"Lloyd E Parsons" wrote in message
...
On 10/16/11 4:16 PM, Howard Brazee wrote:
On Sun, 16 Oct 2011 14:51:55 -0400, "Scout"
wrote:

Quite a few people make a living supplying people with such systems
customized to their specific desires.

Most of my computers have been those. But the local stores that made
my computers have all closed and not been replaced.

True, it's largely moved to mail order since that way you don't have the
overhead of a store front, or if you do maintain a store front, it's
just to
pick up the occasional sale while you're processing the bulk of your
business through internet orders.

Face to face contact was good at finding out what my needs and wants
really were. Having a clone shop by mail order is as personalized
as having a big name computer by mail order.

I'd have to agree. And honestly, if that mail order clone shop is cheaper
on a per configuration basis, than most of the big names, I'd be running
away from them. It just isn't all that much cheaper to buy the parts and
put them together properly than it is to buy ready made, UNLESS the shop
has really cheap labor or doesn't factor that in.

No, actually it is cheaper. It doesn't take very long to assemble a
computer, and properly done you easily undercut the names by selective
buying. Because the names don't get the discounts that arise as the hardware
is superseded by newer tech. A computer they've had sitting in the warehouse
for a year is not worth nearly as much as it was a year ago, but they've
already paid the higher price for the hardware. A local supplier doesn't
have this problem because they have a much quicker supply turnover and thus
they don't lose the value in hardware at nearly the rate as the big players
do. Plus the small supplier can take advantage of price breaks, sales,
discounts, and so on, while the brand guys are limited in their ability to
change the hardware configuration at the drop of a hat.

Nope, small suppliers can generally match much of what a name brand puts out
simply because they aren't having to pay last year's price for hardware they
are going to sell tomorrow. Just watch the price on any hardware. From what
it was a year ago, to today. It generally will drop significantly. So you
can either beat their price or match their price with superior hardware.
However, there is a tradeoff, customer support particularly in driver
updates, software conflicts/errors, and so on is left much more to the
consumer that it might be with the name guys. However, a lot of hardware
drivers now provide automatic updates from the maker as they become
available.