My best value PC tips (esp Currys/Dixons/PCWorld

SidB_2

There is a flaw in this thread that nobody's raised. It's Dixon's/Curry's/PCWorld.

Would you seriously choose to shop there ?

I have yet to meet anybody who had a problem with something they bought from these cowboys that got it sorted quickly and professionaly.

In my own experience I bought an expensive TV. After it warmed up the picture started to roll. My wife contacted their service people who sent an engineer. My wife took a day off and spent the day gardening in our front garden and sorting the garage. Engineer didn't turn up. She had to argue with Currys that he hadn't been. Got the usual "there wasn't anybody in, nobody answered the phone" excuse. Wife in front garden, caller display.

Arranged for another engineer, who actually did turn up. Told the wife he needed to order a part. Fair enough. Next week wife phoned Curry's, "still waiting for part". Next week same excuse. Third week, same again.

Eventually my wife phoned Toshiba. "What's the problem, why no parts ?" Toshiba service engineer "Sorry madam it's a well known fault with these TV's, you shouldn't have been sold it without the modification being done." Wife says OK "what parts do Curry's need and why can't they get them ?" Toshiba reply, "no parts needed, just a drop of solder. Curry's have been told that." Then he gave her specific instructions for the work needed.

Wife rings Curry's and gets the same old flannel about waiting for parts. Asks to speak to supervisor, gets same excuse. Asks to speak to manager, gets same excuse. My wife informs him "politely" that he's BS'ing her, and gets shouted at !!! Won't give his name, wonder why.

Eventually TV fixed after 6 weeks. We right to Curry's head office. No reply received.

I will never ever shop at Currys, Dixons, PCWorld or The Link. I'd strongly advise you to avoid them like the plague, unless you like being shafted.

George_Bray

Magic_Time

Here's my thinking on some of the parts you mention; I'd welcome suggestions on the most cost-effective options as I reckon that whatever you buy is likely to be out of date (less than cool) in 6 months:

ADVANCE INTEL LGA775 UPGRADE 7 ......ABIT M/board- P4 3.4 CPU + Fan - Case - £270.00

Wow! What a price! I'd go for a £30 motherboard. Why pay more? Plus a non-Intel processor just below 3Ghz to avoid paying a price premium for cutting edge speeds which you probably don't really need. Much cheaper.

250GB MAXTOR SERIAL ATA DIAMONDMAX 10 7200RPM 8MB CACHE £95.49
I'd go for a slightly smaller Maxtor hard drive at half the cost. Who needs such huge capacity? Even for capturing 2 hours of uncompressed video.

SAPPHIRE ATI RADEON X600PRO 256MB DDR PCI-E +DVI +VIVO RETAIL
£89.95
Tempting, but probably more advanced than really needed.

A4 TECH WIRELESS KEYBOARD + MOUSE PS/2 [BLACK/SLIVER]
£17.49

I'd retain my existing wired products which work perfectly well, and save money.

Regards
George

ArsenalFC

Sid, did you not attempt to get a refund or replacing it for another tv? Thats what I would of done.

SidB_2

I was a lot younger and naive back then. If it happened today I'd stand by the tills telling everybody what cowboys they are until I got my money back. Oh and I'd threaten them with the "Sales of Goods Act."

Magic_Time

George - I wasn't really trying to suggest these were the best value parts around, I was just trying to do to a like-for-like comparison between the Currys system and a hypothetical build-your-own system - just to illustrate the point that building your own PC isn't NECESSARILY going to save you money.

Of course, if you're looking for a different spec computer then there are plenty of other, cheaper options for both components and off-the-shelf systems out there. I'm sure these would suit a lot of people, but there are perfectly good reasons why other people are looking for a system with a faster processor, bigger hard drive etc. - in my case I was looking for a PC that would handle video editing and the odd game as well as the basic stuff like word processing and web browsing.

woj101

Don't discount ebay. I haven't looked for a while but I bought a base uint (with mouse, multimedia keyboard and speakers incl) about 18 months ago for £211. The specs weren't the best but they were good for that time: celeron 2.3ghz (yes I know celeron is below other processors but it's still quick), 512mb ram, 80gb hard drive, dvd drive and cd-rw, with software pre-installed (incl. winxp).

I haven't followed the pc market much since, but I'd be surprised if you could get that spec for much less now. I've certainly been very happy with it - a real bargain if you can't justify paying £500+ for a pc.

George_Bray

George - I wasn't really trying to suggest these were the best value parts around, I was just trying to do to a like-for-like comparison between the Currys system and a hypothetical build-your-own system - just to illustrate the point that building your own PC isn't NECESSARILY going to save you money.

You did a good job of demonstrating that, even with top notch components, it is possible to match the likes of the Aldi PC. I'm surprised. You've effectively persuaded me not to drop the DIY option! Many thanks for sharing your research and analysis.

As for video editing, I'm at a loss to understand how my new Liteon 5005 standalone DVD recorder encodes video with a processor which doesn't even get hot enough to need a heat sink, whereas our PCs are struggling. Is Windows really that hyper-inefficient? I'm going to try configuring a separate hard drive with a clean load of Windows with processes slimmed down as far as possible, just for video capture and encoding.

Regards
George

culpepper

Well I concede to the fact that it isnt always cheaper to build your own.Have a look in the back of a Micromart magazine ,they have some very good prices (not the second hand bit although there are good prices there too).
Course once youve got a pc,you have a hard drive,cd drive,monitor,OS and so do not necessarily need to add those parts into pricing a self build. I built mine last year for £300 (already had above mentioned articles).
My self building projects have meant I will never need a repair man as I know how to do it myself,so that is an added bonus.

thelawnet

The t9102 is not a bad price.... Here's something similar from ebuyer

Qty Product QuickFind Stock Price Line Total
Intel Pentium 550j 3.4g Skt775, Fsb800 1mb Ext Mem Boxed Btx 080847 *7 days £170.57 £170.57
Gigabyte S775 I865PE ATX Sound LAN USB2 FSB800 ATA100 Retail Box 064802 42 £46.07 £46.07
Viking 256mb DDR 400mhz PC3200 Memory Module 078551 38 £23.23 £46.46
Radeon X600 Pro 128mb Ddr - Pci-e Dvi/tvo 080794 18 £67.45 £67.45
Maxtor 7Y250M0 MaXline Plus II 250GB Serial ATA 7200rpm 8mb Cache- OEM 050955 19 £94.19 £94.19
NEC ND-3500 Double Layer Dual 16x DVD R/RW - OEM Beige 065825 921 £35.54 £35.54
Casecom KG-828 400watt Black Atx Case With USB and Audio 056357 611 £15.31 £15.31
- remove item Cart Total: £475.59
Order usually ships in 7 days
Deliver my Order by: Mon 13th Dec 2004 (Priority Service)Wed 15th Dec 2004 (Standard Service)Fri 17th Dec 2004 (Super Saver)Sat 11th Dec 2004 (Saturday Delivery)
Shipping Band: £6.99
Approx Cart Weight: 17.72Kg
Shipping Surcharge: £0.00
SubTotal: £482.58
VAT: £84.49
Total: £567.07

Total is £567.07, still without keyboard, mouse, floppy and tv tuner. Expect to add on £65 for this so it works out the same price (note NOT more expensive). Pcworld has it for £649.

However, the DIY route has better quality. In particular pc world are using a micro-atx motherboard which will limit upgrading, and they have probably used low-quality components across the board.

Also the 3.4ghz pentium is an utter waste of your money. You can get a 3ghz pentium for £100, and the performance difference is tiny - 3.4ghz is 10% faster (and at more than 10% total increase in cost), but because CPU is nto the only factor, you will only notice a slight maybe 4% improvement (which in fact is NOT noticeable)

Money savers can build a PC for £300 that will be of better overall reliability than this thing --- other things are, do you need a tv tuner - if you are building it yourself, you can make the choice. It's only a good deal if you want ALL the same components, and don't mind corners cut and microatx motherboard.

ultrak3wl

I'm a build-your-own freak, not very difficult to build PCs if you can operate a screwdriver. A bit more time-consuming obviously since you have to research the cheapest source for more items.

In a BYO don't forget to ask your kids to buy the Windows XP and MS Office software for you, the academic price is much less than retail.