How reliable is pricewatch?

[slateman]

I've never used pricewatch, so could someone sort of explain it to me? I mean, do they have some sort of deal with the stores or what?

[cheetah256]

i don't know if they have a deal with the sellers, but i've never had any problem ordering from the people who advertise on there..

[theraidenproject]

this is the paintballwatch.com people, right? If so, I've never ordered from one of ther sellers. I just use it as a gauge of what actual prices are, compared to MSRP, because I can usually find chepaer prices then their retailers.

[cphilip]

Not very acurate but sometimes it helps. But do not use it as your only search. I was looking around at Stock WGP Cockers the other day. Price watch failed to show Big Boy Toys had them for like $30 less than anyone else nor will it show they had free UPS ground shipping on top of that. Could cost you $50 right there. I think the major online dealers do not register and so they do not show up.

[krafty]

I think he means Pricewatch, as in the PC hardware/software pricing site.

I use it for a general comparison, but sometimes the info can be horribly innacurate. Over the years I've found some vendors that I trust, and even if they're a few dollars more, tney'll get my business.

[cphilip]

Oh....

In that case...I dunno!

[joeyjoe367]

I bought almost all the components from my new computer on pricewatch. It's very reliable.

But one thing you gotta watch. For example, when I was buying an AMD XP 1700 with a mother board, I looked @ the cheapest one, and it comes with a crapper motherboard. That's pretty much why it was the cheapest one. Down the list a ways, I saw one with a good motherboard and a CPU Fan for only a bit more.

You just gotta check and make sure what you're getting is what you want. actually GETTING the product isn't a problem at all either. Even if they DO rip you off, on a lot of credit cards, you aren't liable for credit card fraud. Visa is one of them, I'm pretty sure.

One thing, they're GOING to nail you on shipping. What would normally be only 8 dollars to ship is going to cost you 16 or so. But even after the shipping shaft, as I like to call it, it's usually 'still a great deal.

Compare them to your local computer hardware store, and you'll see that there's a large differance in cost.

The reason they can sell the products so cheaply is because they're OEM products, so don't expect anything more than a brown paper box, an installation CD, and MAYBE a manual.

[than205]

joeyjoe367,
What motherboard did you end up with?
I'm looking a getting another Asus.

[joeyjoe367]

I use an ECS (Elite Group) K7S5A, which uses the SiS 735 chipset. 2 DDR, and 2 SDRam slots, but cannot be used at the same time.

also has a built in ethernet card (works well) and sound card, but the sound card is worthless because the amp in it is the size of a grain of rice, and unless you have powered speakers, you won't be able to hear anything.

Also has built in game port, and USB. There's a pin setup for those cases with USB ports in the front, so you can have 4 usb ports.

I like this motherboard a lot. It's pretty darn reliable, no hardware-based crashes so far, and i've been using it for 3 or 4 months now, the comp. on for about 5-6 hours a day ( not ON it all that time )

It also supports up to XP 2000, but with a bios update (which you can download) it can go up to XP2100.

It also has 4 PCI slots, and an AGP 4x slot.

It's an all-round GREAT mother board with a GREAT Bang/Buck Ratio. I think it was $65 for the Mobo. I highly recommend it. Several of my friends have systems built around this motherboard.

I've been told that it's picky about it's power supply, and won't run well with anything lower than a 300Watt power supply. But since I got one with my case, I've never had to experience it.

ASUS Makes GREAt motherboards, but in my oppinion, they're a bit over priced, as with a lot of name brand Motherboards.

ECS Targets the OEM market, so their products are a LOT lower priced.

You might want to look for the ECS K7S6A, which is pretty much the same motherboard, except with 4 DDR slots, instead of 2 DDR and 2 SD.

I hope this helps.

[Tbone]

That Asus sounds like a great board to have. I bought a Soyo Dragon Plus KT266A this past Christmas and it seems to be treating me very well.

About that pricewatch thing - you can also check http://www.techbargains.com for coupons and discounts on online purhcases. They are usually great for getting you good deals on lots of stuff. (I bought a Lite-On 16X/40X DVD-Rom from Dell for $38.14 shipped with discounts from techbargains.com

There's also a great forum at http://www.anandtech.com that has a "Hot Deals" section where people find good prices and deals on the internet. Happy hunting!



-Chris

[than205]

joeyjoe367,
I wanted to thank you for the MoBo suggestion. I got one about 2 weeks ago. Still running great.
Thanks man!