So, in other words, the deal Squilliam is presenting is a pretty damn good deal, assuming it has enough cooling already in the box(I tend to open up the sides of my PCs anyway, lol, I have compressed air handy for the dust problem and you'll never get a heating issue with no box surrounding your hardware, in a cool room).

I mean, considering that a pre-built PC is usually a screw job and much much worse than built PCs you can get around that price range, this one is actually quite an amazing deal.

Espcially since it comes with Vista and I assume has a warranty.

....hell, this is actually the deal of the century if those specs prove out right, lol.

I mean, you could be playing Crysis on medium settings on Squilliam's PC in like 3 days from now, if you ordered it. Like, pow, snap, bang. The "reviewer" said it won't run Crysis well on high settings, but that implies that it will run it on medium settings, so I assume it would.

You certainly could play other high end games like Bioshock, Gear 1, Assassin's Creed, Dragon's Age, and that kinda stuff, out of the box(besides attaching the videocard).

Basically, it could blow a 2000 dollar PC from 3 years ago, out of the water, and it's like 450 bucks prebuilt for ya, with a warranty.

Yeah, but does yours come with Vista?

Edit: That's 120 dollars on Amazon.com, good god!

I guess if you already had Vista, it wouldn't be extra cost, but I don't have Vista or XP discs, lol, if my cpu needs reformatting, I'm screwed.

I've have my BIOS screw up on me a few times, and found out that on my motherboard, there is this little plastic plug, and if I slide it one prong over and turn the power on, it resets them to default. That's saved me a million times.

And everyone always forgets about the operating system when talking about how cheap computers are.  Probably because most people just pirate it.

Mummelmann said: No thanks, no AMD cpu's for me, I have only bad memories of those. Helluva deal though!

I have an AMD in mine. :( Have for years, that's why I'm not biased, I guess. Have AMD and ATI and they both have been dependable and good, even though they suck now. I have that card that launched with Half-Life 2, I think the ATI.

So, in other words, self-built computers are so cheap because people steal the biggest and most important part?

...and with that in mind, this PC/VC combo, warranty or not, is quite an excellent deal assuming they are compatible?

It's a cost that is typically omitted from a complete build. Usually when being used as an argument for why PC gaming is the cheapest platform for gaming.

Of course this runs the assumption that everyone has a commercial copy of Windows XP/Vista or will be willing to pirate/steal a copy.

Unless you bought a copy of Vista or XP as an OS upgrade for your commercial pre-configured PC, you probably don't.

It also runs the assumption that everyone interested in building a PC with the lowest cost being the primary goal knows how to or can figure out how to properly assemble one from a box of separate components without damaging or breaking anything in the process.

As simple as the task may be, if you really don't know what you're doing, there is a lot of potential along the assembly process to break a critical component.

From this perspective, buying a bargain pre-configured PC with a warrantee and just doing a simple video card upgrade is a better choice for most users. Difference in cost factoring in OS is minimal, no major assembly/configuration, with the only drawback of all the factory installed bloatware.

The only compatibility issue is if your OEM mobo is compatible with whatever card you're planning on upgrading to. If it's up to date, it will be.

Benkenobi that PSU is cheap and it only has one 12v rail. I would seriously advocate that people purchase a PSU which meets ATX specifications and uses 2 12V rails to ensure stable power delivery but in any case I would probably add another $10-20 for the power supply if you're going the build your own route instead.

I don't know if I'd advocate buying a cheap PSU since that's the one component that has the highest potential for bricking a system.

If you do the pre-config route and do a low(er) power GPU upgrade like the 4670, assuming the factory PSU is about 350w, I wouldn't upgrade it unless you were planning on using a better quality unit, in addition to supplying more power.

One 12v rail is all you need if you're only running that one low power video card. It's also all you probably should be using in the 300w range.

Quality PSUs tend to run a bit closer to $100, less if you can find a rebate or sale. IMO, the PSU is one component you really don't want to cheap out on in terms of quality.