I just bought Windows Vista....

[izanbardprince]

I held my nose and bought Windows Vista.

Not because I wanted IT mind you, but because it's just so damned hard to actually avoid if you want a name brand PC with any decent type of hardware set up.

You want to customize a Dell Ubuntu model? Good luck!

I made it to the first page where you can customize it with your choice of "Pentium Dual Core E2180" or "Don't buy the system".

It makes me angry that vendors like that sell their systems with such weak processors and such laughable amounts of RAM, and then to find out they're like $20-$50 less than a Windows system with a faster CPU and twice as much RAM to boot.

Unfortunately the cheapest way to get a brand name system with Linux is to buy a copy of Windows with it, then format it off, which is a little dis-ingenious.

Of course, this PC I'm getting is also a media center PC that does a lot of cool things that aren't very well supported in Linux, so I might just stick with Vista.....agggh.

[rfruth]

Why not dual boot and have the best of both worlds ?

[Midwest-Linux]

Too bad you didn't have a Micro Center near you. You can walk in and buy brand new XP machines as well as the EePc . Many computer repair and refurb shops sell computers with No OS just add your favorite Linux.

[LaRoza]

Of course, this PC I'm getting is also a media center PC that does a lot of cool things that aren't very well supported in Linux, so I might just stick with Vista.....agggh.

What can it do that Linux can't handle?

[Tomatz]

Wow you buy retail boxes lol how nooby can you be. Just decide which cpu and motherboard you want then build from there. Search for a place to get barebone pcs. Just be sure to check if the cpu is compatible with the motherboard socket, what fsb clockrate the motherboard has to tell which ram to buy (always get ecc if not a server system). And integrated graphics for the most part suck unless some beefy nvidia/intel one which still then slightly lag behind others in performance. Things you might forget to buy: a fan for the cpu, good size power supply, and thermal paste. Some good sites to try are ewiz, zipzoomfly, pricegrabber, newegg. Assembling yourself, not having windows, buying parts in bulk - lot of $$ saving.


:popcorn::popcorn::popcorn:

[Tomatz]

I held my nose and bought Windows Vista.

Not because I wanted IT mind you, but because it's just so damned hard to actually avoid if you want a name brand PC with any decent type of hardware set up.

You want to customize a Dell Ubuntu model? Good luck!

I made it to the first page where you can customize it with your choice of "Pentium Dual Core E2180" or "Don't buy the system".

It makes me angry that vendors like that sell their systems with such weak processors and such laughable amounts of RAM, and then to find out they're like $20-$50 less than a Windows system with a faster CPU and twice as much RAM to boot.

Unfortunately the cheapest way to get a brand name system with Linux is to buy a copy of Linux, which is a little dis-ingenious.

Of course, this PC I'm getting is also a media center PC that does a lot of cool things that aren't very well supported in Linux, so I might just stick with Vista.....agggh.


I could buy a "brand name" mac donalds.

But for the same price i could cook a Steak Sandwich at home ;)

[3rdalbum]

The best option is to build your own. Seriously, it's not difficult as long as you treat all the components with respect and follow a good HOWTO.

The only difficulty can be when something plays up... like I'm having right now with a computer I built for a friend :-( But my own homebuilt computer has been trouble-free, even though I'd never seen the insides of a computer before I built it.

[BigSilly]

Dunno about the Dell desktops, but we just bought a Dell laptop with Ubuntu on it and we're really happy with it. We saved £30 on the price of the OS, and it was just as customisable as it's Vista equivalent.

It would have been nice to perhaps save a bit more than £30 (it's hardly a fair reflection of what Windows costs is it?), and the choice of colours was lacking, but so far we're really glad we went for the Linux option.

[karellen]

for me it seems handy to buy a new PC with Vista installed for a relatively small difference (without it I don't think it's much cheaper plus it's a pain to get a refund, at least here in Romania) plus you many never know when you need Windows. so it's safe to have it around

[MONODA]

you could have tried out zareason.com or could have gotten a lenovo with SuSE enterprise preinstalled

[bohica8418]

so tell us how the Vista experience is going? Personally I never had any huge problems with it once I turned off the notifications things that could honestly drive a Jainist monk to genocide.

[Buddy's Pal]

It bothered me that Vista and all of the retinue that travels with it would take many minutes to load and to shut down. Just starting Vista used up almost 40% of my 2 GB of RAM. I agree that it worked OK once going but did freeze from time to time.

One day I was advised to download critical updates and from that moment forward, my trackpad stopped working correctly. Sounds like a simple issue. Didn't turn out to be the case. No amount of driver updating and downloading would solve the problem.

That was the last straw.

Ditched Vista, installled Gutsy and haven't looked back. Fires up in 30 - 40 secs. Shuts down in about 10. When loaded and ready to go, it consumes 13% of my memory. Oh and trackpad came back to full operation.

By the way, it also works for getting stuff done. Not a single crash, freeze or restart yet. I guess my hardware must be super generic! Thank you Toshiba ... for being unremarkable I guess.

[bohica8418]

haha yeah, I'm using ubuntu on a Toshiba satellite, and it works excellently. yay for the average!

Hmm that really sucks about Vista. Did you try looking on support forums? Vista actually has some pretty good ones. I was running it on my gaming PC, and I really liked it. The only reason I'm not still is it didn't like to update. Nooooo idea why, buuut maaaay have had something to do with pretty good piracy protection. ;)

so I'm back to gaming on XP. But if your PC came with a vista install thats not OEM, would you be interested in getting rid of it?

[Gauvenator]

Building your own is the way to go. More customizable, no preinstalled crapware, no Windows at all if you desire...it actually isn't that hard either. Just set aside a few hours one afternoon and you can build a nice PC. For $1000 you probably could have 4gb RAM an 8800GT, and a processor that would be extremely overclockable. That's how I went with my first.

[LinuxGuy1234]

Why buy Vista when you can get (X/K/Edu/Myth/U)buntu for free?

Trying Debian is better, I guess. What's up with Vista?

[MasterSushi]

Building your own is the way to go. More customizable, no preinstalled crapware, no Windows at all if you desire...it actually isn't that hard either. Just set aside a few hours one afternoon and you can build a nice PC. For $1000 you probably could have 4gb RAM an 8800GT, and a processor that would be extremely overclockable. That's how I went with my first.

I keep finding deals from Dell, HP, and Gateway that cost far less than I could build the system for. And they give me a warranty, when I build I end up being my own warranty. So I have been going the route of buying a PC when it is on sale and just accepting the Windows license that comes with it.

I also stick with building or buying systems that are under $500. At the $1,000 range, I might be able to build a system cheaper than the big brand builders, I just don't ever look into that. :)

[lespaul_rentals]

Not to be rude, but why are you buying a pre-assembled computer? And why, out of all the companies out there, are you buying from Dell? Yeah, yeah, I know they help us out by selling computers with Ubuntu pre-installed, but seriously, Dell sucks. I'm not just saying that, they do.

There are many people on this forum alone that will help you build a computer, and I'm one of them. How much are you spending for your computer? I can guarantee that you will save money by purchasing the parts seperately and building it yourself. Dell and all the other companies exploit people by taking advantage of those who do not know how to build one for themselves. I built an ungodly computer for 600 USD, and if I had spent 600 USD buying from Dell or HP, I would have gotten a mediocre computer labeled with fancy words meant to sway those who don't know any better.

I'm running XP on it, and I don't need Vista for any of the "Media Center" features you speak of. If you choose the components, you choose what operating system will run on it, and you aren't forced to run Vista.

Building your own is the way to go. More customizable, no preinstalled crapware, no Windows at all if you desire...it actually isn't that hard either. Just set aside a few hours one afternoon and you can build a nice PC. For $1000 you probably could have 4gb RAM an 8800GT, and a processor that would be extremely overclockable. That's how I went with my first.

WTF? 1000 USD? My friend, you got ripped off. You could build a computer with 4 GB of DDR-2 RAM, an 8800 GTX, and an AMD Athlon X2 6400+ Brisbane for 800 USD tops. If you were willing to spend 1000 dollars you could probably bump it up to 4 GB of DDR-3 RAM.

But yes, building your own is the way to go! :)

I keep finding deals from Dell, HP, and Gateway that cost far less than I could build the system for. And they give me a warranty, when I build I end up being my own warranty. So I have been going the route of buying a PC when it is on sale and just accepting the Windows license that comes with it.

Give me a link or something that proves your point. I could build you a computer that outperforms it for the same price or less. And warranties are usually a way for the company to make money. Most reputable manufacturers will give you a limited warranty on their parts when you buy them individually. AMD has a three-year limited warranty, for example. You just build the computer and run memory tests, S.M.A.R.T. diagnostics, and stress to see if all your components are good. If something's malfunctioning, send it back to Newegg within a couple of weeks for an RMA.

[wolfen69]

I keep finding deals from Dell, HP, and Gateway that cost far less than I could build the system for. And they give me a warranty, when I build I end up being my own warranty. So I have been going the route of buying a PC when it is on sale and just accepting the Windows license that comes with it.

I also stick with building or buying systems that are under $500. At the $1,000 range, I might be able to build a system cheaper than the big brand builders, I just don't ever look into that. :)

the day i stop building my own pc's is the day you can pry the screwdriver from my cold dead hands. to me, using a pre-built computer is like using a kiosk at the mall. pride, personal satisfaction, hand selecting all parts and knowing the job will be done right, makes it all worth it. i would actually pay more to build my own.

the only pre-built pc i would buy would be a laptop. of course with either no OS or with linux.

anyone considering buying a new pc to dual boot linux/windows should buy one with linux pre-installed, then install windows. it will work out much better that way.

just to stay on topic, i dont like vista. peace.

[lespaul_rentals]

the day i stop building my own pc's is the day you can pry the screwdriver from my cold dead hands. to me, using a pre-built computer is like using a kiosk at the mall. pride, personal satisfaction, hand selecting all parts and knowing the job will be done right, makes it all worth it. i would actually pay more to build my own.

Amen to that, friend! It's so much more satisfying that way. You have a nice build in your sig. I just built one quite similar:

Xclio A380 (jet engine style)
Raidmax Volcano 630W dual-12V rail PSU
Gigabyte S4-SLI571
AMD Athlon X2 5000+ Black Edition Brisbane
2 GB DDR-2 RAM
XFX nVidia 8800 GS
Seagate Barracuda 320 GB SATA HDD

All this for 600 dollars. I currently have XP on it (yeah, I know :() and use it for gaming and music. I am going to dual-boot with either Slackware or Arch sometime, but right now I'm too busy messing around with my FreeBSD server, my old computer.

[Gauvenator]

WTF? 1000 USD? My friend, you got ripped off. You could build a computer with 4 GB of DDR-2 RAM, an 8800 GTX, and an AMD Athlon X2 6400+ Brisbane for 800 USD tops. If you were willing to spend 1000 dollars you could probably bump it up to 4 GB of DDR-3 RAM.

But yes, building your own is the way to go! :)

1000 was a high estimate...I didn't want to estimate too low, as I was thinking c2d for the proc. Amd is dirt cheap right now tho hehe. :biggrin:

[MasterSushi]

Give me a link or something that proves your point. I could build you a computer that outperforms it for the same price or less. And warranties are usually a way for the company to make money. Most reputable manufacturers will give you a limited warranty on their parts when you buy them individually. AMD has a three-year limited warranty, for example. You just build the computer and run memory tests, S.M.A.R.T. diagnostics, and stress to see if all your components are good. If something's malfunctioning, send it back to Newegg within a couple of weeks for an RMA.

Here is the latest computer I bought.
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=3169467&CatId=2619

I can't find any way to build this PC for less than $399. I know it is a refurbished system, but I still can't find a way to build this system for less than this.

[heartburnkid]

Here is the latest computer I bought.
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=3169467&CatId=2619

I can't find any way to build this PC for less than $399. I know it is a refurbished system, but I still can't find a way to build this system for less than this.

https://secure.newegg.com/NewVersion/Wishlist/PublicWishDetail.asp?WishListNumber=8891168&WishListTitle=I+can+top+that%21

Oh, ye of little faith...

[bohica8418]

hmm i like the included speakers.

but the problem with something like that is the mobo.
Its not going to be really very upgradable because of that.
but it is a good price for the package

[MasterSushi]

https://secure.newegg.com/NewVersion/Wishlist/PublicWishDetail.asp?WishListNumber=8891168&WishListTitle=I+can+top+that%21

Oh, ye of little faith...

Wow. Good job. Looks like I could have saved about $130.00.
I stand corrected.

Update: I noticed there were some components missing. I added in a flash media card reader, speakers, usb keyboard, usb optical mouse, processor fan, and two case fans and it looks like this:
https://secure.newegg.com/NewVersion/WishList/MySavedWishDetail.asp?ID=7460451
Price: $299.15

So, when I compare apples to apples the difference in price is essentially the cost of the OEM Vista Home Premium License. So as far as cost, the PC I could build from parts would be the same price as the gateway I purchased. Granted I could have saved the $100 since I don't need the Vista License, so this is still good. I just wanted to clarify.

[Twitch6000]

Sorry after reading through this I thought I would through in my 2 cents.

Like everyone is saying why not just make your own PC?As for media center stuff there is a Linux or two just for that.
Here are a few sites for future references just in case.
http://www.linuxhq.com/vendors/systems.html
http://www.pugetsystems.com/

http://www.pcsforeveryone.com/
that one you have to pick no os in order got you to install a Linux.

[lespaul_rentals]

https://secure.newegg.com/NewVersion/Wishlist/PublicWishDetail.asp?WishListNumber=8891168&WishListTitle=I+can+top+that%21

Oh, ye of little faith...

In before...

Oh, crap. Beat me to it. :) Nice list, heartburnkid. I was making a list of parts then I noticed your post, and it was pretty much the same. Haha.

[heartburnkid]

Wow. Good job. Looks like I could have saved about $130.00.
I stand corrected.

Update: I noticed there were some components missing. I added in a flash media card reader, speakers, usb keyboard, usb optical mouse, processor fan, and two case fans and it looks like this:
https://secure.newegg.com/NewVersion/WishList/MySavedWishDetail.asp?ID=7460451
Price: $299.15

So, when I compare apples to apples the difference in price is essentially the cost of the OEM Vista Home Premium License. So as far as cost, the PC I could build from parts would be the same price as the gateway I purchased. Granted I could have saved the $100 since I don't need the Vista License, so this is still good. I just wanted to clarify.

Processor fan isn't really necessary; it's a retail boxed processor, so it comes with a basic heatsink & fan (more than enough to run it at stock clock without a problem).

As for the other extras, I didn't really think about those since I either don't use them (media reader) or have dozens laying around already (everything else). You are correct, though, it doesn't include those extras as I set it up.