[ziggyzaggy]

I saw this deal on the tv (http://www.pcworld.c...duct/seo/034869) and thought it looked good, but i thought that it was always cheaper to build your own pc because then you wont have the markup and stuff of the retailer.

However when looking at building it the price is higher than the £699 pc world are selling it for.

Case - £25.20 - http://www.microdire...?ProductID=8511
Keyboard/Speakers/Mouse - £7.58 - http://www.microdire...?ProductID=2629
MOBO - £63.80 - http://www.microdire...?ProductID=9608
CPU Intel P4 650 - £202.36 - http://www.microdire...?ProductID=8773
250GB Hard Disk - £71.66 - http://www.microdire...?ProductID=9458
2x512MB RAM - £63.92 - http://www.microdire...ProductID=10250
nvidia 6200 TC 256MB - £43.36 - http://www.microdire...?ProductID=8718
DVD-RW - £29.67 - http://www.microdire...?ProductID=8316
FDD - £5.82 - http://www.microdire...?ProductID=2849
17" Monitor - £146.86 - http://www.microdire...?ProductID=9233
Windows XP Home - £61.09 - http://www.microdire...?ProductID=9479

Total Cost = £721.32

Thats without delivery as well. So how have pc world got it at £699

Its confusing me i thought they were usually very overpriced.

Cheers

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Basicly, companies like those buy parts for an awful lot cheaper than you or i can by buying them from warehouses in bulk, the only reason that prices are so high from retailers of seprate parts for us is that the shops also have to make a worthwile profit on the goods they sell. Companies that sell individual components only buy a small amount of one thing at a time because not everyone wants to buy that component where as PC world say "lets build so many thousand of these computers and distribute them across the world" so as you can imagine, buying thousands of each component in bulk will reduce the price of each component considerably. Employing someone at minimum wage who can do way more than one PC per hour is where theyll make even more profit too. I can put a PC together in 15 minutes if i have all the parts in front of me, and thats double checking that its put together properly... they probobly have someone to fit the motherboard, someone to fit the GFX card and so on so its a mini production line churning out so many PC's per hour.

Part of that is truth and part is theory... i dont know how the PC's get built, but thats how i imagine them to be built.

that system is low priecd because it isnt one of the best PC's on the market. If you tried to buy a PC with the latest high end graphics and more ram than NASA has in their labs, then thats when they bunk the price up a lot. Take DELL for instance, their gaming laptops, 512MB of RAM... if you upgrade the ram they will charge you silly amounts of money.

Youve got to consider the quality of the components they use too, 1 Gig of RAM is fine, but if theyve bought it from a company that do momory for its basic job, it isnt going to offer blisteringly good performance is it? They will have cut down on everything they can do and not only that but they will also shop around for the cheapest possible place to buy their parts, they will also buy OEM products that doesnt have any glossy retail packaging and therfore costs less

Edited by GrimPingu, 05 September 2005 - 09:23 AM.

[GrimPingu]

Basicly, companies like those buy parts for an awful lot cheaper than you or i can by buying them from warehouses in bulk, the only reason that prices are so high from retailers of seprate parts for us is that the shops also have to make a worthwile profit on the goods they sell. Companies that sell individual components only buy a small amount of one thing at a time because not everyone wants to buy that component where as PC world say "lets build so many thousand of these computers and distribute them across the world" so as you can imagine, buying thousands of each component in bulk will reduce the price of each component considerably. Employing someone at minimum wage who can do way more than one PC per hour is where theyll make even more profit too. I can put a PC together in 15 minutes if i have all the parts in front of me, and thats double checking that its put together properly... they probobly have someone to fit the motherboard, someone to fit the GFX card and so on so its a mini production line churning out so many PC's per hour.

Part of that is truth and part is theory... i dont know how the PC's get built, but thats how i imagine them to be built.

that system is low priecd because it isnt one of the best PC's on the market. If you tried to buy a PC with the latest high end graphics and more ram than NASA has in their labs, then thats when they bunk the price up a lot. Take DELL for instance, their gaming laptops, 512MB of RAM... if you upgrade the ram they will charge you silly amounts of money.

Youve got to consider the quality of the components they use too, 1 Gig of RAM is fine, but if theyve bought it from a company that do momory for its basic job, it isnt going to offer blisteringly good performance is it? They will have cut down on everything they can do and not only that but they will also shop around for the cheapest possible place to buy their parts, they will also buy OEM products that doesnt have any glossy retail packaging and therfore costs less

Edited by GrimPingu, 05 September 2005 - 09:23 AM.

[warriorscot]

Well when it comes to low end pcs the builders are much cheaper as they use products purchased in bulk but they also cut corners and use cheaper parts of a lower quality than we would buy for ourselves. When you build a more expensive higher quality machine it is cheaper but not for a low level machine like that, they also save on the warranties as they buy OEM parts as well and get special deals eg Intel will give them x amount of money if they only but there chips.