The Glade 4.0

Might be buying me a new system here in a month or so. Haven't bought anything brand new for almost 5 years. Have a Dell laptop of the desktop replacement size. It did good work but it's time to catch up. Looking to spend between 6-800 but could go to 1000 if worth it. My level of PC gaming has dropped off over the years so I don't need something to play the newest thing at max settings but I don't want many issues if I decide to jump into a online game for a bit.

Not hung up on name brand. Best bang for my buck is what I've been researching. Are the All-in-ones worth it? Dell has a nice XPS one that looks interesting. I've never used one(exception, I did get to play around with a top end Imac a few years ago and it was very nice).

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"It is true that democracy undermines freedom when voters believe they can live off of others' productivity, when they modify the commandment: 'Thou shalt not steal, except by majority vote.' The politics of plunder is no doubt destructive of both morality and the division of labor."

I cannot personally recommend an All-in-One PC. The one's that I've had experience with were a pain in the *** to work on when something went wrong. And something seems to go wrong with them, more often than any of the other desktops I've supported, user errors aside. It just seems like something is always going out in the All-in-Ones. If something goes out in a desktop, you can generally replace the part, fairly easily. And while you CAN replace parts with the All-in-Ones, I've not had good experience trying to take one apart to get the the piece in question.

If you plan to do any gaming at all, you'll want a decent video card. In which case, you'll be better off getting a nice desktop/tower PC. Which will also give you the option of upgrading other parts of the PC, in the years to come.

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"I Live, I Love, I Slay, and I Am Content."
- Conan the Barbarian

Last time I built my machine pretty close to what Tom's Hardware had for their mid-range build. I've had no complaints but I did upgrade the vid card a year or 2 later.

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The Dude abides.

Best bang-for-buck is always, always going to be in self-built systems.

I put this together really quick: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/1i6Vg

Disclaimer: I have not owned a desktop computer in years and do not plan on ever owning one again. Parts chosen may not be the best recommendation, I just sorted by rating and chose a mid-budget item.

Don't know that I'd agree with you there, Lenas. I've done several price comparisons over the last 10 years or so and have noticed that pre-builts have been beating out piecemeal lists for quite some time now.

Compare this Dell desktop to your parts list.

Not sure how the video cards compare but it looks to me like a better build for less money, especially when considering the fact that you don't have to put it together yourself. Also, your parts list omits an optical drive and operating system.

Self-built used to be the hands-down winner, but that was years ago. Pre-built is looking mighty strong these days.

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Go back to zero, take a pill, and get well ~ Lemmy Kilmister

It really depends on what you want the PC for. That is a decent Dell system, but the video card is not that great for gaming. Also, in most pre-built systems, you get a really, really crappy power supply. And Dell and HP are notorious for using Power Supplies that are not only cheap and under-powered, but also, not standard sizes. As in, if you bought a regular power supply to replace theirs, it won't fit in the system without removing something else, like the optical drive. I've had this happen many, many times in HP systems. I couldn't put a standard size power supply in the case without removing the optical drive. Which means, you have to special order a replacement from HP/Dell, and they charge you way too much for what you are getting.

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"I Live, I Love, I Slay, and I Am Content."
- Conan the Barbarian

This. If I'm buying a machine for a family member that wants to surf the internet, I go pre-built. Warranty, customer support, and they'll run the damn thing for 8 years until it's time to buy another pre-built without doing anything to it (back in the day, maybe adding more RAM, but now they come with so much even that is unlikely).

However, if i'm buying a machine for a gamer, I build them one, for the exact reason specified. Pre-builts are not designed to be upgraded. Each part is whatever the manufacturer could get a bulk deal on that month, so their mainboards/Hard drives/Power supplies/Ram Manufacturer/optical drives change frequently. Even buying the same model doesn't guarantee a compatible part. I've seen many a system crater just by putting in an add-in board. If they're what you need, and all you need, and you don't care about upgrading, go that route. If you ever want to upgrade, build your own, or go through one of the custom builders like Ibuypower who lists EVERY part you're getting. One caveat of that though, is that if you don't know what you're doing building a PC, there's always the chance you could hook something up incorrectly or fry something. They're much more idiot proof now than when I started (plugs only plug in one place/one way) but there's still some steps that can get janky, and frying your new proc when you incorrectly put on thermal paste/heatsink will shoot your costs over pre-built every time.

If you're definitely going pre-built, I have to say, this actually looks like a decent deal:

http://www.ibuypower.com/Store/Ship_Out_Next_business_Day_Summer_Sale_Z77_RTG

However, I have not comparison shopped in quite a while.

Tom's Hardware has 3 systems in their Q2 System Builder article:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/min ... ,3510.html

Prices:
$650 system
$1300 system
$2500 system

The $650 one is getting well over an average 30 FPS at 1080p in games like Skyrim, FarCry 3, and Battlefield 3.

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The Dude abides.

I am extremely happy with the desktop I got 2 years ago from cyberpowerpc.com

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

I will swear by digital storm until the end of my days

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Darksiege
Traveller, Calé, Whisperer
Lead me not into temptation; for I know a shortcut

The video cards don't really compare at all, the Geforce I chose blows away the Radeon in that Dell. I would still call my build better overall. Exclusion of an optical drive was intentional.

Fair point on the power supply. I've been burned a couple of times with wanting to upgrade the video card, thinking it was the only component of a cheap pre-built that wasn't up to gaming snuff, only to find out I had to first put in a heftier power supply to feed the new card.

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Go back to zero, take a pill, and get well ~ Lemmy Kilmister

Do not get an all in one. That's a decent price on the 8700. They seem to be more well behaved than the 7800s so far. I had almost considered building this go around but I got a good deal on an HP Floor model. Video card expansion is one of the things I looked into when I bought this HP and why I picked it out.

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I prefer to think of them as "Fighting evil in another dimension"

I don't think I'll ever own a desktop again. Good mid-range gaming laptops have gotten to be so easy and cheap...

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Well Ali Baba had them forty thieves, Scheherezade had a thousand tales
But master you in luck 'cause up your sleeves you got a brand of magic never fails...
...Mister Aladdin, sir, What will your pleasure be?
Let me take your order, Jot it down -You ain't never had a friend like me
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Laptops are portable and useful, but less comfortable for me to use. I prefer a nice 27" screen, and room for a real mouse.

Why such a small screen? Lol

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“The duty of a patriot is to protect his country from its government.” - Thomas Paine

I use a real mouse when gaming. I don't worry about the 27" screen. if I want bigger than the 17.3" on the laptop, I plug in an HDMI cable.

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Well Ali Baba had them forty thieves, Scheherezade had a thousand tales
But master you in luck 'cause up your sleeves you got a brand of magic never fails...
...Mister Aladdin, sir, What will your pleasure be?
Let me take your order, Jot it down -You ain't never had a friend like me
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Can you give an example of a gaming laptop like you're talking about?

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The MSI GT70 line, as an example. (Mine came with 12 GB of RAM, an i7 3630 CPU, an NVidia GTX 675M 2GB GPU, a 750GB 7200 RPM HDD - and an empty second drive bay I later stuck an SSD in -- Bluray burner, surprisingly good laptop speakers with subwoofer, and a 1080p 17'3" screen, cute stuff like backlit keyboard, typical laptop goodies, for about $1300 -- back in January.)

You still need a cheap desktop if you want to run it as a server. Laptops are no good for leaving on all the time.

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Well Ali Baba had them forty thieves, Scheherezade had a thousand tales
But master you in luck 'cause up your sleeves you got a brand of magic never fails...
...Mister Aladdin, sir, What will your pleasure be?
Let me take your order, Jot it down -You ain't never had a friend like me
█ ♣ █

Desktops are dumb. I'll never own one again. We try to make everything in our lives more portable and convenient but still people long to be chained to a desk

Desktops are more versatile, more easily upgraded, have better options for cooling, and can support more powerful components.

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I love my desktop for gaming. I have a samsung 17" gaming laptop, that specs wise is quite capable, but it spends most of it's life in a bag, never leaving the house.

My desktop rig is more reliable, faster, and quieter than any laptop currently available.

I can play the new Tomb Raider on Ultra/Max settings on a 27" IPS display (2560x1440) at 60fps, and it's quite spectacular.

It probably matters that almost all of my mobile computing needs are met by my phone or tablet, and I just don't drag my laptop out of the house with me any more.

If I played games outside of the comfort of my home office, I might use the laptop, but I don't.

I love my PC.

Versatile is not synonymous with portable. With a desktop, you can stuff pretty much any PCI card in; you can install any amount of memory, you can have any amount of harddrives. You can make a desktop as weak or as powerful as you choose.

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Being able to make something more does not by itself mean it is more versatile. The only benefit the desktop has over a laptop is its ability to be upgraded and by extension be more powerful. Laptops and tablets have many other versatilities, things which people are willing to give up some power for, and it's for those versatilities that they have grown to be so popular.