Should I buy a BOXX 7400?

[DaForce]

I have seen many people build machines with "brand name" hardware.. and do things wrong.. wire something up wrong..etc..etc. miss a screw or something.

Basically they are likely to have less returns due to hardware problems because they do more testing.

I personally would never buy a prebuilt, im just trying to justify the price jump for those who would.

[Dynedain]

I used to not buy prebuilts... untill it quickly became very apparent that the time I spend researching and ordering parts, assembling the system, troubleshooting and returning faulty parts (even name-brand parts can be failure-prone) was too much of a hassle.

If My Time Spent, multiplied by my hourly billing rate is more than the difference in cost between a self-built machine and a BoXX, then my boss is losing money by having me mess around with building machines. And its pretty easy to spend 10 hours or longer researching components, finding out what works (or doesn't) with what, finding the best price, purchasing parts, assembling, troubleshooting, aquiring drivers, etc.

And, its very nice, when you don't have time to mess with things because to have projects to work on, to be able to say to a company "It's your problem - Fix it" and they will.

Remember, that extra $1000 or so can really pay off in terms of reliability, hassle, and time spent fixing things later.

Include the cost of the premium service plans with that HP and it will quickly cost more than the BoXX for the same components.

[GALACTUS]

My bad....... there was a company called reality computing whom appear to be in trouble, but a quick trip to boxxtech.com says that my 3DSmax reseller happen to be the UK boxx reseller "Bluegfx" and I have to say they are great. I would personally go to a company like vadim or mesh and use they money i am saving from going with the cheaper manufacturer to add extra ram and perhaps get a higher spec chip like the athlon fx60, unless you are buying for a company in which case I say let the boss sweat over the price.( the dude, probably like other bosses should be paying us more anyway ) Boxx make good machine and have excellent support but like all prestigious systems cost several limbs.

[tigerX]

Thanks GALACTUS, i'm fairly lost as to which way to go...I've been advised that becasue BOXX parts are all US, they take ages to replace (tho i guess they shouldn't need to be). As for sweating about the price, I am the boss (as of Jan 1st )...and as for being paid more, well I'm gonna ask myself for a raise in Feb...doubt I'll get it tho!

[nvanherpt]

no problems with my alienware so far

[Clifton Santiago]

I recommend Armari. I think they are the highest spec prebuilts in the UK.

www.armari.co.uk

I recently got a dual 280 opteron workstation from them and it runs like a dream. A really fast dream.

They are also very easy to work with, and being local will give 3 year onsite warranties.

If you don't need to stay local, you can get a prebuilt from Monarch: http://www.monarchcomputer.com/Merchant2/merchant.mv

They are an amazing company. When I lived in U.S. I built 3 machines myself, all with their parts and never had a problem.

Plus, their prebuilt workstations come in cheaper than Dell, HP, Boxx, or Armari... even after shipping and VAT/customs charges.

I did a lot of research on this topic just a couple months ago...