🚀 go-pugleaf

G (blackbob@sashimi.wwa.com) wrote:

: Okay, $300 for the motherboard,

I checked on this- the places that sell P75 motherboards for this price 
sell them *without CPU*.  So add an extra $350+ for a *real* motherboard.
$650 for a motherboard *with* CPU.

: $200 for 8 MB RAM,

Where do you get this?  I can't find RAM *anywhere* for under $38/meg.
So this is $300.

: $120 for 240 MB HD,

Comparing to a 500+ meg HD on the Mac.  240 megs isn't enough for *any* 
modern computer.  But you can get a 500 meg HD for about $200.

: $10 for keyboard, $20 for mono monitor/card,

Sorry- Monochrome is 1970s technology.  But I'll let you buy a nice SVGA 
card for $100.  And a basic monitor for $250. (13" 640 by 480)

: $10 for I/O card,
: $50 for PS, $0 for Linux...we're talking ~$700 for the absolute
: perfect computer (okay, okay, add $1000 to replace the Pentium MB
: with an Alpha if you want to get real dreamy).

Oh- and we forgot the modem.  And your extras.  And the CD-ROM.

No- we're talking at least 

Motherboard $650
RAM         $300
500 meg HD  $200
SVGA        $100
Monitor     $250
Modem/etc   $100
CD-ROM      $200
           ------
           $1700

...and you can get a PMac 5200 for about that- with more RAM and a bigger 
monitor.

: >All for about the same amount of money or MORE!  WHEE!  And when 
: >something goes wrong six months from now, and the place you got the 
: >pieces from is out of business because they didn't make any margin on the 
: >stuff they sold, you get to try and deal with a bunch of parts from 
: >fifteen different companies!

: Please explain.  What parts are you talking about?

: a) Memory and disks are made by the same companies for Apples 
: and clones so the users will experience the same number of
: problems.

...but the cheapo motherboards aren't.  And the I/O card isn't.  And the 
keyboard is a $10 piece of crap.  And due to the low prices here, a lot 
of this stuff isn't "name brand" anyway.  And when the incompatibilities 
start popping up...

: b) Intel is not a fly by night company.

You think you get a real Intel motherboard for that price?  Nope- you get 
a cheap Taiwan clone with an older chipset.

: c) The items not covered by a) and b) are of minimal cost, so
: replacement is not taxing, and they do not often break anyways.
: Be realistic, have you ever heard of PC user having to replace his
: multi-I/O card?

Constantly.  The folks I know who buy machines a piece at a time have a 
*lot* more trouble with hardware.  Cheap is cheap.

So to summarize: for the same amount of money, you get a slower, less- 
capable machine (lousy graphics), and you still have to assemble it 
yourself.  Bargain City.

-- 

Chad Irby           /    My greatest fear: that future generations will,
cirby@gate.net     /      for some reason, refer to me as an "optimist."