GrogHeads Forum

Hi Guys

I am leaning very heavily to buying an alienware computer (note I currently have a 7 year old Alienware that I have upgraded a couple of times so I am happy with them and their upgradability).

I know there is a lot to be said for custom builds but I just don't have the time and bandwidth for building my own right now. I have done it in the past and this is not a skill or hobby that interests me (the building part).

The big ticket item specs are below for the Alienware R6 with my discounts and due to my company corporate purchase program for employees discount I can get it at $1900
i7-7700 at 4.2Ghz
850 Watt power supply with liquid cooling
Nvidia GTX 1080 Ti 11 GB
32 GB RAM 2400 MHz
I am going to scavenge my 500GB SSD and newish 3TB hard drives and peripherals like mouse and keyboard and monitors from the older computer.
 
Pricing out similar components but including a case and a similar motherboard lands me at +1800

For a $100 more I get to have my computer running games out of the box when I order it and no matter how well I try to build a comp it always end up being a rats nest of internal cabling.  I like the pre build because their neater setup for cable makes future upgrades a breeze.  Lastly the Alienware Aurora R6 is getting excellent reviews from Toms and other sites.

What do you guys think fast and convenient over the joy of self build and maybe a better future flexibility?

(Honestly writing this all out has made me lean even more heavily towards the Alienware)

If you don't enjoy the build process (I get it, I don't find it particularly fun either), then just spend the extra hondo and buy the Alienware rig. I don't see a downside to it really.

^+1. I've own Alienware laptops and have a self built desktop rig. I'm happy with both.  O0

I agree with the pre-built approach under the circumstances. You're not talking about a tremendous savings in money there, so the $100 is easily worth the time and aggravation you will save in not putting it together yourself.

Yep, fer a hundred bucks it's worth it to have someone else build it.

If your happy with the rest of the components and aren't a "tweaker" then by all means that looks like a great deal. Main issue I have with prebuilt is a lot of the big box guys use proprietary parts that can limit upgrading.

A 1080ti at that total cost is a deal though, so go for it if you don't feel like DIY

Quote from: Barthheart on August 09, 2017, 02:54:14 PM
Yep, fer a hundred bucks it's worth it to have someone else build it.

I agree. O0

You have to enjoy building your Windowbox to make a self-built worthwhile. I actually do, and have assembled my own PC desktops for the last decade or so. Oddly enough I primarily use Macs (much harder, though not impossible to BIY) for every day stuff at home and even 1/2 the time at work. The Windowboxes are primarily for gaming and, lately, running 3D printers.

Quote from: Staggerwing on August 10, 2017, 06:34:09 PM
.....and, lately, running 3D printers.

:knuppel2:

What's wrong with 3D printers? They've enabled a number of Kickstarter games in the last few years with amazing mini's. I got to play 3 games of Cthulhu Wars at WBC a couple of weeks ago. One was 8 players.  :o

Yeah, Barth man. What's wrong with 3-D Printers? :P

Good grief guys, there's nothing wrong with 3D printers.... I have a beef with how Stagger uses his 3D printer....

Very creatively

Quote from: Barthheart on August 11, 2017, 08:39:04 AMI have a beef with how Stagger uses his 3D printer....

?????

I don't have the skills to self-build and have purchased gaming computers over the years.

I've drifted away from Alienware (I had two of them) to Falcon Northwest.  The Talon systems are pretty inexpensive.  My current Tallon is now 7 years old and still runs everything I want to play.  Admittedly, I don't play shooters or do video editing so my needs are not the highest.

I have an eight year old quad core Digital Storm that's still working fine. I've never had any problems but the last few months it's periodically made funny noises that I suspect are either the HD or one of the fans getting onto it's last legs.

I just bought a new 500G SSD as a precaution and I'm going to pay my local Whole Foods Sushi guy to install it for me while explaining every step of the process including the migration of the OS and other programs. He's a PC expert :nerd: as well as a Sushi one! I haven't installed new hardware in a PC since I had my first 386SX back in '91 or so.

In a couple months or so I'll either get a new DS gaming monster system or pay the Sushi guy to build me one. We'll be a 2 PC household then and the old one can primarily be my wife's. She doesn't use very demanding software and her games are fairly simple. Bejeweled 3 and the like.

I've done both. I built my own PC's for years, but it just doesn't make sense anymore. It cost more to buy each component then it does to buy certain pre-built systems.  The catch is it depends on what kind of pre-built system you are looking at. Falcon NW and Alienware charge a large amount for system assembly and integration - but you tend to get better support - other companies charge less for similar hardware, but the support just isn't there.

With the Canadian dollar the way it is, I usually buy Cyberpower or iBuypower and do all my own work, upgrades, yadda, yadda.

Time tends to be the big factor - if you want to maximize gaming time, a quality pre-built is easily worth the money.

I was at a customer site this week, and on my home I stopped at Micro Center.  Looking at through their add when I got home, I saw this.

It's from a company called PowerSpec.  I've never heard of them, but this looks like a great price.  I also like that they detailed they parts that are used in the machine.  Most of the others seem to just use generic terms.

PowerSpec G428;    $1699      http://www.microcenter.com/product/479097/G428_Desktop_Computer

Intel Core i7-7700K Processor 4.2GHz
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080 Ti 11GB GDDR5X
16GB DDR4-3000 RAM
2TB HDD+500GB SSD
Microsoft Windows 10 Pro-64-bit
ASUS 24x DVDRW Drive
Multi-in-One Memory Card Reader
10/100/1000 Network
802.11ac Wireless
Display Not Included


Here are other PowerSpec systems that they have.  http://www.microcenter.com/search/search_results.aspx?Ntk=all&sortby=match&N=4294967292+4294965234&myStore=false

Quote from: Barthheart on August 11, 2017, 08:39:04 AM
Good grief guys, there's nothing wrong with 3D printers.... I have a beef with how Stagger uses his 3D printer....

and how do you think next generation vibrators are designed?

Quote from: GDS_Starfury on August 18, 2017, 07:41:02 PM

Quote from: Barthheart on August 11, 2017, 08:39:04 AM
Good grief guys, there's nothing wrong with 3D printers.... I have a beef with how Stagger uses his 3D printer....

and how do you think next generation vibrators are designed?

Using a holodeck for prototyping?

Con, did you ever get your new system?

I was planning on getting it in September.  Its been a busy and expensive month and we did our parenting rite of passage and took the kids to Disneyland.....now it might be October since the Mouse sure knows how to gouge you...that bill is truly eye popping

Con

Once you get it post some pics - always like looking at new systems  :dreamer:

Pulled the trigger on it today.  My current rig has suffered about 8 bluescreen of death in the last two weeks and I was getting more and more nervous that something big was going to fail.  I got it in 2010 so I got my moneyworth out of it.  Just dont have the time to troubleshoot the old one or throw more money into a replacement graphics card or whatever is causing the bluescreen problem to keep it limping along.

Specs are
Alienware Aurora R6
   
Intel® Core™ i7-7700K Processor (4-Cores, 8MB Cache, Turbo Boost 2.0, Overclocked up to 4.4GHz)
850 Watt Multi-GPU Approved Power Supply with High Performance Liquid Cooling   
NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 1080 Ti with 11GB GDDR5X
16GB HyperX™ FURY DDR4 XMP at 2667MHz;    
256GB M.2 PCIe SSD (Boot) + 2TB 7200RPM SATA 6Gb/s

I will be scavenging keyboards and mice and monitors plus additional SSD and multi terabyte drives from the old computer
Couple of other little bits and pieces and expedited shipping has set me back $2000 even.

^Nice!  O0

Con, did you get your new computer. 

I put an M.2 PCIe drive on my new computer and it totally boots in less than 2 minutes from power on.

Hope you enjoy your new gaming experience. 

I ordered it and have been hitting the tracking log button like a frenzied lab rat hoping for a piece of cheese.  Latest update is it will arrive on Monday.  Here is hoping that FedEx with all its metrics and data and years of experience is wrong and it gets here Saturday  :crazy2:

You're not looking well Con.  Hopefully your not going to be out next week with the flu.   O:-)

Yeah that new PC flu can hang on for a couple of days....  ;)

OK New computer arrived today here are my very rough first impressions
Alienware has gone very minimalist.  My old Area 51 came with a leather bound manual, alienware swag, CDs and an alienware holder, mouse pads etc.  This one came with a computer and a cable.  I kept searching the box to make sure I wasn't missing anything.
The old area 51 was a heavy metal beast with solid metal components and chassis.  The new one is more plasticity and much more compact.
Lack of manual had me scratching my head on how to open it up until I went and watched some online videos.  I eventually found a manual on the Dell site that cleared up a lot of questions.
The new one has some superb design and engineering in it runs super quiet is ultimately much more transportable and compact so it can fit on desktops instead of taking a big chunk of precious leg room away from me under the desk.

Issues I have run into that are my own fault
1. I have a dual monitor setup but one monitor is 7+ years old and doesnt have HDMI cables so I cant connect it.  I checked and a similar OK replacement monitor is in the $250 range and since I am not a twitch type gamer I will be fine with that level of resolution etc.
2. I really messed up on the storage drives.  I went with the cheapest option thinking I could scavenge a 500GB SSD and a 3TB and 1TB ultra fast drive from my computer.  Well it turns out the that the SSD that comes with the new computer is plugged directly onto the moptherboard.  So using the old 500GM SSD as my boot drive is not as good an option and since I didnt know this ahead of time I went with the smallest memory for the on board motherboard SSD.  I am sure this will come back to haunt me at a later date.  I am not 100% sure the drive bays that are free are compatible with all the different drives I have so I am going to have to do some hill billy PC engineering to get them to fit (or consolidate etc).
3. I knew this going in but I hate changing from windows 7 to windows 10.  I am sure its better but I like my old comfortable windows 7 knowing how to navigate and do what I wanted to do.  I am spending a huge amount of time trying to disable most of the windows 10 features (looking at you Cortana)

Con,

   What monitor are you looking at.  Just curious, as I'd like to get a new one at some point.


   I put an M.2 drive in my new rig.  I did put a 1TB, and it's the only drive I have in it at the moment.  Still have plenty of room on at the moment.  Do you notice a faster boot time with yours. 

   Final question, was there much bloatware installed. 

M.2 is the way to go, even as just a boot drive.

Yeah I feel more than a bit foolish that I didnt realize the SSD was an M2 drive.

The boot time was not something I had noticed until the question but without a doubt it is significantly faster than my previous SSD.

For Monitors I have these Acer H236HL monitors (now 2 of them).  They fit together seemlinessly and I like them plus they are cheap $130 ea at BestBuy/Amazon etc.
Here is a review and it is very popular on Amazon
https://www.amazon.com/Acer-H236HL-bid-23-Inch-Widescreen/dp/B00AZMLIDQ/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1505876082&sr=8-1&keywords=acer+h236hl
https://pcbuildsonabudget.com/acer-h236hl-review-is-it-a-good-1080p-monitor-for-gaming

As for bloatware I dont really have a benchmark to go by but my impression on the Alienware is that it is pretty minimal.  I am still struggling with learning the new Windows 10 interface (and i am not a big fan of tiles etc) so I deleted just about all of them.  Other programs seem a reasonable amount nothing that stood out as bloatware to my eye.

Thanks Con.

Update part 2

This is really on me so no knock on Alienware...the computer is very weel engineered but I didnt do a good job of thinking it through when I was reading the specs.

Due to the compactness of the case there is only one 3.5 HD bay.  The other 2 bays are 2.5 bays for SSDs.  My plan was to scavenge 2 very large very fast 3.5 HD out of my old computer that had terabytes of photos and music on it (I am a huge audiophile and have kids so I use huge amounts of memory for my photos and music).  I was thinking I would just swap these drives in and be done.

Instead its like I have had to build my old computer.  Right now the old one and the new one are open and in parts in front of me.  After digging on the internet someone else had the same exact problem and they helpfully posted with pics how the modded the case to work with multiple 3.5 HD.  There is a 3.5 HD cage you can buy on ebay for $20 that fit the dimensions and screw holes of the 2.5 bays currently in the new computer.  I have ordered them and will get them early next week.  The downside of this modding is that there is now only room in the case for 1 video card and not a dual setup.  I can live with that.  Also alienware was being a bit cheap the computer did not come with any SATA 3 cables so I need to buy 2 of those with 90 degree turns in them so that they can fit the hard drives in the case.

New plan is to make the mods put the old HD in and wait until the price of SSD memory comes down.  In a couple of years I will be able to buy multi terabyte SSDs for much cheaper than they are going now and if necessary then I can also upgrade to 2 graphics cards if I want too.  Right now I can use the new computer for everything critical and music and photos can wait till later next week.

Again this is not Alienwares fault its mine in not thinking things through carefully and making some wrong assumptions.  Ironic though

Con

You can buy an external HD enclosure and hook it up to USB 3. You won't get all the speed if it's an SSD but it should work. If it is a platter drive USB3 should not be the limiting factor I think.

Just curious, is there much need for a second video card.  Or maybe asked a different cay, when would you need to think about using a second video card.

that really depends on the games you play.

Star is right. Unless you want to play across multiple screens or max settings on a 4K screen a single 1080ti will literally run everything out now on max.

SLI also adds added challenges of not all games playing nice with it.

Update to the update

I dived in again and changed out the stock psu for a new corsair 860AX

The Alienware oem psu gave off a clicking and coil whine that just drove me nuts since my new desktop placement is on my desk instead of under it. Alienware sent me a replacement and it was ok for a month but then it began to sound even worse. I did a lot of reading on this issue and it turns out to be a fairly common one for psu. Swapping one Alienware psu for another was a bit like gambling that you will get one that won't develop this issue.  I just decided to take the majority of the advice and spring for a 3rd party psu that was recommended for not developing this noise and coil whine.

Of course I spent about a day trying to change out all the cables and working on the guts of my computer. If nothing else I am keeping my pic build skills sharp even though I didn't build one  :)