Off-Topic Thread V3.0

rob808

Vicxas wrote: »

After nearly a month sitting in "Order Recieved" my PC finally went into production yesterday:

nice what are you getting of Dell.I say it was expensive given the state of the PC market.

K.O.Kiki

I'm sorry to anyone I recommended getting a Dell G5

MidlanderMan

K.O.Kiki wrote: »

I'm sorry to anyone I recommended getting a Dell G5

Dell, Lenovo and HP are all notorious for using weird non-standard motherboards, PSUs, and cases. Anyone recommending one needs to add that information to the recomenation.
Dell systems, especially Alienware, are also atrocious for airflow and thermals.

cherryghost

Dell have been doing that for years, but jesus christ that is terrible.

Homelander

People really to stop looking at, and assessing, these PC's from an enthusiast POV. They are not, and never have been, aimed at people who build their own machines.

Most major manufacturers do similar. Do I support it? No. Do I think it makes them terrible PC's for the average joe who have no interest in building, and have never even seen the inside of a PC? Also no.

I think it's fair to say that no-one here, outside of the current shortage situation obviously, would ever really recommend Dell or Asus or whoever over the likes of AWD, PC Specialist, or other places supplying well-priced pre-builts assembled from standard parts.

But I think Dell, Lenovo, etc are completely fine for 90% of the market who don't care about standard parts, airflow, RAM speed, etc. In fact more than "not care", they literally have zero clue, or interest, about how the machines work.

If they turn on and their games work, it's all good.

ED E

Helped a mate get a Aurora R5(?) from their outlet a few months back. Is it the bees knees? Nope. Is he loving DIRT 3 and Asseto Corsa? Fvck yes he is.

cherryghost

Homelander wrote: »

People really to stop looking at, and assessing, these PC's from an enthusiast POV. They are not, and never have been, aimed at people who build their own machines.

Most major manufacturers do similar. Do I support it? No. Do I think it makes them terrible PC's for the average joe who have no interest in building, and have never even seen the inside of a PC? Also no.

I think it's fair to say that no-one here, outside of the current shortage situation obviously, would ever really recommend Dell or Asus or whoever over the likes of AWD, PC Specialist, or other places supplying well-priced pre-builts assembled from standard parts.

But I think Dell, Lenovo, etc are completely fine for 90% of the market who don't care about standard parts, airflow, RAM speed, etc. In fact more than "not care", they literally have zero clue, or interest, about how the machines work.

If they turn on and their games work, it's all good.

It's being assessed as more of the PC enthusiast are turning to OEM manufacturers due to the ongoing shortages. That is purely what the GN video is based on, he specifically talked about that in the video.

savemejebus

K.O.Kiki wrote: »

I'm sorry to anyone I recommended getting a Dell G5

Sorry now but that was one of the worst videos i've seen from them. The factual content is indisputable but the faux outrage is mental. He says he's been building systems since at least 04 but this is the first time he's seen many of the things in the DELL? Come on, that's clickbait, i'm surprised it's not titled

"We bought this DELL pc and you'll never believe what we found inside?"

Dell have been doing this forever, it is and has always been (with some atx xps exceptions) a big part of their business model. Anyone, and I do mean anyone who buys a bog standard DELL thinking that they'll be able to use something other than the CPU,GPU,Ram and hdd elsewhere is likely the same type of person who comes on here complaining because their 10 euro no name chinese psu is crap. They haven't done any research.

He says if you are one of those people that aren't into (building) computers then you won't really care but if you want to just buy a pre-built to game on then you should care because long term you're going to end up buying another computer. Strangely enough i'm pretty sure that's what someone who is not into computers will do anyway.

I haven't subbed to his channel but does he have a similar video about iMacs not using standard form factors and parts....sheesh

He could have made the same video in a much less crappy way by pointing out how weird DELL builds are compared to standard builds but man the way they did that sucks.

K.O.Kiki

Homelander wrote: »

People really to stop looking at, and assessing, these PC's from an enthusiast POV. They are not, and never have been, aimed at people who build their own machines.

Most major manufacturers do similar. Do I support it? No. Do I think it makes them terrible PC's for the average joe who have no interest in building, and have never even seen the inside of a PC? Also no.

[...]

Most OEMs don’t do this anymore!
They underspec but the majority of Lenovo/HP prebuilts these days use standard ATX/mATX components, meaning you have an upgrade path.

savemejebus wrote: »

[...]

Dell have been doing this forever, it is and has always been (with some atx xps exceptions) a big part of their business model. Anyone, and I do mean anyone who buys a bog standard DELL thinking that they'll be able to use something other than the CPU,GPU,Ram and hdd elsewhere is likely the same type of person who comes on here complaining because their 10 euro no name chinese psu is crap. They haven't done any research.

He says if you are one of those people that aren't into (building) computers then you won't really care but if you want to just buy a pre-built to game on then you should care because long term you're going to end up buying another computer. Strangely enough i'm pretty sure that's what someone who is not into computers will do anyway.

I haven't subbed to his channel but does he have a similar video about iMacs not using standard form factors and parts....sheesh

He could have made the same video in a much less crappy way by pointing out how weird DELL builds are compared to standard builds but man the way they did that sucks.

Asinine take.

As has been shown in other videos, the Dell G5 suffers because of the bad design implemented throughout.

Bad thermals with proprietary heatsinks, low boosting behaviour, even simple things like shipping with single-channel RAM by default.
All fixable if they just used standard components and decent designs, e.g. to allow users to install more/better fans, or a standard heatsink.

People are buying computers expecting decent performance and yet they’re missing out on 10-20%, with few ways to fix it.
And because of that missing performance, they will feel the need to upgrade sooner (costing them money) with a system that can’t be sold piecemeal (thus, e-Waste).
It’s ethically irresponsible (and don’t give me that “hurr durr good business” crap)

savemejebus

K.O.Kiki wrote: »

Asinine take......

Way to go. Did you miss the part where I said

The factual content is indisputable but the faux outrage is mental

Cuddlesworth

savemejebus wrote: »

He could have made the same video in a much less crappy way by pointing out how weird DELL builds are compared to standard builds but man the way they did that sucks.

I think its the first time he was really encountered this from watching the video. I can somewhat understand the outrage, in a SFF machine dells propriety parts make sense but in a large tower like this, the cost savings would have to be minimal.

And I think he has a good point, everything in that desktop apart from 3 items is unfixable and unusable without support from Dell.

In the past, that wasn't a big deal because the 5 year support cycle was in line with a machine being fit for recycling at the end. Thats no longer the case, a 10 year old mid spec desktop, like a 2500K Sandy Bridge and 8 gigs of ram, is still relevant with minor upgrades for general office use. In 10 years time, your average mid spec machine is probably going to see little to none of its capacity used. I see this right now with my own system, the cpu/mobo/ram/case are 7 years old now and I see zero reasons to upgrade.

But this desktop and many others like it will end up as scrap because its unfixable without Dell provided parts. Even the case is scrap. Its incredibly wasteful, those standards exist for a reason.

savemejebus

Cuddlesworth wrote: »

I think its the first time he was really encountered this from watching the video. I can somewhat understand the outrage, in a SFF machine dells propriety parts make sense but in a large tower like this, the cost savings would have to be minimal.

I don't buy it, he's talking about building machines since 04, he'd have to have encountered this. Cost savings might be minimal but consumer lock in and forcing a costly support path would add up to big bucks, a la apple. And just so there is no confusion, i personally think this is a bad thing.

Cuddlesworth wrote: »

And I think he has a good point, everything in that desktop apart from 3 items is unfixable and unusable without support from Dell.

In the past, that wasn't a big deal because the 5 year support cycle was in line with a machine being fit for recycling at the end. Thats no longer the case....

But this desktop and many others like it will end up as scrap because its unfixable without Dell provided parts. Even the case is scrap. Its incredibly wasteful, those standards exist for a reason.

Again, I don't disagree with any of this. My issue is with the video and how it's presented. It's arriving very late to the party to pretend to be outraged by a practice that has been in place since 2003 at least.

AlmightyCushion

I do think his outrage in the video is a bit OTT but that is kinda standard for his videos. Maybe I am remembering wrong but I thought Dell stopped using non-proprietary components years ago. At least in some of their gaming PCs as opposed to the cheaper/smaller PCs. I vaguely remember it being discussed here maybe 10 years ago. The custom cooling solutions on the GPU seems horrible and pretty scummy. You wouldn't expect them to use the best cooler out there but surely they should be using something better than that. The performance from it must be rubbish even compared to a stock cooler from nVidia.

Cuddlesworth

savemejebus wrote: »

I don't buy it, he's talking about building machines since 04, he'd have to have encountered this. Cost savings might be minimal but consumer lock in and forcing a costly support path would add up to big bucks, a la apple. And just so there is no confusion, i personally think this is a bad thing.



Again, I don't disagree with any of this. My issue is with the video and how it's presented. It's arriving very late to the party to pretend to be outraged by a practice that has been in place since 2003 at least.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/stephenlburke/

He might not have seen it in practise, unless he was exposed to Dell hardware directly. Even though he has been employed by Dell, his past tech experience seems to be software based with pc building on the side. If thats the case its possible this is a first for him.

Dell were also never really this bad. Power supply's were ATX with odd pin layouts(you could modify). CPU coolers were standard to the board. A fair amount of this is new to me, since I haven't really seen a home Dell desktop for 10+ years.

Homelander

Dell really isn't the only or primary manufacturer using non-standard parts. The thing is, all of the major manufacturers have flip-flopped between using standard and non-standard parts, and not necessarily in time periods, but also by models. So there's no definitive way to say that X uses standard parts where Y doesn't, for the most part.

Many manufacturers also have "standard" parts that are wired differently, so people only found out the hard way when their new PSU wouldn't power on the build. HP in particular were brutal for this. When Dell use standard ATX, in every case I've seen anyway, they were 100% standard ATX spec.

I don't for a second disagree that there's factual statements in that video, or that Dell do employ negative practices even outside using non-standard parts. Someone mentioned single channel RAM. This is brutal, and it's something I've raised repeatedly in the past - it's absurd to be offering single channel RAM in gaming desktop's and laptops.

But for the most part, these machines do the job that's expected of them by mass consumers. The kind of people who buy these gaming machines without the faintest clue about - or interest in - what lies below the surface, for the most part, once it works.

These same people typically - particularly in the mid-range - would buy a new machine every 4/5 years also, rather than upgrade, and come away with a generally positive experience of having purchased Dell, in the main.

It's a corporate world and these companies aren't stupid, all of these things are carefully assessed and all factors weighed up. There's all manner of other ****ty practices in effect among various retailers too.

Again, ultimately, not a chance I'd ever recommend Dell over a self-build, or buying a pre-built from a firm that assembles with off-the-shelf parts either. But they are what they are, they're very reasonable value, and they're not the devil they're often made out to be.

Confused11811

For the average consumer in Ireland what's the real alternative to these Dell, Lenovo prebuilds ? Overpriced CustomPC in Carlow ?

Is it the Amazon UK prebuilds that'll ship to Ireland which are few and far between? The various other independent PC manufactures from outside of Ireland that'll ship here but might take 6 to 8 weeks to be assembled and shipped.

Build your own is off the cards for all but a few, how many have the skills/patience/money to do so. My most recent build cost €1,266.81 and was completed weeks after the first component was bought. GPU's next to impossible to get unless your like me, presently glued to your workstation while working at home and manage to react to part alerts within the half second they appear.

For most people the Dell will do and not just because there is nothing else there. Dell is a brand name most know and rightly or wrongly they would trust. In truth their PC's will do the job for most, the market for the G5 is probably parents buying a gamin PC for young kids and teens who've been told by friends that PC gaming is better than Xbox or PS5.

That reviewer makes valid points but he is a rage merchant. Just look at his teardown review of the AMD RX6700XT where he's just short of throwing it against a wall. His rage is just a front to get more clicks and subscribers, there are better more balanced reviewers out there. He is overly and needlessly aggressive in his tone, I just don't like watching his videos.

AlmightyCushion

Confused11811 wrote: »

For the average consumer in Ireland what's the real alternative to these Dell, Lenovo prebuilds ? Overpriced CustomPC in Carlow ?

Is it the Amazon UK prebuilds that'll ship to Ireland which are few and far between? The various other independent PC manufactures from outside of Ireland that'll ship here but might take 6 to 8 weeks to be assembled and shipped.

Build your own is off the cards for all but a few, how many have the skills/patience/money to do so. My most recent build cost €1,266.81 and was completed weeks after the first component was bought. GPU's next to impossible to get unless your like me, presently glued to your workstation while working at home and manage to react to part alerts within the half second they appear.

For most people the Dell will do and not just because there is nothing else there. Dell is a brand name most know and rightly or wrongly they would trust. In truth their PC's will do the job for most, the market for the G5 is probably parents buying a gamin PC for young kids and teens who've been told by friends that PC gaming is better than Xbox or PS5.

Brexit has screwed us a bit in that department but don't a few of them still ship here such as PC Specialist and AWD?

Confused11811 wrote: »

That reviewer makes valid points but he is a rage merchant. Just look at his teardown review of the AMD RX6700XT where he's just short of throwing it against a wall. His rage is just a front to get more clicks and subscribers, there are better more balanced reviewers out there. He is overly and needlessly aggressive in his tone, I just don't like watching his videos.

Is that the one where he said the card was terrible because it didn't have thermal pads on the back of it? Yeah he gets really pissed off over the smallest of things sometimes.

MidlanderMan

He said the card was crap because the heatsink didn't make contact with the memory. Which he's right to ridicule.

deceit

With crypto currency collapsing today by about 50% does this mean we might get reasonably priced gpu's soon?

Confused11811

AlmightyCushion wrote: »

Brexit has screwed us a bit in that department but don't a few of them still ship here such as PC Specialist and AWD?

AWD(ADMI) on Amazon , some ship and some don't depends on if it's fullfilled by them Amazon or not. It's the same with other prebuilt on Amazon. Outside of Amazon it seems there are long lead times and in times of price and consumer trust Dell will probably be considered the better option in the view of the average Joe. Most people will rightly or wrongly take the easier cheaper option and they'll be 100 percent happy with the results.

AlmightyCushion wrote: »

Is that the one where he said the card was terrible because it didn't have thermal pads on the back of it? Yeah he gets really pissed off over the smallest of things sometimes.

That's the one

MidlanderMan wrote: »

He said the card was crap because the heatsink didn't make contact with the memory. Which he's right to ridicule.

Agreed but the ridicule and point he's trying to make is lost when he's acting like a baby throwing the card around like it's complete piece of junk. Maybe it's just me but I discount him as being OTT and a rage merchant.

AlmightyCushion

MidlanderMan wrote: »

He said the card was crap because the heatsink didn't make contact with the memory. Which he's right to ridicule.

He definitely gave out about there not being thermal pads on the back of it and it was more than just a passing comment.

deceit wrote: »

With crypto currency collapsing today by about 50% does this mean we might get reasonably priced gpu's soon?

Hopefully it doesn't just rebound back up and business as usual. Would be great to see the crypto prices crash and stay low and give us a better chance of getting a GPU.

AlmightyCushion

Confused11811 wrote: »

AWD(ADMI) on Amazon , some ship and some don't depends on if it's fullfilled by them Amazon or not. It's the same with other prebuilt on Amazon. Outside of Amazon it seems there are long lead times and in times of price and consumer trust Dell will probably be considered the better option in the view of the average Joe. Most people will rightly or wrongly take the easier cheaper option and they'll be 100 percent happy with the results.

Are they the same as these guys? https://www.awd-it.co.uk/ I think they ship here.

Yeah, I know what you mean. The Dell will be grand for most people. It would just be better if they used standardised parts and didn't ship their stuff with rubbish coolers. If something goes wrong with that power supply in a few years, what the hell do you do with it? Getting a replacement could be a balls and in a few years it will still be a decent PC that would be worth repairing something like that.

Confused11811

deceit wrote: »

With crypto currency collapsing today by about 50% does this mean we might get reasonably priced gpu's soon?

Cryto goes up and down like crazy. IMO the larger miners will ride out the bump, you might see a number of small miners jump and sell used GPU's but the fundamental shortage of 6nm manufacturing facilities required for the current gen GPU's isn't going to change.

Jaguar Land Rover issued profit warnings today because they are going to be hit with the chip shortage affecting manufacturing of vehicles. Samsung , Sony and every other manufacturer needing chips have all said the same.

TSMC - Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. who make the 6nm chips are dealing with a water supply issue affecting output and Taiwan itself is now dealing with a Covid outbreak and bringing in lockdowns.

It's very grim TBH

deceit

Confused11811 wrote: »

Cryto goes up and down like crazy. IMO the larger miners will ride out the bump, you might see a number of small miners jump and sell used GPU's but the fundamental shortage of 6nm manufacturing facilities required for the current gen GPU's isn't going to change.

Jaguar Land Rover issued profit warnings today because they are going to be hit with the chip shortage affecting manufacturing of vehicles. Samsung , Sony and every other manufacturer needing chips have all said the same.

TSMC - Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. who make the 6nm chips are dealing with a water supply issue affecting output and Taiwan itself is now dealing with a Covid outbreak and bringing in lockdowns.

It's very grim TBH

I figured this time it would be different as the chinese government announced a crackdown on crypto currencies. If I'm not mistaken most crypto people would be in China (Not well versed on the topic though).

Confused11811

deceit wrote: »

I figured this time it would be different as the chinese government announced a crackdown on crypto currencies. If I'm not mistaken most crypto people would be in China (Not well versed on the topic though).

Massive facilities in UK, US and Europe, lads like this guy in London won't be phased by recent stuff - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cRxL2GKDU5E

China brings on crackdown, while US banks join partnership with crypto firm NYDIG. There are huge profits being made be certain people with all the volatility.

Crypto aside, the shortage will continue

Mr Crispy

Etherium is transitioning to a Proof-of-Stake model from the current Proof-of-Work model, so it will supposedly be far less reliant on GPUs (and energy) - Etherium Foundation Blog

Of course, miners could just switch to another crypto currency.

Giblet

While Bitcoin crashes, GPU miners earn more!

EoinHef

That Gamers Nexus review of the 6700,was he not annoyed as the problem with the cooler wasn't present on the more expensive models?

Ie they skimped on production costs on lower end models because they knew the cards would sell in the current climate regardless of this problem?

I appreciate Gamers Nexus because they are the most consumer focused of all the reviewers imo. Not afraid to call out or be blacklisted by companies either. They have often said if we get black listed we will just buy products off the shelf for review. They won't compromise their review systems integrity to accommodate companies.

Integrity in journalism is severely lacking these days in a lot of places so good to see at least a few sticking to their guns.

AlmightyCushion

EoinHef wrote: »

That Gamers Nexus review of the 6700,was he not annoyed as the problem with the cooler wasn't present on the more expensive models?

Ie they skimped on production costs on lower end models because they knew the cards would sell in the current climate regardless of this problem?

I appreciate Gamers Nexus because they are the most consumer focused of all the reviewers imo. Not afraid to call out or be blacklisted by companies either. They have often said if we get black listed we will just buy products off the shelf for review. They won't compromise their review systems integrity to accommodate companies.

Integrity in journalism is severely lacking these days in a lot of places so good to see at least a few sticking to their guns.

Wouldn't you expect the more expensive cards to have better coolers? That is part of the appeal of them. He even said in his teardown of a more expensive version (can't remember which) that the cooler is better and more expensive to make. He then said the card doesn't seem like great value because it is near enough the price of the 6800 which offers much better performance and it better value as a result.

EoinHef

AlmightyCushion wrote: »

Wouldn't you expect the more expensive cards to have better coolers? That is part of the appeal of them. He even said in his teardown of a more expensive version (can't remember which) that the cooler is better and more expensive to make. He then said the card doesn't seem like great value because it is near enough the price of the 6800 which offers much better performance and it better value as a result.

The difference in more expensive models to me is that they give a surplus of cooling to allow headroom for say overclocking or are much quieter. Not that a card can only be cheaper if the cooler doesn't meet the fundamental requirements of a cooler.

A cooler is there to do certain things,keep the core, memory along with power delivery cool,I don't think its OK to say we will fully cover two of those fundamentals while scrimping on the third for cheaper models. That could affect the longevity of the card and its stability which suits no one except the company selling it.

I think GN's point was that in normal times the market would take care of this and no one would buy the card as it would be known to have sub standard cooling,but the way things are now with availability they are able to sell them.

And what's evidenced by the more expensive coolers is that companies know these components need the cooling,but to cut costs for cheaper models or make more profit etc these concerns are ignored.

That's what I took from it anyway. GN can be hard to listen to sometimes but ultimately I feel they provide an independent opinion which is sorely lacking in some areas these days.