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About LinkBacksWhats the word around town on the choice of branded or custom build PC's? We have a bit of both but up to now have found more problems with the custom builds (perhaps it is where we had them buit though).
Whats the word around town on the choice of branded or custom build PC's? We have a bit of both but up to now have found more problems with the custom builds (perhaps it is where we had them buit though).
Sorry, this is probably a well travelled subject!!
We always go for custom built and have a close relationship with the people we buy off.
Go for branded, factory built. The configurations are (generally) tested more than custom built machines. Also, I would say that a good supplier would be able to provide branded pc's at a lower price than your local shop.
So, I personally choose HP, with us going with Fujitsu-Seimens before (but stopped due to reliability and service contract problems). I have been told to steer clear of Dell by my boss due to perceived support problems.
DELL....
out of different manufactures dell are the only cases that stand up to most vandalism.
We tried Fujitsu, WOC and Refresh.. DELL have a good case.
We go for Dell too, mostly on price and being able to deliver large quantities at fairly short notice and to customised specification. We've also had a very very low rate of DOA equipment from Dell in the past year, something I sadly can't say for Apple
Vandalism, there is another problem with custom cases. They don't stand upto the destructive force known as hurricane pupils!! We are a boys school nad they love nothing better than to tear them apart,.
We used to use custom, until the company went bust 12 months into our 3 yr onsite warranty. Leaving us with over 300 PC's with no warranty at all.
We go Dell now.
Dell again...
really reliable, no problems and as pointed by NBC_Sys_C-ord pretty vandalism resistant.
Custom-built by The IT Support Centre in Birmingham with 4 year warranty - we have about 130 of their machines that work prefectly. One or two Gigabyte motherboards have had to be replaced but thats no biggie - phone them up and the replacement is here next-day CityLink. No DOAs and none damaged by users.
As mentioned in other threads, we can get 30 of these for around £9k.
Dell, for all the reasons given earlier. It can be tedious logging a problem with Dell at times, but it happens pretty infrequently so I live with it. We can get spares pretty easily even for machines out of warranty, not cheap but there again we have not needed to buy many. (A few PSUs).
My advice with chosing any supplier is to look not only at things like telephone support, but check for parts availability, online support (websites, forum), driver support etc.
Custom PCs are great for getting exactly the spec you want, but can become a nightmare later when you cannot get exactly the replacement part when they break & so you can end up with software imaging issues, particularly with 'all-in-one' fully integrated system boards.
I hat Dells, and I'd never have one at home, their bl@@dy NIC drivers are a pain in the neck.
However you can't beat them on Cost / Warranty for schools... damn them!
You could always get a PCI Intel NIC and disable there onboard NIC's
I get ours from NEC i find you get good customer service, and they also pickup your old equipment for free.
NEC with 3 yr warranty cheaper than any dells I've priced.
Ben
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