Funny I see a lot of Dell people in here ;). I can

"Having followed the posts elsewhere on this site, all the posts relating to these problerms seem to be from users with home-built PCs. I can't recall one with a commercially-built one"I disagree. Most of the "help" posts I see here are from store bought owners. They buy rather than build because they don't want to deal with problems. That philosophy works well until some goes awry, then that store bought system is just another computer that isn't working right.Most who build know their systems rather well, so they tend to troubleshoot until they either fix it or run out of fixes to try. Then they seek help.For serious gamers, building their own is really the only option.Greg

Home built, IMO the only way to go if you want the best bang for the buck. I've never seen a store-bought computer that didn't have something in it that I didn't like, usually to save money. And as somebody else said, if you built it yourself, you know every screw and cable, and know all the hardware is good. And the best thing is: For what a performance store-bought box costs, you can build your own, and-have money to spare. From what I've seen of them, I wouldn't have a Dell, Compac, Hewlett-Packard etc etc as a gift! Just my 2 cents!BestGrahame (EDHL)

The computer I had before the one I just built was a Dell - Dimension 8200 series. Great puter, never had a problem with it. :) Infact, I just convinced my roommate to buy his puter from Dell rather than Gateway or Sony. -whew!- My parents also have a Dell... :DI did have problems with FS - as evident in my 'Tweaks don't work' thread, but that was fixed due to the fact that I'd forgotten (D'oh!) to install the VIA drivers. lolol Atleast it was something easy to fix on my first build! :DAs for prices... Totally agree! When I bought my Dell, it cost me abouot... $2400. I had gone online and priced everything except a monitor and keyboard/mouse for $1700. $700 saved!!!!! Went with Dell b/c of Tech Support - :DThis time around I built an AMD 64 3500+, Abit AV8 VIA K8t800 Pro, 1024 PMI PC3200 RAM, ATi x800 256 Pro, 500w PS, Thermaltake Tsunami Dream case... All in all, I came around $1500 - kept the drives, soundcard and monitor/keyboard/speakers from my old one. Woulda saved more if I hadn't splurged on shipping - hehehe