Seen this and thought I'd get opinions on it

[Brooke]

And Dell blows. Totally blows.

Having bought hundreds of them in my lifetime (including for mission-critical machine control), I disagree. 

[Gman]

I agree Brooke, although I think I understand where Rich is going with that - some of their "you build it menu" type home PC's are made from some substandard parts by today's standards at least, and aren't a good bang for the $ compared to building it yourself from Newegg or some place like that.

That said, my company has used the Dell line of "Rugged" Laptops for a while, and they have been absolutely bulletproof.  Almost literally - our PSD and Embassy security division in Afghanistan uses them, as does our maritime protection detail guys and supervisors - the IT department was very, very impressed with these little jobbies.  They are in service in some of the harshest climates around, cold during the night, hot during the day, and while at sea, subjected to all kinds of water particulates both airborne and otherwise. 

[MrRiplEy[H]]

Having bought hundreds of them in my lifetime (including for mission-critical machine control), I disagree. 

Have you ever thought how much price premium you've spent for the Dell label in your lifetime? I bet not 

[danny76]

I wouldn't trust anyone claiming to be a financial advisor who is not a squillionaire living on a private island

[Brooke]

Have you ever thought how much price premium you've spent for the Dell label in your lifetime? I bet not  

Yes, I have thought about that.  Buying Dells the way I buy them saved me lots of money.  That's why I did it.  I've been comparing and buying computers since the early 1980's.  I've bought and used many non-PC types (Ohio Scientific, TRS-80, PET, Sun workstations of various sorts, NeXT, Apollo, Apple II, Apple III, Lisa, the first Macs and later Macs, some CP/M computers, HP workstations, DEC workstations) and many PC types (IBM, PC's Limited (precursor to Dell), Gateway, Dell, Compaq, Grid, build it yourself, ones built by local computer shops, HP, and probably some I have forgotten, like Packard Bell or AT&T or Honeywell or something like that, PC Brand, etc.).  In experimenting with lots of different brands, I have been most happy with Dell (hence the reason I stayed with them for many years after finding that out experimentally).  If I were more happy with another brand or with build it yourself, I'd be doing that instead.

There are several ways I think about cost of a PC:  how much it costs initially to obtain it, how much it costs for upkeep, and reliability (or more precisely the costs when there are reliability problems or upkeep hassles).  Dells (the ones I buy) are inexpensive for the performance they deliver, typically less costly than a build-it-yourself of comparable performance; have the lowest maintenance cost of any other route or brand I've tried; and likewise have very low failure rates.

[hlbly]

Morfiend

You're right, the exception to the cash-only rule is the house mortgage.  You can minimize the impact on your life by going with a 15 yr mortgage, and again accepting the hard reality that if you can't make the payment for a 15 yr mortgage, then maybe you need to wait a bit longer to build up the down payment, or pick a smaller house.

That said, I recently had to both buy a new house and refinance another house I own and am having trouble selling.  To make that work, I did the re-fi at 15 years and the new purchase at 30 years.  I'm putting whatever I can budget against the 30 yr mortgage to get it closer to that 15 yr term, but I also know that I broke a basic rule of thumb.  By "the rules", I would have been better off renting a smaller house until I settled the old house by selling it or getting it stabilized as a rental, and only then buying the new house.  But I landed in Las Vegas at the very bottom of a huge housing market crash, and gambling mentality is so freaking infectious that I couldn't resist buying at the low point.  So I'm stuck with 2 mortgages and my renters just moved out.  So now I'm double glad I never got the vette, haha.

Well, there is one other exception to cash only...  If you can't keep food on the table or the power/water on in the house, you do what you gotta do including feeding the kids on credit and just not paying off the CC until you figure something out or increase income or sell everything non-essential, move to a cheaper place, etc etc.  But someone feeding their kids on credit probably shouldn't own any car but a $500 beater, shouldn't own a TV or smartphone, shouldn't have cable tv service, etc.  Lots of "essentials" really aren't, and those should be ditched long before it gets to that point.

Wow I am just a retired grubby old GI but I have lived your advice all my life. Total amount of personal debt is about 30k on a 4 bedroom house. I just purchased. I have two cars. A 2012 Sentra I bought used paid for in cash < try getting a car salesman to quit talking payments some day >. and a 69 Camaro I will probably sell and add the money to my little girls college fund. My oldest graduated two summers ago from Oregon State with a total of $4,000.00 in student debt. She lived at home did some part time work and my Dad and I helped with the rest. Some people in my family say I am tight enough to sit on a quarter and pull a booger out of GW's nose.

[PJ_Godzilla]

I wouldn't trust anyone claiming to be a financial advisor who is not a squillionaire living on a private island

I am an engineer first, but my beloved employer ( Ford ) sponsored an MBA for me last century. One project I did during that study, just for laughs and a grade,  was a look at the correlation between mutual fund performance and mutual fund loads. The answer: there is none.

Therefore, I'd recommend you not even trust the "squillionaire", especially given some of the notoriously bad advice given some of those clowns ( consider Buffett, his public pronouncements, if followed, could cost a fool quite a bit).

The best thing to do is diversify and, in those cases in which you do assume some specific risk, do so based on your own thinking and information. That's what I do anyway.

Forget analysts ratings, too. Most of those guys are twenty something recent graduates whose experience in anything like a real industry is near nil.

[MrRiplEy[H]]

Yes, I have thought about that.  Buying Dells the way I buy them saved me lots of money.  That's why I did it.  I've been comparing and buying computers since the early 1980's.  I've bought and used many non-PC types (Ohio Scientific, TRS-80, PET, Sun workstations of various sorts, NeXT, Apollo, Apple II, Apple III, Lisa, the first Macs and later Macs, some CP/M computers, HP workstations, DEC workstations) and many PC types (IBM, PC's Limited (precursor to Dell), Gateway, Dell, Compaq, Grid, build it yourself, ones built by local computer shops, HP, and probably some I have forgotten, like Packard Bell or AT&T or Honeywell or something like that, PC Brand, etc.).  In experimenting with lots of different brands, I have been most happy with Dell (hence the reason I stayed with them for many years after finding that out experimentally).  If I were more happy with another brand or with build it yourself, I'd be doing that instead.

There are several ways I think about cost of a PC:  how much it costs initially to obtain it, how much it costs for upkeep, and reliability (or more precisely the costs when there are reliability problems or upkeep hassles).  Dells (the ones I buy) are inexpensive for the performance they deliver, typically less costly than a build-it-yourself of comparable performance; have the lowest maintenance cost of any other route or brand I've tried; and likewise have very low failure rates.

So you're actually claiming with an honest face that after Dell puts their profit on top of it, their ready built machine is cheaper for you than self build?

Dell and other OEMs commonly use 6-7 year old hardware in their setups, not forgetting the nice little proprietary power cables etc. nice stuff.

[Brooke]

So you're actually claiming with an honest face that after Dell puts their profit on top of it, their ready built machine is cheaper for you than self build?

Dell and other OEMs commonly use 6-7 year old hardware in their setups, not forgetting the nice little proprietary power cables etc. nice stuff.

Yes.  I've priced it out in the past (figuring assembly labor at zero), and the Dell was cheaper.  Of course, pricing changes all of the time, so that calculation can change over time.  But if you figure in labor (which you must if this is done in a business as opposed to hobby use), that skews it a lot.  Also, in a business setting, custom-built just doesn't cut it over 5+ years.  Personnel moves on, records get misplaced, etc., so long-term maintenance of such machines becomes a hassle.  It's always easy to deal with that with Dell.  You put in your tag #, and everything you need to know is there.  Also, they keep up to date even with computers 5 years old or more.  The reliability has been awesome as well.  I use these machines for tasks where a single machine crash can cost thousands of dollars in lost raw material for product and a week delay in products that are time critical for customers.

The Dell machines I buy are not 6-7 year old hardware.  Dell does not use proprietary cables.

[Brooke]

A current example of Dell vs. build it yourself.

Dell Inspiron 3000 desktop
i5-4440
Windows 8.1
8 GB DDR3 1600 MHz RAM
1 TB HD
DVD+/-RW
case, KB, mouse
cost = $550
This setup is much better than my current setup (which is a Dell i5-2400 system that cost me $500 over 2 years ago), but my current system runs AH at 60 fps with everything maxed out except the local-reflections slider (or whatever it is called), which is set at none.  That includes in heavy clouds, and I have maximum anti-aliasing forced on for my graphics card (an nVidia GTX 550 Ti).  This is the Dell setup I'd buy today if I were buying a new computer today.

Estimate for build it yourself for such a system using near lowest-end estimates from equipment at Newegg, except as noted.
i5-4440 $195
Windows 8.1 64-bit OEM $100
8 GB DDR3 1600 MHz RAM $100 (crucial.com)
1 TB HD $60
DVD+/-RW $20
case $40
KB $15
mouse $10
300 W PSU $25
motherboard LGA 1150 $80
total = $645.  That's counting labor to decide on which particular parts to buy and to assemble it at $0/hour.  It takes at least a few hours to shop for the parts and to assemble, and if you put that in at $15/hour, you are at $700 for this system.

Please feel free to correct me if you think that I have overestimated the cost of any of the build-it-yourself system's components or to refigure it all based on what pricing you think you can get.  My guess is that it will still be challenging to beat the Dell price by a significant amount, especially if you count the labor as anything more than $0/hour.

[MrRiplEy[H]]

The Dell machines I buy are not 6-7 year old hardware.  Dell does not use proprietary cables.

Are you sure? It's not that long ago that I saw a 80 gigabyte hdd in a Dell setup You can't buy that stuff retail anywhere for like 10 years. Large OEMs buy huge mass quantities of hardware and then they sell the antique in basic business setups for years after. What looks like a sweet deal becomes pretty rotten once you really look into the hardware setup.

And Dell used to have reverse power pin order in their motherboards which meant that if you replaced the PSU with a new one, you fried your mobo and who knows what else. Same happened if you connected that Dell PSU to a regular mobo. Same connector, reverse cable order. Sweet.

[Brooke]

Are you sure?

We've been over this before.  Dell does not use proprietary connectors, Sam I Am.  They do not use them in a boat.  They do not use them with a goat.  They do not use them Sam I Am.  They do not use proprietary connectors. 

I think that your information is about a decade out of date with regard to Dells.

[DREDIOCK]

I'm a pretty financially responsible kind of guy... I wanted to buy a corvette about 12 years ago, but would have had to finance part of it so I waited.  Some pay raises kicked in, and just a couple of years later I had enough cash to get that corvette, and suddenly it looked like a waste of money.  When I had only $20k to put down on a new vette (at 5 year 1% financing and no interest the first year), the opportunity cost looked like $20k, which at my salary level could be made back in a year, no problem.  When I had $70k saved up to get the vette, suddenly the opportunity cost thought process was holy crap look at all these other much better things I can do with $70k, no way I'm going to dump it into a stupid car.

Everyone gets bit by this.  It's why Dave Ramsey almost always starts off with "sell the car", when people in financial trouble have expensive cars or big car loans, even when they have very low interest rate on the car loan.  If you want to be rich, act like rich people.  They're not financing their cars or computers just because of a low interest rate or deferred payment, and those rich people didn't do that before they were rich either.

I know this is sort of off topic, but the OP was discussing financing deals, and the answer there is that the company is offering those financing deals because THEY benefit from it, not the buyer.  They know darn well that buyers will act more sensibly if they pay cash, up front.  Deferring the payments leads to spending more, and the companies offering those payment plans know this because they hire MBAs instead of personal financial advisors 

My wife occasionally says "I'd like to go out and spend it like I have it."

To which I have to remind her that the people that have it. Usually dont spend it like they have it. Thats why they have it

[DREDIOCK]

eagl I dont think he's asking about economic lessons.  he's just asking about computer parts.  it's his choice how to pay for it.


semp

In that case for about $1,000 He can build a system himself that will last him at least 5 years. Thats how old my best bang for buck Intel E8400 system is (built in Sept 2008) and still going pretty strong.

If memory serves correct Alienware often goes for twice that

[DREDIOCK]

A current example of Dell vs. build it yourself.

Dell Inspiron 3000 desktop
i5-4440
Windows 8.1
8 GB DDR3 1600 MHz RAM
1 TB HD
DVD+/-RW
case, KB, mouse
cost = $550
This setup is much better than my current setup (which is a Dell i5-2400 system that cost me $500 over 2 years ago), but my current system runs AH at 60 fps with everything maxed out except the local-reflections slider (or whatever it is called), which is set at none.  That includes in heavy clouds, and I have maximum anti-aliasing forced on for my graphics card (an nVidia GTX 550 Ti).  This is the Dell setup I'd buy today if I were buying a new computer today.

Estimate for build it yourself for such a system using near lowest-end estimates from equipment at Newegg, except as noted.
i5-4440 $195
Windows 8.1 64-bit OEM $100
8 GB DDR3 1600 MHz RAM $100 (crucial.com)
1 TB HD $60
DVD+/-RW $20
case $40
KB $15
mouse $10
300 W PSU $25
motherboard LGA 1150 $80
total = $645.  That's counting labor to decide on which particular parts to buy and to assemble it at $0/hour.  It takes at least a few hours to shop for the parts and to assemble, and if you put that in at $15/hour, you are at $700 for this system.

Please feel free to correct me if you think that I have overestimated the cost of any of the build-it-yourself system's components or to refigure it all based on what pricing you think you can get.  My guess is that it will still be challenging to beat the Dell price by a significant amount, especially if you count the labor as anything more than $0/hour.

Often comparisons  like those arent apples to apples. For that extra $150 you can often get better individual parts. Not all parts with similar surface specs are the same