building new pc, how much to charge?

angelofdeath

i was asked to build a pc for someone, he wants it primarily for audio/video editing and is not much of a gamer. he wanted to get a dell xps system (3.4 p4, 1gig ddr2, 19" tft, dual layer dvd etc) which wouldv'e cost him 3363 euros

so this is what i've put together for 2491 euro - spec and pricing
and the currency conversion - conversion

so, is there anything ive left out or should change and how much do you reckon i should charge for building it?

Creamy Goodness

charge by how long it takes to get all set up, as you don't want to say erm i'll do it for 50 euros and then somethings wrecks your brains during windows install and you end up spending a weekend to get it fixed.

Ciaran500

You better add shipping to that before you decide on any prices.

po0k

Charge him what it costs for the parts + Shipping, and then add in the number of man-hours it took to build at whatever rate you think is ok (€7 p.h. upwards)

Stark

Then decide whether you want to charge for future technical support Because once you build a PC for them, you're their personal customer care technician for the duration of that PC's life. Plus you've to factor a warranty into the Dell price.

angelofdeath

any guesses approximatly as to how much shipping will cost?

Creamy Goodness

i think overclockers has a maximum delivery rate of £22.

i got one hefty monitor delivered the other week (iiyama pro454) the box weight 25kilos :O

i also ordered other stuff that come in separate box and i was only charged £22.

Jessop

I wouldn't recomend XP Home for audio/video editing. To unstable in my experience. XP Pro is a big improvement.

Ciaran500

There should be no stability differences between XP Pro and Home. Most differences are in to the networking section.

Jessop

dont know a huge amount bout operating systems, just from experience working with audio editing in XP home i've had alot of problems which XP Pro seems to have sorted out

angelofdeath

i agree, i use home for av editing and have never had any trouble, the only differences between home and pro are to do with networking, i decided to go with intel and a large hd for video editing purposes, the gfx card might be overkill but he was looking at an x800 on the xps system

SantaHoe

Stark wrote:

Then decide whether you want to charge for future technical support Because once you build a PC for them, you're their personal customer care technician for the duration of that PC's life. Plus you've to factor a warranty into the Dell price.

Couldn't agree more.
Basically EVERYTHING that will EVER go wrong with this PC will be your fault no matter how much it really wasn't.
I'd make sure you clear this up with the person before hand and either arrange some kind of pay-per-issue support, or tell them they're on their own once you've set it up.
Within reason of course, maybe give them a month or so of hand-holding until you're sure the PC is stable.
It's hard to know with some people... whether or not they've got the balls to call you up a year later asking you what their password is. :rolleyes:

angelofdeath

well i think if he has issues down the line with configuration then ill be happy to sort it out, but if one of the components ups and dies on him then he can go deal with overclockers and ill make that clear to him

SantaHoe

I suppose it depends on how well you know the guy and how much you've already got on your plate... be warned though, free support can really add up when you're the sole tech support for a lot of different people... you end up working almost full time for diddly squat.

Nukem

Ok here is my 2cents

You have a PCI-E mobo (linky)and an AGP card.
That mobo has a nice onboard Audio setup - wouldnt bother with the Soundcard (maybe). Thats case is way cheaper in Komplett (by about 25euro)
Why eactly are you buyin in the uk. Did you check Komplett and Jes

Mutant_Fruit

well i think if he has issues down the line with configuration then ill be happy to sort it out, but if one of the components ups and dies on him then he can go deal with overclockers and ill make that clear to him

Speaking from experience, DO NOT OFFER SOFTWARE SUPPORT (beyond how to get windows installed and eveything up and running for the first time). Software and configuration can (and will be) a bitch to fix. Spyware removal takes hours, and is definately not worth it. Get them a spyware removal program, get them not using internet explorer, get a firewall up and running that they can't feck up.

If something goes wrong with hardware, offer them support for that. That is generally very easy to solve, and all it would involve if a part was to break would be one e-mail to overclockers getting the RMA number, and one email to your customer telling them to send the part to whatever address with that number attached. Or you could drop over and whip it out in 5 mins.

But please, don't go down the "offering software support" route, you'll regret it in the end.

angelofdeath

thanks for pointing that out nukem, is agp compatible with pci-ex? and thanks also illcompare prices with jes and komplett

good point there, your right i should just set him up with the right software before hand firefox, adaware avg etc etc and delete all shortcuts to ie

fair enough ill do it that way so


edit:// i should rephrase that: are agp cards compatible with pci-express motherboards?

Creamy Goodness

if it's for audio editing i'd stay with the soundcard and ditch the onboard as it's generally not that great.

i don't think AGP cards are compatible in PCI-X slots.

MagicBusDriver

Use the Overclockers forum to sheck the spec. The people there know alot more about computer hardware.

I would charge 200 euro for building that system. Under-charging is pointless, the more you charge the more people think you know.

Random

XP Home and Pro have no differences in stability from my experience, so that's not a factor.

As for AGP and PCIe.. they don't use the same slots, no. A lot of the PCIe boards come with AGP slots though, best check the specs first to be sure.
From what I'm away PCIe SLI (2 graphics cards together) boards don't support AGP at all

mad m

Read in between the lines angelofdeath,dont build it!!!

If you build it they will come.Remember what happened to Costner?He only built a poxy baseball field and loads came.If you do build it get a good enough price and skip country.

RicardoSmith

ciaranfo wrote:

....A lot of the PCIe boards come with AGP slots though,.....

Find me one.... :rolleyes:

Nukem

RicardoSmith wrote:

Find me one.... :rolleyes:

Bit puzzled why you want an AGP slot. Goin outta date soon. Get a mobe with DDR2 Socket 775 and with PCI-E. Gfx cards are near the same price?

Anywyas if you are looking for a mobo which is 775 socket cpu and has an AGP Komplett have 2 but both dont support DDR2

RicardoSmith

I want to see a board with PCIe and AGP like he said....

Nukem

RicardoSmith wrote:

I want to see a board with PCIe and AGP like he said....

Stop winding him up -its not nice.
I think he meant a mobo with PCI-E architecture and an AGP slot

dancin

Get out now before it's too late. No seriously I mean it. The Parts are coming at a little under 900 cheaper than dell.

But...

It will cost you time and hastle to build it and get it to the state where it does what the guy wants it for. Say 3 hours to put it together. Another 2 to get Windows onto it. And that's your quality time after work or over the weekend. Not to mention the time and effort you're putting into researching and ordering the parts (then sweating on delivery).

You're ordering a bunch of components. What if one or more of them don't work? You'll have to return it and wait for the replacement, all while your mate is hastling you about the delay in getting their system.

Then whenit;s assembled, you'll get the all the video editing software questions too.

You should charge at least €20 an hour for your work - probably more as it's your free time outside work that your using up.

Think of it like this. If you get a car serviced they charge you 40 - 50 euro per hour before parts. If you know about cars and had the tools and parts you could do it yourself. But nobody thinks twice about getting a car serviced and paying for it.

Why should building a computer be any different?

If your mate knew how he could do it himself, but as he's come to you, he's using your expertise and knowledge.

Dell are getting the components cheaper that you can ever get them. Yet their system is at least 1/3 more expensive than your parts list. The difference is their profit and assembly costs. They're also averaging the warranty cost over all dell customers.

You WILL be approached afterwards to fix problems. Unless you go look, you can't (in most cases) rule out hardware problems. And once you're there to check it out you will find it very hard to get away.

Sorry if this sounds pessimistic, but I've been caught out a few times in years gone by with this sort of thing. People never appreciate the work you put in, and always expect it to come for free or almost free. Now I restrict my tech support duties to my immediate family.

But even this doesn't pay (as such). For example.

Last summer I set up a LAN for my in-laws. 2 PCs and an Apple Mac. Sharing one Broadband connection and 2 printers (one from the apple and one from the PC). Worked fine for 3 months.
Then the Mac user messed up their printer settings, and couldn't get an important document to print. I was away that week, and they called their local Apple dealer. Guy came out, messed around for 2 hours. Broke the LAN. Disconnected the Broadband and didn't fix the original print problem, declaring the printer to be dead. Then charged then €200 for call out and time spent onsite!!!

I had to spend the entire following weekend (i) fixing the problems he caused (ii) listening to them rant about what a mess he made. Eventually fixed the systems back up and managed to fix the original Mac printing problem to boot.

They complained to the Apple dealer, but got nowhere. I got a single of chips on the sunday afternoon!!! At the apple dealer's rates, I should have been up about 2 grand by the end of the weekend.

So after all that ranting, you should tell your mate that he should go back to get the system from dell, and save yourself a ton of grief.

Nukem

Would have to agree with Dancin here. Fixed buddys comp,faster than it ever ran he said and put new parts in for him (CD and PSU) paid for the parts himself and i did it for free. 3 hrs work
Who do you think he blamed when his brother went f*ck arsing around with some settings (ya guessed it me).
Not worth the hassle unless the person agrees they break it - their prob. you gave it to them fine (within reason, something blowing or worse due to the build)
For instance you build it and he/she gets the notion to change something and it breaks who are they goin to blame - you!!!!

RicardoSmith

Nukem wrote:

Stop winding him up -its not nice.
I think he meant a mobo with PCI-E architecture and an AGP slot

But its ok to give bad advice? Pleeeessee. :rolleyes:

I think people should quit giving advice until they know the different between PCI Express, PCI, PCI-X and AGP, and which boards support which cards and which CPU types. Ditto XP Home and XP Pro. Its the blind leading the blind in here.

angelofdeath - The cost is simply your time.

angelofdeath

thanks for the advice, to be honest im going to take the chance because i think it'll be a good project and besides i need the moolah but ill definitely make the terms very clear to him before i order anything

i changed the agp card for this (gx-029-ok) and the crappy speakers for slighly less crappy speakers (first one) which brings the price to 2506 euro without shipping

i think 200 euro would be a fair price to charge for building it, and he's still saving 600 euro and getting a better system

edit:// fixed the links, btw i haven't gotten around to comparing prices on komplett and jes yet

Ciaran500

Does he need such a powerful graphics card if he's not a gamer?

zod

Just saw this system in the Dell outlet store :

SYSTEM SPECIFICATION
Dimension XPS Generation 3 (System Identifier. 04MA2MWH)
Dimension XPS, MT, Pentium 4, G3, SKT-T (3.6GHz)
Microsoft® Windows® XP Home Edition

---

System Price EUR 1,585.00 (minus €79 discount) + VAT + Shipping = €1893

Operating System: Microsoft® Windows® XP Home Edition
Memory: 1024MB PC-4200 DUAL CHANNEL (2X512mb)
Floppy Drive: 1.44MB Floppy Drive
Hard Disk Drive: 400GB SATA Hard Drive (7200rpm)
2nd 400GB SATA Hard Drive (7200rpm)
Modem: V.92 Modem Data/Fax/Voice PCI Ire/Spn
Sound Card: SoundBlaster Audigy 2 XPS
CD Read-Write Drive: 12X DVD+R/+RW
DVD Drive: 16x DVD Drive
SATA Cable Mod for 2nd Hard Drive
USB KEYBOARD UK MG
256MB ATI Radeon¿ X800 XT
Dell 2 Button USB MG Scroll Mouse

+ 1 year warranty

Apologies if this is not helpfull, I'm not big into these high performance PCs

angelofdeath

ill take a look at that, with a 19" lcd monitor and dvd-rw upgrade, if its a similar price to whats on overclockers, then id advise him to go for the dell system

angelofdeath

doesn't seem to be available at the moment on dell.ie

zod

go to dell.ie then the outlet store or :
http://www1.euro.dell.com/content/default.aspx?c=ie&l=en&s=dfo

choose express shopping

change the model to XPS gen 3 , theres only 3 listed

Lump

Doing editing myself I would warn you that a minimum of two monitors would be needed. How much editing is he going to do? Also warn him to de-frag the drive regularly. It will get rather fragmented quickly and with the size of the drive it'll take ages to de-frag.

Also 300 Gig? I have a 200 gig drive that I use, and it will take 15 hours of DV compressed footage.

John

angelofdeath

i always keep my footage uncompressed while im working on it and then compress it when all the editing is done, and a 10 minute movie can take 20-30 gigs

angelofdeath

i check that xps system out, 800gigs storage 1580euro, plus a 19" monitor for 360euro (approx), im going to recommned that to him

Ruu_Old

Stark wrote:

Then decide whether you want to charge for future technical support Because once you build a PC for them, you're their personal customer care technician for the duration of that PC's life. Plus you've to factor a warranty into the Dell price.

True they could be at u for ages, like "x doesnt work, can you come around and fix it". Happened to me many times and ive learned

zod

be carefull they dont last long on the outlet store!

Lump

angelofdeath wrote:

i always keep my footage uncompressed while im working on it and then compress it when all the editing is done, and a 10 minute movie can take 20-30 gigs

Why? It's already compressed on the camera. 5:1 By digitising it at DV quality doesn't further compress it.

John

Nukem

Quick note on that GFX- look at the name OCuK its their own brand. Wanted to by a similar one and they wouldn't give me a spec sheet so f*ck that. Sure its just a 6800 Overclocked. Wouldnt touch it. Still stand by the lads. Buy a Dell for him.

Nukem

EDIT: Had a quick look at Dell for ya - check http://www1.euro.dell.com/content/topics/segtopic.aspx/listing/enie?c=ie&cs=iedhs1&l=en&s=dhs and the most expensive one. Worth a phone call.

angelofdeath

Lump wrote:

Why? It's already compressed on the camera. 5:1 By digitising it at DV quality doesn't further compress it.

John

wires crossed, the editing i do is mostly confined to editing footage taken from recorded gaming demos, a bit different to 'real' av editing i suppose

Dr Bolouswki

pure madness because support would be a nightmare....

anyway - if you're not buying from dell outlet (I can't offer you even close to their prices) I'll sell you a new dell XPS or high spec 8400 at a keenly reduced price, and you can charge him €100 for the contact!

yes I work for dell, and yes I shamelessly tout for business...

PM me if you're interested...

angelofdeath

pm sent

Lump

Ah I understand now.

John

Nukem

Dr Bolouswki wrote:

yes I work for dell, and yes I shamelessly tout for business...

\Ya crafty b*stard. Silly puppy for saying it though.