BYO or manufactured?

[Mike Butash]

	It greatly varies on what kind of pre-manufactured kind of system you buy.
Don't go buying an HP Pavilion or Compaq Presario expecting to get anything
near a quality computer (without at the very least wipe the disks and
reinstalling from scratch, even then with their hardware, you never quite
know...).  I tend to find most of them use sub-par equipment until you bump
to the server class with quite the bump in price.  I've always been a byob
person since being burnt a few times in my newbie stages by the best buy
specials.  Shelling out the cash for something like a Compaq Proliant server
is a whole different ball of worms, but you will pay premium and I can build
a comparable system for much less cost, with equal quality and stability.

	Same thing when you build a system from separate components.  Buying
garbage generic ram from Frys usually yields to oddball issues with sporadic
lockups and the whole nine.  I buy all my memory from Crucial or get Corsair
sticks and never have issues unless I mix and match.  Buy brownbox Frys
video cards (the ones you can never quite tell who exactly made them) and
expect the same.  Building your own box and doing some homework will usually
land you a solid system if you buy quality components.  As Bob said, don't
cut corners - you get what you pay for.  If nothing else, building one's own
computers usually tends to be quite an educational experience for most,
especially when it's the first time doing so.  If you're in anything related
to the tech field (or intend to be), I think it should be a prerequisite if
you haven't.

-mbutash

-----Original Message-----
From: plug-discuss-admin@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us
[mailto:plug-discuss-admin@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us]On Behalf Of Bob
Cober
Sent: Tuesday, April 23, 2002 8:59 PM
To: plug-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us
Subject: Re: BYO or manufactured?


I also recommend BYO system - but I would try to stay with name brand stuff.
Don't cut corners on the components.

Still, there is nothing wrong with buying a pre-built.


----- Original Message -----
From: Dr. G <drghastly@cox.net>
To: <plug-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us>
Sent: Tuesday, April 23, 2002 1:14 PM
Subject: Re: BYO or manufactured?


> I make one trip. If you research all the information you have and know
what
> you want, then you shouldnt have to spend that mucht ime running around
> town, ESPECIALLY since now mostr places have a website and you can order
> from Online-only vendors quite easily for some parts. Yes, there is the
cost
> of shipping, but some places give discounts or group bundles. The cost of
> shipping is already added in for a HP, DLL, etc.
>
> BYO will always be a better deal then any proprietary system, unless you
won
> it that is :)
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Sundar" <linux@esaravana.com>
> To: <plug-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us>
> Sent: Tuesday, April 23, 2002 1:03 PM
> Subject: Re: BYO or manufactured?
>
>
> > I used to do BYO, but not anymore. If you include , all the trips you
> > make to Fry's (and time wasted at office thinking about it), you might
> > actually come better off with manufactured systems. Whenever I used to
> > build the system by myself, I always went back and did upgrades on this
> > and that. But last time, I went to dell.com and picked up bare bones
> > dual processor systems and it worked out cheaper than the dual processor
> > system I was planning to build and never been happier before. I have
> > Solaris, BSD, Redhat and Windoze on that box. No problems.....
> >
> > Sundar
> >
> >
> >
> > Matt wrote:
> >
> > >This isn't really directly about Linux, but what are your opinions on
> > >building your own computer, or buying a Sony/Dell/whatever? I ask
because
> > >for the past few years I've been building my own, and it doesn't seem
to
> be
> > >working out too well for me. SuSE Linux 7.3 is supposed to have an
> amazingly
> > >easy install, but it took me a week to install it, even though my
> computer
> > >is very powerful. It always freezes somewhere, usually when it has to
> reboot
> > >or on its way back to the installation from rebooting. But anyway, I
> > >shouldn't go into all of that. I think a manufactured PC might work
> better
> > >because I know the manufacturers test all the parts together to make
sure
>
> > >they don't "fight" with eachother, and because I let my friend borrow
my
> > >SuSE CD's and he installed it flawlessly on his emachine, with windows,
> and
> > >that computer is about a third as powerful as mine.
> > >
> > >________________________________________________
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> >
> >
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