Soon I am upgradeing and am considering a DEll or HP. Around 2.6 or 3.0 Gig hz. 1 G Ram. A good VC. What is the best way to go? All suggestions will be appreciated. Thanks in advance.RLJR

My advice is to call them up and do a price comparison. IF they run at the same price, my preference would be dell.:-jumpyCheck out my work: http://library.avsim.net/search.php?Search...Weik&CatID=Roothttp://vatsim.pilotmedia.fi/statusindicato...tor=OD1&a=a.jpg------------------Kenneth WeikTWVA395 / [email protected]

And even if the Dell is a couple hundred dollars more, my preference would still be Dell.

none of the aboveMichael J.http://www.reality-xp.com/community/nr/rsc/rxp-higher.jpg

It certainly depends on whats in the box. You have to realize there is no or a very low profit margin selling electronics. HP, Compaq, Dell, Gateway, or any other mass vendor is going to try and sell a unit that has a lot of on-board peripherals, i.e., sound, graphics, NICs, Modems, etc. These units are NOT good game or intensive graphics machines. They may do very well for office applications, such as word processing, spreadsheets.As another poster pointed out, go to their websites, do the investigation of what's in the box and make your choice. Remember, on-board peripherals, especially graphics and sound are determental to gaming.W. Sieffert

HiI'd have to agree with everything W. Sieffert says above, but if you insist on buying "off the shelf" go with Dell, as people seem to be much happier with Dell than with the other three mentioned. I still have an old Dell XPS T500 which I later upgraded to 1.2 Ghz CPU. It was simply a matter of re-flashing the bios and installing the new CPU. I was amazed at the performance increase since I was still using the origional mobo, RAM, etc. But why not build your own; it isn't all that difficult. Check out www.sharkyextreme.com for component recomendations and prices to build the entire system. Their current "value system" uses an Athlon XP 2500+ CPU which is usually an easy overclock to 3200+, and thats pretty fast. You should really consider it. David

go with a custom built box for better parts and upgradability.

>go with a custom built box for better parts and upgradability.>Well spoken from Ccqr.I suggest you build it yourself, because if you do, you will NEVER buy another machine that someone else touched but yourself. It's quite simple really, lots of tutorials out there on the web.

Keep the comments coming. This is a big topic with a lot of people. I am starting to think , build my own. Take note though, Dell has the XPS with a price that almost matches a homebuilt with the same equipment. Odd that I used the word homebuilt as I built a homebuilt airplane.

"Odd that I used the word homebuilt as I built a homebuilt airplane."Built a few myself over the years. Having built a homebuilt, putting a computer together would be a piece of cake. I certainly wouldn't buy one. You can indeed build cheaper than buying one built. Much better in the long run to build than buy.Cheers,

Getting and putting the hardware together in a homebuilt PC seems easy as there is a lot of help seen here on this forum. How about getting the software in and running. That is the troublesome thing for me. If I can get some confidence of the software thing and get weined from calling Dell with a problem then it is a done deal. I will build my own. Is there an easy way to get one up and running without spending hours in thick books?

Buy the Dell. Before you do, go ahead and price all the components at newegg.com . You'll find that the total price of buying components versus a ready built system is small. The support alone is worth the extra cost. If you haven't built a machine before, save yourself some headaches. Those that claim they can save lots of money by building it themselves are likely using some of the components from their old machines and/or buying cheaper oem products with 30 day warranties. They're also not factoring in the software you get with a Dell. When I buy a component, I always buy the retail version which comes with a full three year warranty. If you have a problem with your Dell that can't be solved over the phone, they'll send a tech out to your house the next day.

I've bought a number of Dell's over the years for my shop. First thing we did after receiving one is reformat the hard drive and wipe all the Dell junk off them.OEM isn't neccessarily a 30 day warranty. It's a manufacturer's warranty. Simple as that. It's a known fact in the electronics biz that if a component is going to fail it usually fails early on. Dealing with a reputable online seller like newegg.com often means simply returning a faulty item directly to them for replacement. I've never had to return to them (haven't had anything fail), but I've heard that their return policy is very customer friendly. IMHO, a 3 year warranty on any computer or compunent is a waste... very few people keep that same system that long.And then there is the famous software rip-off... paying for software you never receive on disc. Please show us your copy of Windows, Bigshot. The copy of Windows you paid for but don't actually own. It's installed on your Dell, but you don't actully have the Windows disc. Some of the smaller niche computer manufacturers will install software AND ship the system with the software discs, but not outfits like Dell and HP. Buying a built computer means buying what they want you to have. They make money selling the system to you, and they make money installing often unwanted software (like AOL). Buying a computer from a company like Dell or HP means paying money to have alot of software the average computer user would never want in the first place.