Not me. You.
There are only two situations where buying a brand name PC makes sense.
1. If you don't know a damn thing about computers, refuse to learn more and have used up all of the patience of your friends who've been doing your tech support.
2. If you are buying more than ten.
3. If you can make a decision on rational self interest that the time and effort it takes to build your own exceeds the value and just say, "screw it," and buy a pre-made machine. The people in this category tend not to use up all the patience of friends because when the proprietary parts blow they shrug and solve the problem themselves (#3 added because of commentary by Tam).
Otherwise bribe (dinner works most often) a friend who knows what they're doing to show you how to gather and assemble the required parts. You may be stunned to see how easy it is and how much you saved.
The reason I say this is because I know several people who've bought a brand name machine and had the power supply fail. They are now stuck with buying a new one from the original company for a hundred or so bucks where a generic would have been about $30-50.
Even worse is the guy who's done this pattern about five times now. $128 for a proprietary power supply is STILL cheaper than a whole new HP. But he's going to buy another HP... And he's rapidly becoming the person described in situation 1.
There are only two situations where buying a brand name PC makes sense.
1. If you don't know a damn thing about computers, refuse to learn more and have used up all of the patience of your friends who've been doing your tech support.
2. If you are buying more than ten.
3. If you can make a decision on rational self interest that the time and effort it takes to build your own exceeds the value and just say, "screw it," and buy a pre-made machine. The people in this category tend not to use up all the patience of friends because when the proprietary parts blow they shrug and solve the problem themselves (#3 added because of commentary by Tam).
Otherwise bribe (dinner works most often) a friend who knows what they're doing to show you how to gather and assemble the required parts. You may be stunned to see how easy it is and how much you saved.
The reason I say this is because I know several people who've bought a brand name machine and had the power supply fail. They are now stuck with buying a new one from the original company for a hundred or so bucks where a generic would have been about $30-50.
Even worse is the guy who's done this pattern about five times now. $128 for a proprietary power supply is STILL cheaper than a whole new HP. But he's going to buy another HP... And he's rapidly becoming the person described in situation 1.