Quote:
Originally Posted by Trollheart
I freely admit I am not a gamer, but I always thought Alienware were the PCs you would, as a gamer, buy if you came into a shedload of money? Who is better then, just as a matter of interest? Though I stand by my comment that a desktop is better for the reasons I outlined, especially ease of upgrade.
|
No I agree, a desktop is far better. Simply because you can plan your setup, choose your individual parts, and build it yourself, or have someone else do it. You can't do that in the same scope when you're choosing a pre-built laptop, and even less when you're just picking an "Alienware setup A, Alienware setup B", etc.
I'm not much more than a casuaul gamer myself, however I've built many PCs and I know that the entire process of paying more for a brand that does it for you is largely an industry based on ignorance and susceptibility to marketing.
I can, quite literally, build you an "Alienware gaming PC" with the exact same parts, except with a different shell. And for significantly less money. That's what I mean. And enthusiasts know this, which is why Alienware gets most of their profits from the same kind of people you mentioned, but never the enthusiasts that have a bit of knowledge about the fact that Alienware is doing the exact same thing, with the exact same parts, but just putting it all together, mounting it in a custom case, and selling the product for more than it's actually worth. Alienware is not creating CPUs. They aren't creating graphics cards. They are not creating RAM. And to my knowledge, they aren't creating motherboards, nor are they creating chipsets, pertinent drivers, nor any of the things that make a computer perform. They are a brand that creates their own look, and their own perception. That's irrelevant to someone who puts down the kind of money it takes to have a good gaming PC for the right reasons.
There is nothing inherently better about Alienware, nor is there anything inherently better about a pre-built PC, save for the possibility that someone that doesn't know how to Google the relatively simple process might screw something up. Although, I think that the only scenario where people should be paying more than the worth of the parts is if they're getting a custom built laptop, which is largely out of the scope of enthusiasts to do on their own (as opposed to desktops). But even then, Alienware is not the only game in town, and you can still pay significantly less for the same hardware, because you're simultaneously not paying for brand recognition that has absolutely nothing to do with performance.
That's all I'm saying.