Dell steals $300-400 off customers!!!!!!

306maxi

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http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1697,1970767,00.asp

Seriously..... go onto Newegg and put the following items in your cart

A 975X chipset board
A P4 930 CPU
512mb of expensive DDR2 memory
An Antec P180 (or any decent case that catches your fancy)
a 500w+ PSU which is SLI capable, modular and so on

Tell me how much it costs you. Don't know if they include an OS and it doesn't state this so I didn't include it! I suspect that as it doesn't have a hard drive it doesn't include an OS.
 

FITCamaro

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:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

Like $1200 for a case, power supply, motherboard, Pentium D 930, and 512MB of RAM? Thats funny. Especially considering its a shitty Dell motherboard and just regular Value RAM. Their cases aren't horrible but they're no Lian Li or Silverstone.
 

SciPunk

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No suprise there, business as usual - its why I've always wondered why so many people buy Dells
Well there is a little thing called "value added". Dell assembles the system for you, tests it, and provides support for the whole system (even though the componants come from different sources). I think we should also assume that Dell is trying to make a profit, not just break even. And let's also asume that they have to pay emplyees, facility fees, insurance, etc... So adding $300-$400 seems fairly reasonable to me.

Personally I wouldn't buy a system from Dell, but for people who don't want to spend an entire weekend building a system, loading the drivers, updating the OS, and loading software... that sound pretty reasonable.

Let me ask you, if you build a nice system for around $850, including Windows... how much would YOU sell it for?
 

Tenshigure

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It's already been pointed out...but how exactly are you going to be "stealing" a profit of that margin? It's not like they're tripling the cost of the machine to bend you over on the costs; hell, I find if anything they found the right margin to help compensate for not only parts testing, but R&S and tech support as well.

I don't know about you, but if I built a barebones machine and sold it off, I'd make as much as I could off the thing. Hell, whenever I build PCs for other people, I try to make at least $200-300 off them, so does that mean I'm stealing from them as well? No, it's just smart business practices.

The solution: DONT BUY FROM DELL IF YOU DONT WANT TO. Call me crazy, but ranting about this to people who wouldn't in their right mindset buy combos like that from ANYONE is futile...and as I know from many customers I deal with, there are plenty of people out there that would rather spend top dollar on namebrand merchandise then worry about quality or even performance (see the iPod).
 

Pain

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I can't wait to start a business where I will just give away my product without making a profit. Boy, I'll turn the business world on end!

:roll:
 

Exterous

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Well there is a little thing called "value added". Dell assembles the system for you, tests it, and provides support for the whole system (even though the componants come from different sources). I think we should also assume that Dell is trying to make a profit, not just break even. And let's also asume that they have to pay emplyees, facility fees, insurance, etc... So adding $300-$400 seems fairly reasonable to me.

Let me ask you, if you build a nice system for around $850, including Windows... how much would YOU sell it for?

I belive I said BUSINESS as usual - and as well all know, businesses try to make money. But what I can make for $850 is not what they can make for $850. They have a bit more buying power than I do so comparing me to a multi-billion dollar corporation seems a bit of a stretch :wink: Based on experience I would put their price at around $500 (If that). Now given their markup size and that fact that you can get a non-barebones PC from HP with a D940, 1GBRAM, DVDburner, 160GB HD w/ MCE OS for $1109.99 - or a similar from Gateway for $50 less - is why I wonder why so many people buy Dell
 

AndrewNP

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dell looks to make profit, they have on site support if you get the right warranty, a bit easier than going through each company you brought from.

keep your eyes open, there is almost ALWAYS an good deal coupon code you can find that reduces the price by a marginal amount, as for right now there is 40% off dimension desktops (you could of gotten 2405fpw w/ a standard e510+x600 gfx for 960$) ...the monitor alone is around 700 (then sell the dual core pentium system w/ 512mb ram and an x600 for XXX, making a decent profit.) or just give it to your kid/friend with a different monitor as a gift/sale.
---the 2405fpw was taken out of the choices because so many people did the deal mention aboved, the 40% off is still in action until 6/8. (the 2005fp is still a choice)

dell charges a bit extra to make money, but look at their value systems (as low as 300$ per system)...okay it is a 2.53 celery with 512 and a 160gig but that is what schools would use. buy 100 of them with the 40% off, that is a deal(heance why dell is the largest computer retailer in the world)


well..after conroe there should be amazing deals at dell and everywhere else for that matter.
 

wun911

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OMG Dell actually makes money from selling computers???? world shattering news.... and you know what they probably make more than just 400 bucks a PC.

I dont think they buy their parts from newegg either I think they just bulk buy their PCs.

I hear they have good customer support, but then again never had a dell.... never been ripped that badly.
 

306maxi

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OMG Dell actually makes money from selling computers???? world shattering news.... and you know what they probably make more than just 400 bucks a PC.

I dont think they buy their parts from newegg either I think they just bulk buy their PCs.

I hear they have good customer support, but then again never had a dell.... never been ripped that badly.

I wasn't suggesting that they buy their parts from Newegg :roll: No Tier 1 buys parts from retailers or etailers :roll:

The point I'm making is that this isn't even a system......it doesn't have a graphics card, hdd, optical drive or OS. It doesn't require Dell to assemble a bespoke set of applications for this particular PC and test that it works properly as they'd do with their normal PC's. This is just some guy in a factory screwing in a mobo, putting a CPU in and screwing the PSU in. It's blatant highway robbery. I wouldn't be surprised if they're making US$600 on these systems........

It's be just like being able to buy a BMW in bits and paying someone to assemble it for less than what it costs to buy one from the showroom floor.

Of course Dell have the right to make money. But this verges on theft
 

shadowduck

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Well there is a little thing called "value added". Dell assembles the system for you, tests it, and provides support for the whole system (even though the componants come from different sources). I think we should also assume that Dell is trying to make a profit, not just break even. And let's also asume that they have to pay emplyees, facility fees, insurance, etc... So adding $300-$400 seems fairly reasonable to me.

Let me ask you, if you build a nice system for around $850, including Windows... how much would YOU sell it for?

I belive I said BUSINESS as usual - and as well all know, businesses try to make money. But what I can make for $850 is not what they can make for $850. They have a bit more buying power than I do so comparing me to a multi-billion dollar corporation seems a bit of a stretch :wink: Based on experience I would put their price at around $500 (If that). Now given their markup size and that fact that you can get a non-barebones PC from HP with a D940, 1GBRAM, DVDburner, 160GB HD w/ MCE OS for $1109.99 - or a similar from Gateway for $50 less - is why I wonder why so many people buy Dell

You don't provide 24/7 Tech support, onsite service for 3 years (standard on business systems) either. Newegg is always going to be cheaper, but if your system breaks after 2 weeks, you won't be calling Newegg for troubleshooting, if it were a Dell you can call them for help.

Besides, this is a free market economy, price is based on what people are willing to pay. Dell is not ripping off anyone, they are simply doing what they are REQUIRED to do (to their best ability) by law, increase shareholder value.
 

306maxi

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Well there is a little thing called "value added". Dell assembles the system for you, tests it, and provides support for the whole system (even though the componants come from different sources). I think we should also assume that Dell is trying to make a profit, not just break even. And let's also asume that they have to pay emplyees, facility fees, insurance, etc... So adding $300-$400 seems fairly reasonable to me.

Let me ask you, if you build a nice system for around $850, including Windows... how much would YOU sell it for?

I belive I said BUSINESS as usual - and as well all know, businesses try to make money. But what I can make for $850 is not what they can make for $850. They have a bit more buying power than I do so comparing me to a multi-billion dollar corporation seems a bit of a stretch :wink: Based on experience I would put their price at around $500 (If that). Now given their markup size and that fact that you can get a non-barebones PC from HP with a D940, 1GBRAM, DVDburner, 160GB HD w/ MCE OS for $1109.99 - or a similar from Gateway for $50 less - is why I wonder why so many people buy Dell

You don't provide 24/7 Tech support, onsite service for 3 years (standard on business systems) either. Newegg is always going to be cheaper, but if your system breaks after 2 weeks, you won't be calling Newegg for troubleshooting, if it were a Dell you can call them for help.

Besides, this is a free market economy, price is based on what people are willing to pay. Dell is not ripping off anyone, they are simply doing what they are REQUIRED to do (to their best ability) by law, increase shareholder value.

Yes. But with the money you save by buying a PC from a local PC that still comes with a warranty ..... you could get a better specced machine than this. Or a HP and have something that's better than the Dell, higher specced and still has a warranty
 

HYST3R

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wow. a bare bone system for the price of a fully functional pc!

yeah sounds like big business and marketing pulling the wool over the uneducated customers eyes.

i also noticed that they threw in the letters XPS as many times as possible (marketing), making it sound like its some sort of top of the line parts. HA!
 

S7A88Y

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Its called buesniess, they can make a good PROFIT this way, Intel does it 2

it cost Intel 45USD to make one of their 650USD chips.
 

MadHacker

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Its called buesniess, they can make a good PROFIT this way, Intel does it 2

it cost Intel 45USD to make one of their 650USD chips.

But how much does Intel pay for the first CPU off the line? with their research, costs of making a plant... AMD just spent 2.5 billion on a factory...
 

Exterous

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Well there is a little thing called "value added". Dell assembles the system for you, tests it, and provides support for the whole system (even though the componants come from different sources). I think we should also assume that Dell is trying to make a profit, not just break even. And let's also asume that they have to pay emplyees, facility fees, insurance, etc... So adding $300-$400 seems fairly reasonable to me.

Let me ask you, if you build a nice system for around $850, including Windows... how much would YOU sell it for?

I belive I said BUSINESS as usual - and as well all know, businesses try to make money. But what I can make for $850 is not what they can make for $850. They have a bit more buying power than I do so comparing me to a multi-billion dollar corporation seems a bit of a stretch :wink: Based on experience I would put their price at around $500 (If that). Now given their markup size and that fact that you can get a non-barebones PC from HP with a D940, 1GBRAM, DVDburner, 160GB HD w/ MCE OS for $1109.99 - or a similar from Gateway for $50 less - is why I wonder why so many people buy Dell

You don't provide 24/7 Tech support, onsite service for 3 years (standard on business systems) either. Newegg is always going to be cheaper, but if your system breaks after 2 weeks, you won't be calling Newegg for troubleshooting, if it were a Dell you can call them for help.

Besides, this is a free market economy, price is based on what people are willing to pay. Dell is not ripping off anyone, they are simply doing what they are REQUIRED to do (to their best ability) by law, increase shareholder value.

I don't belive I mentioned giving customer support. In fact I mentioned that comparing me to Dell was not a good idea. I am not a corporation of thousands of people. I also didn't say anything about buying from newegg. I compared dell's barebones PC to a full PC from HP and Gateway. I understand that Dell is trying to make money, hence the 'business as usual' remark - my comment is simply that I don't understand why people overpay for their Dells. I will say that Dell does sometimes give good discounts - but often, even with their 40% coupons, fall short of an HP or Gateway computer price (Which is why I speculate that they are the only computer company (besides Lenovo-mobile only) that lost market % last quarter. HP, Acer, Sony and Gateway all posted % gains
 

elpresidente2075

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I wonder if anyone here has even SEEN this chassis. Even though I would never buy the combo mentioned in the first post, I WOULD consider buying just the case and power supply. Did you know that the red one comes with a 1Kw power supply, standard? Not to mention, the case is pretty sexy if you ask me. Just wish they would take the letters D-E-L-L off the front...
 

Malimn

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What I find is funny how people are talking about the price but forgetting they are using CHEAP parts.... Who gives a rats arse if your drive space is 500 Gigs if the thing is slow as crap. Dell, Gateway, etc build PC's to a price point with very little thought to quality. I built my PC a year and a half ago and other than not having a SLI or Crossfire motherboard I am sure that my system is at least 2-3 times faster than the lemmings who buy a new computer based of off drive size, memory (512mb), DVD, USB, etc.

MY Comptuer specs are as follows:
Aspire XNavigator Case (500w Power supply)
ASUS A8V Deluxe motherboard
AMD 3800 64 Bit Processor
3GB Corsair XMS Pro CAS2 Memory
Dual 74GB 10kRPM SATA Raptor drives
Plextor SATA DVD R/W Drive
X800 Pro (only weak link now) Video Card
XP Pro

My cost via Newegg was 1800.00 or so and I spent about 5 hours putting the system together, loading the OS and then patching.

Go ahead lemmings and buy from Dell, Gateway, etc and you will get what you paid for.. Cheap box with cheap slow parts. instead of speaking to tech support here in the US, which when you buy your speaking to someone who speaks our languange, you will have to deal with someone in india who is just reading from a series of scripts on how to fix your computer.
 

koogco

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i am glad that people finally realise that dell does add alot to the price of a computersystem.. i have an example.. but even though it is in USD it is still the danish prices (wich are alot higher than those in US)
just for fun i collected a very good gaming computer at the danish dell website.. the price was nearly 4000$
to compare i collected the exact same computer (with asembling) at a danish site named shg.dk (where i buy my system soon) they did it for about 2200$.. so even though dell migt have price knockoffs up to 40%.. it is just not enough to make up for the price, and about support, there are always forums like this one, where alot of people wants to help.

so unless you know nothing about computers at all, dont go for Dell!
 

koogco

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i am glad that people finally realise that dell does add alot to the price of a computersystem.. i have an example.. but even though it is in USD it is still the danish prices (wich are alot higher than those in US)
just for fun i collected a very good gaming computer at the danish dell website.. the price was nearly 4000$
to compare i collected the exact same computer (with asembling) at a danish site named shg.dk (where i buy my system soon) they did it for about 2200$.. so even though dell migt have price knockoffs up to 40%.. it is just not enough to make up for the price, and about support, there are always forums like this one, where alot of people wants to help.

so unless you know nothing about computers at all, dont go for Dell!
 

Pain

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I am a network admin by trade and before that I worked in electronics for 18 years. When someone asks me my opinion on what computer they should buy, and I know that person knows little or nothing about computers, you know what I tell them? I tell them to go to Dell, or HP, or Gateway and pick one out and buy it. Why? So I don't have to offer them tech support myself.

I'll help my friends with computers, but I'm not going to get involved with helping every tom-dick-harry with computer problems.

There are a lot of people who know nothing about computers, and it's easy for people on this or other hardware forums to try to make sense of them buying from OEM manufacturers that we would never consider, but hey, if no one was buying from Dell then they wouldn't be in business. I'd be more than happy to own a business as sucessful as Dell has been. I'm sure most everyone posting in this thread would too.

I personally buy my company machines from Micron, or MPC as they are known now. Not because I couldn't build a better machine but because it's not worth my time to build every machine by hand. MPC actually uses very good parts and has excellent tech support for their business clients...I can't speak about consumer tech support.
 

lewbaseball07

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No suprise there, business as usual - its why I've always wondered why so many people buy Dells
Well there is a little thing called "value added". Dell assembles the system for you, tests it, and provides support for the whole system (even though the componants come from different sources). I think we should also assume that Dell is trying to make a profit, not just break even. And let's also asume that they have to pay emplyees, facility fees, insurance, etc... So adding $300-$400 seems fairly reasonable to me.

Personally I wouldn't buy a system from Dell, but for people who don't want to spend an entire weekend building a system, loading the drivers, updating the OS, and loading software... that sound pretty reasonable.

Let me ask you, if you build a nice system for around $850, including Windows... how much would YOU sell it for? DUDE IAM 12 AND IT TAKES ME LIKE 6 HOURS TO BUILD A COMPUTER AND DO ALL THAT STUFF....NOT 2 DAYS(MAYBE IF UR A NOOB) I THINK DELLS ARE A RIPE OFFFFFF!!!!!!!!!!!