Dell? Gateway? Micron? What Should I Get for my New PC???

[Beetwasher]

Any other suggestions? Advice welcome! Please explain why you think your suggestion is best!

[DS1]

1. Dell are making money hand over fist

and giving a lot of it to the GOP, and I think thier quality is on the decline.


Micron, on the other hand, have always been a notch up in build quality.

[CBGLuthier]

2. Anything but Gateway

Their support sucks, and their computers too. Plus they have downsized.

Micron builds good, solid computers. i got a bunch of military surplus microns that are great.

[B3Nut]

3. Locally custom-built.

Get support right from the guy that built it. Alternately, it's never a bad time to learn how to roll your own PC. Do that, and I bet you never buy a store-bought box again. All my home desktops are self-built, except for an IBM Craptiva I found in someone's garbage and turned into a server. At my place of work we build our PC's in house, it's lots of fun.

Todd in Cheesecurdistan, IT mook

[billyskank]

4. Buy the parts and build it yourself

No soldering required. :)

[LSK]

5. refurbished IBM laptop + wireless

:thumbsup:

[Initech]

6. Either build your own (if you're going desktop) or go Apple.

Building your own isnt that difficult - half the computers where I work were house built.

The problem with going say Dell or Gateway is that a lot of the parts are way below manufacture quality. Plus dealing with the technical support for both companies is a major pain in the ass.

[democracyindanger]

7. Build your own.

My suggestion is the best because I'm a freakin' genius.

[supernova]

8. I've got a 7 year old Micron

that I had custom built. I've never had any problems with it. It always starts up. I replaced the Comm card three years ago so I could have DSL instead of dial up.

The only drawbacks to it are that the HD is relatively tiny now (13.5 Gigs) and it's a huge mofo that I can't lift. :P

But Micron reliability has been excellent. :thumbsup:

When I replace it, I'm getting an IBM ThinkPad.

[purr]

9. Anything BUT dell

I got one and had nothing but headaches. I had to file litigation charges to get them to fix my laptop and then my power cord went about 6x, keyboard replaced 4 times, fans replaced 2x, memory shot within a year, and a new motherboard.

[graywarrior]

10. Shuttle X

[Oeditpus Rex]

11. My experience with Dell was pretty bad

Had a hard drive go out within the warranty period (no hassles getting it replaced, though), then a power supply. Then I got a BSOD, and tech support was awful.

I ended up dumping it for an HP.

[purr]

12. I got a HP laptop too

and I havent had ONE issue with it. My dell is a little over a year old and its been repaired more times than I care to count.

[philosophie_en_rose]

13. Toshiba from Costco.

Costco has a six-month, no questions asked return policy. Plus, Toshibas are durable and fast. You really get your money's worth.

[suzbaby]

14. A Mac!

Once you've had Mac, you'll never go back...









And apparently I am a poet and I just didn't knowit

[Initech]

15. Amen to that!

My Mac laptop hasnt needed to be repaired ONCE since I bought it in '04.

[MANative]

16. I've had good luck with my HP/Compaq -

have both a laptop and desktop. Prices were reasonable, no hardware disasters. Replacement and upgrade parts readily available. Looked at Dells last time around and found them very pricey for what you got. They also tried to do serious upgrades to things I really didn't need.

[Writer]

17. Hewlett-Packard n/t

[riona]

18. mac

it's a well behaved machine

[Bossy Monkey]

19. I've been happy with the refurbished Sony Vaios I've bought on uBid

uBid generally is a cheap knockoff of eBay, but they always have many lots (as in "lots of 10," not "lots and lots") of Sony factory refurbished Vaios. I bought a desktop five years ago and a laptop last month, both through them, and have been generally satisfied. Because they sell in lots of 10 (and because it isn't a very popular site), you get competitive, if not bargain basement, prices. I bought both of these for around $1,000. Just make sure you check over the machine's specifications very carefully (they are provided in great detail) before bidding, because you may win an auction somewhat by accident (ie, "Well, I'll bid, but surely somebody else will outbid me before the auction ends." I always seem to buy stuff I wasn't seriously trying to bid on; I've always been happy with the results mind you, but just be careful. This is a wonderful laptop but has MS Works instead of Office. Oops!)

Can't really comment on other options except that Dell is reputed here to be a totally Republican outfit (and my girlfriend's Dell ran into a lot of hardware problems) and that Gateway quality is everywhere ridiculed.

Other than that, if there's a game or other application that you particularly want the computer for, check its system requirements and make sure any machine you look at clears those. Pretty obvious stuff and I'm sure you know it already, but some people forget to think about this.