Building my pc

kwikbreaks

The rule with Maplin is to never buy anything unless it is on promotion and even then check elsewhere first. There are sometimes bargains to be had from Maplin but you can also get your fingers badly burned.

Unless the "Build my own PC" is a hobby thing for self education then check very carefully that you can't get the equivalent PC cheaper ready built. Don't forget to figure in the cost of an operating system unless you plan on using Linux. Don't forget postal charges for bits. Years back I used to roll my own to save money. If I wanted something specialised I maybe would now but last time I looked it was cheaper to buy a ready built machine.

isofa

Scan are pretty good price wise, found them to beat Dabs and others on most things, just double check they have stock, as I've have the occasional issue with urgent orders being delayed due to stock issues.

I use mymemory.com for memory cards, they are fast, reliable and all stock is genuine, sometimes they have the best prices, but not always.

I've been burned with Amazon, buying from what I thought was Amazon.co.uk only for the order to be sent by a marketplace trader (it's now more obvious when you purchase), had a highly suspect SanDisk card arrive, no packaging at all.

piggeh

Scan or ebuyer have always been good to me, both pretty good on pricing.

I echo thoughts on a PSU - get a decent brand (Corsair, Tagan, etc) and the quality is staggeringly different to those £10 PSUs you can buy. Also the power levels are more consistent and those cheap ones claiming 600w tend to advertise peaks only, you couldnt power a system on those which actually require 600w constantly, it probably would only be suitable for a ~300w system.

Lakeuk

sheana wrote: »

hi have just been ripped off by maplin store.bought a memory card for camera for £49.99. i later discovered that comet were selling the same card for £22.99.customer services were totally disinterested and refused to let me return item.could you please warn others.i am new to this and not sure how to do this.

You probable would of found it was half the price again buying online.

Always shop around

also for flash memory always compare prices between sites like play.com, 7dayshop, ebuyer, amazon

timbim_2

Play.com. One of the cheapest for flah cards/USB sticks.

Percy1983

It mostly comes down to budget, I build quite a few Pc's and the general trend is to buy an E5200 for £60 and overclock it to around 3.5-4ghz, a resonable board based on the P35 or P43 chipset, 4GB DDR2, A resonable power supply £30+. an ATI 4670,4830,4850,4870,4890 depending on res needed etc.

sanchez_saver

you might better of looking for a cheap pc then jazzing itup with components as you can pic up a good pc for about £250 now. The problem you have with building you own is the components can be cheap but the microsoft licence then puts the price up, but people like HP get discount by getting BIOS locked MS software so keeps the cost low and then just put in the grapics card you want.

Percy1983

sanchez_saver wrote: »

you might better of looking for a cheap pc then jazzing itup with components as you can pic up a good pc for about £250 now. The problem you have with building you own is the components can be cheap but the microsoft licence then puts the price up, but people like HP get discount by getting BIOS locked MS software so keeps the cost low and then just put in the grapics card you want.

I wouldn't really agree with that, it can work out but not always, as for a windows license, you can get an OEM license for vista home premium for £80 or if you look around on ebay you can get one for £50 which what I just did for a PC I was building for a friend.

DatabaseError

I wondered the same around christmas..I've always built my own PCs (well, ever since the shop built P75) and at christmas we decided the twind would have a new PC each...so I priced components...then looked at shops (inc an Acer @ tesco) there was very, very little in it...except...building my own I knew the boards, I knew I'd used quality PSUs (with extra power for when I upgrade). Both Pcs are overclocked (and one is the lovely E5200) and both ended up with 2nd hand 8800GTs...pretty good gaming PCs for next to nothing
My only concern is the E5200 can clock much higher than my Q9300...so, for some tasks, my kids' PC is better than mine
(and hundreds of £ cheaper!)

Pitchshifter

If you want a cheap, average PC, buy one ready made:

I came to the conclusion that building a PC was less cost effective, when my Dad needed an upgrade.
I found a PC from Ebuyer for around £200 without monitor (we used his old one), this came with Vista Basic and was fine for all his uses (web, email, accounts).
As an exercise I tried to specify all the components separately incuding Vista, choosing the absolute cheapest components, but couldn't match the price. Even lowering the spec on some components to shave a few quid off it still came out significantly more expensive.

If you want a fairly high spec PC with your choice of case build your own:

When I built my personal gaming PC, saving money was not the top priority, getting the exact parts I needed and nothing I didn't need was.
I wanted a really good quality quiet case (£90) and a good PSU (£70) as a basis for mid/high end gaming rig. The internals cost ~ GFX £200, CPU £200, MOBO £90, MEM £60, HDs £100
I'm very pleased with the result and it's still going strong over a year later.

I think in this situation I saved some money building it myself, but not much.
Only build yourself if you know precisely what you want.

BTW: I've built about 10 PCs over the years and these days it really is user friendly and straight forward.