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How much did you pay for your computer?
Less than $500 (wow! any regrets?)
Between $500 and $750 (what kind is it?)
Between $751 and $1,000 (what kind is it?)
Between $1,001 and $1,500 (what kind is it?)
Between $1,501 and $2,000 (what kind is it?)
More than $2,000 (what kind is it?)
It was free (how did you pull that off?)
Discussion is locked
Home built: 3.4 GHz Pentium 4 processoron an Asus P4C800-E motherboard, 2GB RAM, 250 Mb Western Digital hard drive, 250 Mb ATI All-In Wonder 2006 Edition video card, Sound Blaster X-Fi Platinum sound card, Plextor Plexwriter Premium CD writer, Plextor PX-712A DVD writer, Lian LI tower, Wireless WI-FI (802.1G), Klipsch Promedia 5.1 speakers, & Power Computing 17" monitor (an oldie, but a goodie).
This retired "gray-beard" had never touched a computer until 5 years ago. Finally got tired of the lack of speed and general crappiness of the (name-brand) machine, so early this year I took the plunge and built my own. Was a lot of work & head-scratching, but I've never regretted it. I now have a fast machine with lots of space which would retail for around $2500.
My computer works great. I got it about 1 year ago. Its a emachines.
I got tired of calling a company that was not responsive.Decided to build it myself.Selected the components and features I needed, not what was available of force fed to the masses.If something goes wrong, I can replace a piece of hardware.Need to upgrade-- do it yourself.I left room for expansion and future upgrades.Files have gotten larger lately so I'll need to upgrade to a larger hard drive or two.
Years ago i researched and put together componets due to my needs. I do the same to up-grade and i don't have to buy only from Dell or the others. Woody
My first computer cost me over $3,000 but this one cost considerable less. It is an Athlon 900 and I use it for working at home and playing (going on line). I am 64 years old and I don't have much more time to play. Right now I have had to mickey-mouse this machine to get on-line with an external modem, but the machine keeps plugging away no matter what I attach to it. My XP (a newer Athlon) won't connect to the internet so I am using my machine that I got from Blackwolf a generic type while my Compaq sits idle nearby. I like generics better because they don't add a bunch of stupid programs on the machine that I will never use!
I paid 3200.00 CDN dollars. That's something like 1000.00 USD 
Thermaltake Kandalf Aluminum Case
Enermax 535 W PSU
Asus A8N SLI mobo
AMD 4200+ x2
2 gig Kingston ram
XFX 7800 GTX SLI
Thermaltake Hardcano 13
1 - Seagate 80 gig SATA
2 - WD 200 gig
SB Live Platinum 5.1
Klipsch ProMedia 4.1
Logitech Wireless Trackball
Logitech Wireless KB
Built it myself in March after having used top-shelf Microns for ages. Silverstone case, ASUS A8V Deluxe mobo, Athlon 64FX53 proc with 1014 bios, Coolermaster Hyper 6+ heat sink (superb with the Silverstone flow-through case), 2 gigs Corsair matched RAM sticks, 2 - 300 gig Maxtor Diamond Max SATA drives w/cooling fans, Antec 480 Neopower psu, Sony DRU710A optical drive, old floppy drive, old NEC DVD and CD optical drive. Overclocks to 2.7 ghz cooly - 48 degrees C in 68 degress F ambient with SiSoft burn-in running ten times, and most stable. The front side bus, as you know, is faster than the blazes, at least for now. Various old and new PCI cards and Radeon 9800 PRO AGP card (I'm not a gamer). Most demanding program (which, as a digital photographer, I use most often), is Photoshop with marvelous Fred Miranda plug-ins and it runs like the blazes.
You have a good enough video card to play game you don't need better to enjoy fluid and good games, of course there is always better but 1 1/2 year ago or less it was top of the line.
I have the 9800 AIW AGP and no complain and I play BF2 and COD2 and other games on a built it myself AMD Sempron 3000+ on a A7N8X Deluxe and it work very well, all the 3 desktop computer are build by me and my wife and the Laptop is an Compact AMD Athlon64.
As you can see we love AMD here 
and for good reason .
Service is exceptional and I am always right with my desktop hehe.
I even built mother in law system and guess what she have for CPU and we do printing scanning and fax too with a brother all in wone and network ready.
I have Zboard keyboard for game and Logitech wireless for normall day to day work altough I could have done everything on the ZBoard I still want the PS2 for compatiblity reason as Zboard is only USB for the newer version.
To complete the system I have a cheap quick cam chat of logitech; never again will I buy microsoft hardware as they don't support newer OS "***" lol but logitech still support my very old quick cam home even on XP so for me it is logitech all the way now, and anyone want cheap sidewinder weel and micorsoft joystick?
Anyway built yourself and you know exactly what you pay for and what you have on your HD is what you want, not what they decided.
Have a nice day
No roadwarrior and retired eyes would have 20" or so instead of supposed maximum mobility. I'm many years Mac inclined - I stay away from the endless hassle of the evil empire/darkside. As luck has it, I'm more technophone than -phile and I have several friends who are IT people - but on windows systems. Drat. I do dual platform from ostensible necessity and virtual is incredibly slow currently. I live in an Intel town so next generation, if I'm not Alsheimers then, will be Mac/Tel. Any bargain hunters are welcome to their choices. You generally get what you pay for. I'll stay Mac elegant rather than universal.
A used, off lease, Dell Optiplex GX110 with Windows 98SE, 10 gig hard drive. Bought 2 years ago as interim computer. No regrets.
I belive it was around $700.00
Compaq Presario
2.60 GHz Intel Pentium 4 processor
512 MB updated to 1024 MB memory
120 GB hard drive
GVD+RW/CD-RW combo drive
model S5400NX
I have a little more than $2,000 into my computer as I upgrade every couple of years or so. I built it up myself from component parts. It is AMD based with all the bells and whistles. The next upgrade will include a new MB/CPU and Graphics card and probably run about $700.
Dell Dimension 8100, 1991 cutting edge!
Richard S Talavera RRSVT
rrsvt@gilanet.com stiff neck 'n bucket drives ---
a side 'a hogtown blues a strip a' red bacon ---
Rein A Krack Link
I paid over 2,800 for a Mac PowerBooks with Tiger X OS 10.4.2. I am not at all satisfied. The 30+ page manual is pathetic, the downloaded 'Mac 101 Manual' was not any better.
The software add-ons are a difficult process, and there is no way to find how the software, especially the Tiger X OS operates. I downloaded the new patch (60+ MB) and it took two hours from the apple web site at DSL network speeds.
Could not print to my Brother MFC 2100.
The iPhoto feature will not allow pasting of *.jpeg or *.bmp images and store them in folders.
How does one de-clutter the 'Mac desktop, and really know where the files are stored (no clue in the manual).
Mac PowerBooks can show images on both its LCD (notebook) screen and an external monitor. But cannot find any information as to how I can make the 19-inch flat screen monitor as the primary screen, and the notebook screen as secondary, when I am working at home.
I know a lot of Mac fans are going to boo & hiss! But I have sent e-mails and requests to apple for help, and I have not received any replies.
For my point of view, I wish I had not bout this machine; the price and the lack of some basic information one step above those needed by total illiterates. I bought 2 books, after spending another $100, and am struggling as to how to make sure that I don?t loose my files, folders and be able to access them when I need them.
If anybody can recommend some sites and material which has good solid information with limited ?geek-speak? please send me the information at:
bamahmood@knology.net
I would appreciate Text only, my site does not let through HTML.
Thanks
Yep you will get boo lol.
No sorry can't comment on MAC outside that my custom built is not slow and my wife ATHLON64 Compac Laptop is not slow either but hex experience may and will varie as I am sure in the MAC World, I am sure that the no salute outside of MAC still exist so I am good for hell I guess but at least my hell is hot hot
Good luck and I am sure the MAC community will arise to your help as you just make them look very very bad.
I bought a Dell Dimension desktop in 2001 with a 3 year warranty. It died just before its 2-year birthday. Customer support tried several ways to help--including sending a tech to our home. It worked for about 2 hours after the tech left.
Another phone call--and Dell replaced the entire computer with an upgrade that equaled what the original cost of the computer would buy me in the 2003.
My new (to me)computer is still working fine.
That's for the all the parts, pieces and externals (printer, scanner, speakers etc.)
I've been doing this stuff for a while and have been making my own "home-brewed" systems for about 10 years now.
Software? Man I don't know... probably at LEAST a grand!
...and no, it was not because of multiple rebates.
Some time ago, I was fed-up and read-the-riot-act to COMP USA for never having the items they advertise IN-STOCK. The store manager was nice enough to hunt around their other stores and find the system listed in the ad that I wanted and have it transfered to his store.
I had to prepay for it so that he could do the stock transfer. Well, the cashier was apparently distracted and failed to ring-up the computer along with the other "Free After Rebate" items in the package. SOOOOO, when I went in to pick up the computer about three days later, the manager got it out of the stockroom and handed it over to me.
Isn't it great when these Corporations hire people who are so careful that they "ring up everything"in front of them and foeget about the things they can't see.
Maybe if they would pay a living wage they would get someone who really cares about thier JOB.
Congrats on your "purchase"
Would you believe in 6 months I have owned this computer, I had to get a new motherboard, DVD burner and 5 in 1 card reader? The ''tech'' who put in the motherboard did such a sloppy job. He left before Windows even booted up. I had to reinstall windows all over again. Then, I waited a half an hour on the phone for technical support to guide me into installing drivers. I still don't know if things are right. I then called to let them know my 5 in 1 card reader was not working. The ''tech'' had left the USB cable unplugged. I had to take apart the case and try to figure it out. It took 2 weeks to get the new card. The guy on the phone ''forgot'' to mail it to me. I installed it myself.
I am VERY unhappy about the way I was treated. I was a former Dell customer who chose not to go back to Dell due to outsourcing. I read that Micro Velocity had great tech support. Yeah.......
Less than $500 for an eMachines. Had to do a little arm wresting to get a defective CD-RW/DVD drive replaced, but otherwise has been a good machine.
...w/iSight, iPod 3G 40 Gb, w/wireless home WPA-secured Airport Extreme/Express network. PowerBook has the fastest video adaptor and a Firewire 800-connected 250 Gb back-up HD.
I got a new Dual G5 for graphics use. I spent a lot ($3500) but not as much for the functionality. I have a pair of cheap (relative) pc's but intel inside and winxp dont hack it. Wintel is also a virus haven. If I didn't need a PC for my Medical software, OUT
I would build my own I would go to website and get
the parts I want then put it together. Put the operating system I like. Then use it for what I designed it to do. It would likely cost about $1200.
I would want an AMD 64 Processor with hyperthreading a socket 939 board and at least a GB of
ram. Have at least 250GB hard drives an Iomagic DVD writer and Two 4 socket USB 2.0 PCI Cards and the best
Video Card I could buy. I would make it for gaming.
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