My vote goes with sony and Hp. Im in the market soon (i hope) and i fooled about with all them lot and those two had the best customizability/ price, i didnt look at alienware cause there too overpriced.
Well... Since it seems to be taking way too much time to actually get the proper funding, I'm going to scratch the laptop idea and get a Desktop (cheaper, yay!) and a brand new game boy with Final Fantasy VI (the last one I liked...:P).
So general consensus is AlienWare, HP, or Dell... OK.
... Any important difference between a Workstation and a Desktop... ? o.O
Hey, you don't have to be a prick, Dab. My computer never "fries" its happened to me once in the last few years, mmkay? Besides that, its pretty much completely my brother's fault... Downloads f---in' anything.
Now... If you don't mind, I have to go get my own computer so that these things don't happen anymore, eh? No "smashing" my computer shut for me, or leaving it on for days at a time (good way to melt a laptop, did I mention?). Anyone who touches it without my explicit permission dies. Simple, no?
Go off have make love to your giant ego and leave the rest of us alone, will ya? Ever wonder how your post count got so damn big?
Oh, and DON'T SPAM MY THREAD. You will regret it.
`Virus
I have a Customised Dell Desktop, works a charm. It has a NVidia GeForce 8800 GTX, a 3.4 GHz Prossesor, 2GB Ram, 7.1 surround sound card and (my pride and joy) a powerful Cooling water pump that keeps me running fast all the time...
Well one little issue I ran into was open GL support, some newer laptops provide (or lack there of).
For example. A lot of HP/Dell laptops come with the Radeon Mobile 200M express integrated Vid card.
If you are a gamer, stay away from those. Why? because there is no support for OpenGL.
The OS goes down to generic drivers and you end up watching f \/ < |< | |\| g slideshows.
Case in point http://fixthe200m.wordpress.com/tag/ati-radeon/
Ihave kotor and kotor 2 which will install but you get three frames per second.
This card is very prominent in bargain laptops (in US). $400~$800 range.
I have been using different notebooks for more then 8 years and now I ended up with IBM/Lenovo Thinkpad T series. I currently have T42, and the new one T60 is on the way (from USA:)).
I dropped the current T42 twice, once I forgot it on the roof of my car and started to drive and it well on the road and it survived. So if you treat your laptops like me, go for the Thinkpad T series. But they are quite expensive...
EDIT: Uh Oh, sorry mate, didn't read that you don't want a notebook any more...:P
Oh so you want a desktop now? Dont get one premade, they charge extortionate amounts for labour and its more fun to put one together yourself anyway.
So, if your having trouble with funding, get a rig like this:
Essential:
C2D E6320
8800 GTS 320mb
Asus P5N32 E-SLI (If you are thinking of upgrading to SLI at a later date) or the Asus Commando (No SLI)
Corsair Dominator PC2 6400 CL4
Antec Trio 650W (65 pounds, 10 W per pound, 100% stable)
Antec Nine Hundred case
That rig will be pretty cheap, and very good value for money. There is a list of peripherals below. By the way, both Nvidia and ATi are having major driver issues with directX 10 (read: 1024x768 in Company of Heroes DX 10 patch, minimum framerate 2FPS with 8800 GTX, DX9 version 100+ FPS minimum)
Peripheral:
Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Gamer (If you like your music)
Arctic cooler Freezer Pro 7 (for CPU, cheap and efficient, much better than reference HSF)
19" or 20.1" Widescreen monitor with at least 1440x900 resolution
DVD drive
And any other peripherals you feel you need.
Workstations and Desktops are no different for your purpose, as workstations are for "work" and desktops can do it just as well. The marketiers just think it sounds cooler and gains more sales.
@Fighting Chicken: that 3.4 GHz processor isnt a C2D is it?
Hey, check out this site Cyberpowerpc.com I just got my rig from there. besides the memory which i got from newegg. Besides memory they have really good prices and cool cases. Id say my case beats any overpriced alienware pc and looks cooler than a dell xps case. My whole rig costed about 1650.00$ But defienatly get a moniter and memory from newegg. Memory is very easy to instal. And there moniters are very well priced. Also from cyberpower you get a 3 year warranty :cool:. Im building my next pc but if i was buying one id definatly do what i did for this one. And if you want a little alien on your pc tape it on :P
My comp specs:
AMD Athlon 64 X2 5400+ 2.8ghz (non OC'ed)
2gig ddr2 memory
Nvidia GeForce 8800GTX 764mb Powered by EVGA My case
700W Thermaltake Toughtpower PSU
Windows Vista Home Premium 32bit