Building and Buying questions

[fhasser]

Hello,

I've been around the forum for a while, read the tutorials and some threads an I think lots of you guys are great. So I'm going to try and ask you to guide me through the process of getting a new PC .

First of all, I live in London and everything here is just bloody expensive. And I do mean online prices, nevermind the high-street. It's about 1,5-2 times more expensive then some of US online shops I've seen posted here.

So before I'll make any further decisions I need to know if it's at all possible to buy it online in US and ship and assemble here.

1. Sockets, if I'll have a simple US-to-EU plug to stick my US comp in UK socket - will it be alright? Or the voltage or something else will mess up my comp?

2. Shops. I've had a look around on newegg and so far I'm really attracted to the prices and choice, but their warranty policies seems dodgy - do they have them at all? Or is it all manufacturer warranty?

3. Shipping. Do you reckon (or maybe you've had experience) they'll deliver all the stuff with no damages? I wouldn't like to resend it a thousand times at my expense.

4. Alternatives. Are there any decently priced (in comparison to US) shops in UK? And in genreal, do you think it's all worh it? I mean, I'm on the limited budget and I'd love to get a better value for my money.

I would really appreciate all the help guys. Thanks in advance.

[b1gapl]

Hey fhasser



I think it would be better to buy in the UK, even though the prices are high....because the cost of shipping from US to UK, would probably equal UK's normal pricing. I could be wrong.

There are a lot of good online computer sites to buy from, in the UK. Such as:
overclockers.co.uk
scan.co.uk
ebuyer.com
....Those are some of the most popular.

What is your budget?

[vernong1992]

Originally Posted by fhasser

Hello,

I've been around the forum for a while, read the tutorials and some threads an I think lots of you guys are great. So I'm going to try and ask you to guide me through the process of getting a new PC .

First of all, I live in London and everything here is just bloody expensive. And I do mean online prices, nevermind the high-street. It's about 1,5-2 times more expensive then some of US online shops I've seen posted here.

So before I'll make any further decisions I need to know if it's at all possible to buy it online in US and ship and assemble here.

1. Sockets, if I'll have a simple US-to-EU plug to stick my US comp in UK socket - will it be alright? Or the voltage or something else will mess up my comp?

2. Shops. I've had a look around on newegg and so far I'm really attracted to the prices and choice, but their warranty policies seems dodgy - do they have them at all? Or is it all manufacturer warranty?

3. Shipping. Do you reckon (or maybe you've had experience) they'll deliver all the stuff with no damages? I wouldn't like to resend it a thousand times at my expense.

4. Alternatives. Are there any decently priced (in comparison to US) shops in UK? And in genreal, do you think it's all worh it? I mean, I'm on the limited budget and I'd love to get a better value for my money.

I would really appreciate all the help guys. Thanks in advance.

buy from Scan.co.uk... what do u mean by Socket (US and UK socket) do u mean the PSU plug-in??? you can't ship to London from Newegg... US only....

[fhasser]

Hey b1gapl, thanks for warm welcome.

So then you're confident about buying here... Well, it's less fuss, but maybe it's worth buying just the video card in US? Because that's what's really expensive here.

Ok, so the rig. I'm a designer, and I love aesthetics. So I am getting a Vista . Nowadays I use mainly Photoshop CS (and it's sloooow on my Acer laptop) and soon I'll need to use CAD and some modelling software.

The main targets are:

*Photoshop CS3 (and the ones that will follow) - heavy use - retouch of high-res photos, design, magazine editing, etc.
*CAD
*Poser
*I do watch lots of DVD's
*I haven't played in anything for a very long time so I guess I'll be eager to try some of the ones-I-wanted-to-play and ones-you-must-play, but I'm not worrying too much about running all the next-gen games maxed out. I'd love to be able to play Assasin's Creed though on acceptable level
*I store a decent amount of data and I don't want my HDD to brake down on me
*Vista should run flawless

The budgie is J660. J600 is very good, J700 is limit. I'll need the mouse, the board and the screen too. LCD should be no less than 19" Widescreen for all the editing.

And as it seems to me, perhaps I'm asking too much for that kind of budget?


PS, vernong1992 - by socket I mean t the actual socket where you put in your PC's power cord. It's different here, you know, with three plain ends instead of two.

[vernong1992]

^ ya i sorta figured that out...

[b1gapl]

Going into CAD and photoshop, 4GB of memory would be nice. A quad core will benefit as well, if you can fit that into the budget.

What did you mean by a budget of J600-700? Did you mean pounds/quid?

[fhasser]

Yes, J is what you use for a pound when you dan't have the exact sign .

I doubt I could fit Quadcore. 4GB - maybe, but I'm ot sure about Vista 64-bit. It depends, thing is I was planning on getting a 8600GTS 256 (or an ATI eq., not really a fanboy of any of them), but going trough this forum makes you think that it's either you don't eat for a month and fork out extra 100 punds for at least 8800GTS 320, or better not get anything at all because with 8600 you'll be doomed forever .

Thing is - I'm not planning an upgrade after buying for quite a while (3 years?), but it's either AMD and 8800GTS or Intel and 8600GTS. Roughly. What's up with AMD anyways? Are they any good and which ones in particular, maybe?

The CAD usage will not be as heavy as Pshop, as it'll be used for plain tech. drawings.

[b1gapl]

AMD is not up to Intel, but should be, when they release their new CPUs this coming November, I believe.

If you're looking for mid-end gaming, I guess the 8600GTS isn't too bad, but you really should consider something like the HD 2900Pro or 8800GTS.

[fhasser]

I'm trying to build something now to use as a start. Could you build something for me too, using ebuyer.com? It's just I have no strong idea about the case-PSU-Mboard.

Leave out the monitor-mouse-keyb.

[fhasser]

Right, there's a quick build.


CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo E6750 2.66GHz 1333FSB Socket 775 4MB Cache
Mboard: Gigabyte GA-P31-S3L Intel P31 Express Socket 775 8 channel audio ATX Motherboard
RAM: Corsair 2GB Kit (2x1GB) DDR2 800MHz/PC2-6400 XMS2 Memory Non-ECC Unbuffered CL5(5-5-5-12)
HDD: Seagate ST3500630AS 500GB Hard Drive SATAII 16MB Cache 7200RPM
DVD: NEC Optiarc AD-7170S-0B 18x DVD±RW/DL/RAM Serial ATA Black
GPU: EVGA 8800GTS SuperClocked 320MB DDR3 DVI PCI-E
LCD: LG 192WS 19" Widescreen (1440 X 900) 5ms 700:1

It all came to J615 so far, with no kboar+mouse (I have the one for 40 in mind) + no case or PSU. CPU is average as well.

What do you think?