Buying a PC or peripherals
Please note that this is my personal advice: it does not express the views
or opinions of the club.
I quite often get asked by extended family about which PC to buy - which
brand, what spec, is 256MB a lot of ram, for instance? Buying a pre-made PC is
difficult, and there are so may options and manufacturers that even us
computer geeks have trouble sorting it all out sometimes. However, there are a
few bits of key advice I do usually give:
- Don't buy from a high-street store! This includes Dixons, Comet, etc
AND also the 'specialists' like Time/Tiny! It's very tempting, once you've
made the decision, to rush out and get one in your hands right now - but it's
often not the best choice. Computers are a salesman's dream - complicated,
rapidly changing and the average buyer is unable to resist when overloaded
with phrases like 'a massive 20 gigabyte hard drive' 'state-of-the-art 2
gigahertz CPU' 'able to run the latest software and games'. Very rarely,
the average user may get a reasonable deal but far too much of the time I
have seen people walk out having paid around £200 or more over the online/mail
order price. You may prefer the convenience of a shop on the high street:
that's your prerogative, but I would rather spend the money more wisely.
- PCs are disposable items. The way the PC market changes, an average PC
bought today will probably last about 3-5 years before you will need to buy
a new one. It is simpler to buy a brand new one than to upgrade any of the
internal parts, as an older PC will probably need every single internal
part replaced (and probably even the case) to be brought up to the same
standard - which costs more than buying a new one. It is possible to keep
a PC 'current' by upgrading a part at a time, but you are talking approx
£300-500 per year in parts and a good amount of time and effort.
- I usually suggest that anyone
considering buying a PC get it from Dell. Dell do a
variety of systems, they produce well-balanced reliable systems and have
good customer support. The only way to buy a PC is to select how much you
can spend, and then look at what you can get for that amount (as an
estimate aim to spend between £700-800 for best price/performance). It is
always tempting to spend 'just a bit more', but cutting edge (latest and
fastest) PC hardware can be a lot more expensive for not much gain. Make a
budget and stick to it!
- If you are looking for computer parts/peripherals, there are a
several reliable review sites out there - I tend to use www.tomshardware.com or www.anandtech.com for hardware reviews -
or search for the product name/model number and the word review in google. I look at a shopping site and pick out a few cards or peripherals close to the amount
I want to spend, then go and find the reviews for those products and pick
the best one of those few. The sites I frequently use are www.dabs.co.uk and
www.ebuyer.co.uk. Dabs is slightly better at customer service
and advice, and they are pretty good about returns and after-sales help.
They are also fairly cheap. Ebuyer are one
of the overall cheapest places I have found: they also have very 'cheap
and cheerful' own-brand products, usually for only a few quid. They are
very cheap for most cables and extras you need, such as blank CDs.
However, the 'cheap and cheerful' also applies to the customer service. If
you know exactly what you need then Ebuyer
are actually pretty good.
- Recently, I came across www.pchound.co.uk, a site where
you enter a particular piece of hardware and it shows you the cheapest
sites. While it doesn't include delivery costs, it is very useful and it
has correctly found the cheapest prices that I could find for the last
two items I have bought.
