How do you afford new hardware?

[gehidore]

In general i was wondering how every one out there keeps up with these prices.

I my self rely on the unlimited stupidity of the average computer user to break their computer. I fix it and charge half of what the other guy does and they still get more from me.

this way people come back and refer me to others.

make 300+ on a good day although it is just sit and wait till something is broken. (or they need a new computer)

plus i get to sel the hardware they give me. its fun stuff

[Satanic Atheist]

I rarely need to get new hardware since my machine is mostly use for entertainment (music & films plus the odd game).

The only two things I've bought in the last year for my machine was a 30Gb drive and a 120Gb drive. That's hardly going to break the bank.

4 years ago I built my machine and haven't done much to it. I used to get a lot of components from a local University that was upgrading and simply throwing out older stuff. Thanks to a friend that worked there, he salvaged a lot for both of us.

Who really needs to stay on top of technology when you have Linux? If I upgrade my processor, am I really going to see that much increase in power? I don't use my machine that much as it is. It's mostly downloading and holding up a few core network services. Nothing else.

James

[hard candy]

I do it the old fashioned way- I wait until until everyone has closed up, snip the phone lines to disable the alarm, wiggle through the air ducts, and have some moonlight madness sales of my own. Right now I'm running triple Athlon 64's on 3 separate MB's with 15 GB 3200 RAM and 24 hard drives. :D

Actually it's save the money, shop around, send in rebate coupons, and buy what was the "next big thing" 6 months ago. As an example, the Logitech MX700 usually runs around $70. Circuit City had it on sale for $59.95, plus it had a $10 rebate, so there's $30 saved there- which goes to something else on the list.

[Daedrus]

Save money by keeping yous system only as updated as you need it to be. Still working on a PIII 800 that is almost 3 years old. Only thing new is a video card. and more ram.

[Satanic Atheist]

Hard Candy - we all know you get your money from returning the empty Moonshine bottles.

James

[hard candy]

Hard Candy - we all know you get your money from returning the empty Moonshine bottles.

Actually, Bon Bon and I make our money filling up the empty moonshine bottles. We have the still hooked up to our computer and a cron job starts a new run every 3rd day. We use gnucash to keep the books, mysql to handle the inventory, and we're tapped into the local 911 net to keep track of the revenuers. The secret to good "shine is to change the car radiators every 90 days and put a fresh car battery into each new run to "spark' it off. And while we're waiting for the run to finish, we play Unreal Tourney against some clan from Scotland. The MCDundee's, I think. Beat 'em every time- you know how it is when men wear skirts, can't think straight when the important stuff is blowing in the breeze. :D

[andysimmons]

Originally posted by Gehidore
In general i was wondering how every one out there keeps up with these prices.Newegg.com :)

[Satanic Atheist]

Originally Posted by hard candy
The MCDundee's

That would be "McDundees"... if there was a clan of that name...

But that aside, since I'm not Scottish I don't wear a kilt and don't have anything "blowing in the breeze"... How do you fair against the Welsh???

James

[hard candy]

Always beat the Welsh, too. Unreal clans from Cardiff, Swansea, Rhyl, Flestinlog, Pembroke all fell before Bon Bon's wit and cunning. They cry out
"We are merched!" after Bon Bon finishes with them. :)

[Alex Cavnar, aka alc6379]

Personally, I buy one or two pieces at a time.

If it's a processor or a motherboard, I make sure that they're a generation behind. For instance, my latest acquisition will be last year's hot thing-- a Soyo Dragon Plus! with IDE RAID, along with an XP2000+ with a Palomino core. Following along with this last year's hot thing, I'm going to get a 1GB DIMM of PC2100 RAM. I know that 1GB is still an awful lot, but I'm building this machine to last me a few years...

[pkpss]

Originally posted by andysimmons
Newegg.com :)

Booyea. A new decent computer (even an Intel platform) would run you less than a thousand easily. If you don't game, you could easily get it to $600.

[randabis]

Originally posted by Alex Cavnar, aka alc6379
Personally, I buy one or two pieces at a time.

If it's a processor or a motherboard, I make sure that they're a generation behind. For instance, my latest acquisition will be last year's hot thing-- a Soyo Dragon Plus! with IDE RAID, along with an XP2000+ with a Palomino core. Following along with this last year's hot thing, I'm going to get a 1GB DIMM of PC2100 RAM. I know that 1GB is still an awful lot, but I'm building this machine to last me a few years...
I'd just get the Tbred man...it's not that much more expensive.

[Nu-Bee]

Originally posted by Gehidore
In general i was wondering how every one out there keeps up with these prices.

I my self rely on the unlimited stupidity of the average computer user to break their computer. I fix it and charge half of what the other guy does and they still get more from me.

this way people come back and refer me to others.

make 300+ on a good day although it is just sit and wait till something is broken. (or they need a new computer)

plus i get to sel the hardware they give me. its fun stuff

I sell my body to lovely young heiresses...

[ph34r]

Originally posted by pkpss
Booyea. A new decent computer (even an Intel platform) would run you less than a thousand easily. If you don't game, you could easily get it to $600.

Using newegg, I built a dual 1.2 ghz athlon this summer for $500...

[heckle]

You can also take a trip over to retrobox for some good deals at times on older hardware...

http://retrobox.com/rbwww/home/

[Zoist]

Originally posted by Gehidore
In general i was wondering how every one out there keeps up with these prices.

To me the price of PC parts is as low as it's ever been! It costs you jack to buy a decent PC these days compared to several years ago where it was a big family investment. Just about everyone I know/meet has one and a lot of people have more than one in their house.

[Alex Cavnar, aka alc6379]

Originally posted by randabis
I'd just get the Tbred man...it's not that much more expensive.

I would, but the motherboard I'm purchasing doesn't support the Tbred, only the Palomino core. I like the motherboard that I purchased a lot, though, so I'm happy with the decision.

In this case, price wasn't the issue, it was compatibility.

[Seph64]

Originally posted by Alex Cavnar, aka alc6379
I would, but the motherboard I'm purchasing doesn't support the Tbred, only the Palomino core. I like the motherboard that I purchased a lot, though, so I'm happy with the decision.

In this case, price wasn't the issue, it was compatibility.

You could've bought an Abit NF7 nForce2 Motherboard for $82 at newegg.com, I am running on it right now (in Linux) with an AMD Athlon XP2400+ thoroughbred.

[JamminJoeyB]

I afford new hard ware the old fassioned way. I fix a friends PC and charge them what ever it is going to cost me for my new hardware.

Selling a of few pints of blood here and there also helps.

[Lostman]

My last upgrade I did set me back a bit. I'm a buyer for a living, so I can sniff the deals, but I was running a 1.3 gig Tbird on an old Asus board and it was time to move on. I never upgrade my cpu unless I can double the speed. Or come close to it. So last year I got the XP2600 and went with 512 of pc3200 on the A7N8X Deluxe. I got a deal on the board, saved about $30 at the time. And I replaced my GF3 Ti500 with a GF4 Ti4400 and after selling the old card I only paid about $40. good deal.

My next upgrade will probably be a DVD burner or a LCD monitor. My system should hold off for a while.

[Brat2dbone]

I usually don't upgrade until I don't meet system requirements of programs/games I want to run, of course games are the most common reason. Ususally when I do upgrade I wait until what I want has been around for a bit and the prices drop. My next upgrades probably won't happen until after Half-Life2 and Doom3 are out for a bit, if the reviews come back that they are not as good as expected, the upgrades will of course be postponed a bit more.

[lerninlinux]

http://www.compgeeks.com/products.asp?cat=SYS

used/refurbed boxes with no OS. Get a P4 for under $400 delivered.

[amgeex]

When I go to the movies I spend as little as possible and save the rest! Pretty cheap you might say, but I'm 16 here and it works! Hehe. Either that or selling internal organs, but that ain't a good idea, probably...

[SeT]

The cost has gone down but it's still expensive. I'm a pretty big gamer and like to keep high end stuff. Right now I'm running a self built computer with AMD Athlon XP2700+, 512MB of PC2700, and an ATI Radeon 9800Pro. I'm also getting ready to put together a water cooling system because air cooling is just to damned loud to keep this setup at a decent temperature.

Anyway, how do I afford it? I don't. I had to save for a year before I had this setup. Before that I was working with a 4 year old Compaq - 333Celeron with 64MB of RAM which still works for my parents use.

[hard candy]

Hehe. Either that or selling internal organs, but that ain't a good idea, probably...

Bon Bon says it depends on who the organs belong to.