Here's my copy-paste on the whole "build or buy" scenario".
Building your own gaming computer actually
does not save you money if you buy all the parts.
Most people that tell you you can save hundreds of dollars by building your own gaming computer by buying all the parts have never actually done it themselves. Let me break it down.
A prebuilt has parts (like the power supply) just good enough to run what's in there. No guessing needed, no buying a more powerful one than you need. The bloatware/crapware installed, they actualy get paid to include that and it lowers the overall price of the machine. You can just uninstall it when you get it. The company making it gets the parts in bulk, not individually packaged/wrapped/warranteed, so there's much less overhead (extra money cost) per part, the savings are passed onto you. You also get the Operating System included in the price. Remember that windows is not free! Furthermore, with a prebuilt, you tend to get a longer/better warranty than you do on individual parts, AND you can get all the needed drivers from one site.
It's not 1998 anymore! It's 100% possible to go buy a dell that can play Crysis! All you need to do is look. Look at more than the "family-friendly" models up front in Best Buy. Websites are a good thing to check.
When you make a custom computer one, price savings come from reusing parts from other computers or just buying less in general. When most people set up custom computer builds, they tend to forget things like speakers/keyboard/mouse, a card reader, and other things that are included with the prebuilt.
http://cashmoneylife.com/2008/04/25/save-m...g-new-computer/
http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2006/11/05/...mputer-upgrade/
http://www.build-gaming-computers.com/chea...g-computer.html
All of those sites say the same thing. You save money with custom builds when you reuse parts.
Of course there are OEM parts, which people see to be cheaper, but
they're not cheaper by magic. They're cheaper because
you're getting less. OEM comes without any accessories, it's the single part you ordered. Normally this won't be a big deal, but you might be surprised what's counted as an "accessory". OEM laptops come without batteries! OEM processors tend to come without heatsinks+fans! So if you go to buy an OEM part, make sure it's not missing something that you'd have to buy separately in order to use it fully...
Of course, not all parts work in all machines, and not all are best for gaming. You don't see people with custom gaming machines re-using DDR-400 RAM from an old e-machines, they're either buying new ram, or re-using cheaper ram that is still acceptable for gaming, like DDR2-800. Parts that almost always can be reused are the drives (harddrive, DVD/CD drive) and monitor, and keyboard/mouse. Stuff like that adds up if you don't mind re-using your current ones.
Now, I'm not trying to discourage you from building your own, my point is that ordering every part online is NOT the way to save money.
If you have a recent computer at home you're willing to take parts out of, and want the pride and fun of building your own, go for it. If you don't have any machines you can take parts out of, however, then you might be better off with a prebuilt.
Minion4Hire said:
Here's the tl;dr version of Rydian's post
Do-it-yourself Pros:
Fun
Control hardware used
Can be focused towards performance/features needed
Cons:
Time consuming
No tech support to turn to
Separate warranties and RMAs for each individual part
- - - - - - - -
Prebuilt Pros:
Effortless
It "just works"
One phone call for all warranty/tech support
Cons:
Some odd/pointless hardware choices (ie. 8GBs of RAM paired with a mid-range dual core)
Harder to upgrade later
Actually USING tech support can be frustrating if you know what you're doing