I'm consoling myself by looking at Alienware's website and seeing how much more (nearly three times more!) it costs to straight-up buy a computer with similar specs.
Oddly, I managed to at one time fine a gaming rig that cost about the same between my build and the prebuilt. But anyway, hi: I have worked in computer repair shops and hardware is a little bit of a hobby of mine. (I have the itch. I will need to buy new components for my desktop eventually.) Bonus: Prebuild parts shot:
I'm thinking of maybe upgrading my four-year-old laptop with an SSD. Any advice on how to go about figuring out whether that is possible?
@Emma didn't see the notification 'til now, sorry! Anything Here will work for you. Your laptop uses the standard hard drive connection, and a 2.5" form factor, so thats what you need to look for when you're looking to get a ssd.
So, I'm not really in a good place to be buying stuff anyway, but I'd just like to state how annoyed I am with all the OEMs charging wayyy over MSRP for the Radeon 480 parts.
what is the msrp for radeon 480? A quick google brought up a bunch of links to buy, but not the msrp, at least not that i saw.
$200 for 4GB, $229 for 8GB. And the ENTIRE POINT was that AMD wanted to significantly undercut nVidia, who can't really afford to compete in that price range... And then the vendors started buying chips and using them to make $400 cards. (I have actually seen a $399 price on a RX480 card. No, just, no.)
Let's see, my current rig is the 10th or 11th I've built for myself over the years. I can post specs if anyone is interested. I build my machines mostly for gaming. I have developed a bit of brand loyalty over the years. I am currently thinking about upgrades. My next upgrade is a better primary monitor, I run a dual monitor setup. Beyond that I'm torn, its a bit warm inside my case, even though I have great airflow. My next step may have to include water cooling. Which would mean a new case, water blocks for CPU and video card(s), pump, reservoir, tubing, and radiator. On the plus side with good water cooling I could do a bit of overclocking. Is anyone here using a water cooled setup? 'cuz I has questions. If anyone has questions for me I'd be happy to help.
Oh hey, I should be getting my computer bits sometime early next week. I'll post pictures as it's assembled. For some reason, I have access to a proper industrial-grade ESD protected room. It's got pink anti-static bubblewrap and everything!
News: Computer parts ordered! It should be arriving on Monday, and a couple of extras will be turning up during the week, that I wasn't able to get good shipping on. More on this story as it develops.
I keep extending my multiposting, but I have all the bits! When I take them out of their boxes, I'll see about grabbing some build pictures and posting them when I get to a convenient location.
Ah, sorry about the lack of pictures. I'll take some of the inside of the box at some point. I was too busy being bitten by the heatsinks (thus giving my computer a taste for blood) to do so. But it's together! And mostly working! Windows update isn't playing ball, and I can't get Skype to work, but other than that, it's hitchless. Victory for my vampire computer.
computer folks, anyone know stuff about upgrading laptops? my current one works fine it just needs a better (processor+ram+possibly video card) so I can play ff14 without the LAG FROM HELL. I've had it since early 2012 so uh, it's Old, and this is probably cheaper than outright buying a new machine. I can't figure out how to find video card specs (it's some kind of Nvidia I think) but the processor is "Intel Pentium CPU B950 @ 2.10GHz" and it's only got 4gigs ram. Laptop overall is a Lenovo B570.
