier this year, cant really build your own laptop
 
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