Show HN: Pangoly – Build your shiny new PC
pangoly.comYour obvious rival here is PCPartPicker. Having used that extensively, here's some things I don't like about yours:
Expert mode removes compatibility checks. This shouldn't be the case - as soon as I select an item, it should cull the results and show me only the intersection of items that are now compatible with my chosen piece of hardware.
The lack of an ability to filter. Maybe I want to splurge more on a graphics card, but I need one that has at least 4 mini-display port outputs to drive my monitors. Right now there doesn't seem to be a way to say "show me only gpus that are nvidia, above $500, and can drive at least 4 monitors".
One of the biggest things for me: lack of reviews. You have a pangoly score. That's great and all, but you're a brand I don't (yet) trust. If I'm buying a component that costs multiple hundreds of dollars, I want more than a single score from a company I haven't heard of. I want to know what the reliability is like, and I want to hear it from people who have had hands on experience with it. I want to know how loud the fans are, what temperature it runs at passively and actively, etc.
Visually your site is really nice, but your expert mode leaves a lot to be desired, and I think you have a ways to go before you catch up with the competition. If I were you I would try and find your niche - either target users who are switching over from console gaming, and want to build their first computer, or build out a bunch of more expert features and target regular hobbyists.
I just built a pair of PCs using pcpartpicker. I had similar thoughts:
1) I really like auto-filters on compatibility. If my CPU and mobo aren't compatible, don't let me put both on the same build.
2) I don't need to see big pictures of most of the components. I might want to see what the case, monitor, and peripherals look like, but I'll only look at the SSD when I'm installing it.
3) I didn't see an easy way to sort or filter by specific criteria. On PCPartPicker, I sorted HDs by $/GB and was able to easily scroll down the list until the first drive that was large enough (1 TB), and probably could have filtered it to only include those. Here, I just have a bunch of hard drives to pick from, in no particular order, without a lot of advanced options -- and I didn't even get many on the screen because of the large images.
It's just a couple steps away from being a really excellent site.
Also missing: an obvious way not to include an HDD/GFX card (I just tried the "pro" setting).
I think your categories are too large - e.g. you show various motherboards but really no way to choose which one you want (i.e. physical size, minimal ports, other characteristics), nor an easy way to select the chipset.
Similarly, the SSD grouping simply had "SSD"s. Again, features like encryption support and/or powerloss protection might be interesting to look at; and even more obviously, I'd really like to narrow down the selection by size.
I saw you preselected the 4770K, yet the 4790K is it's successor (and certainly should be an option).
All in all, I want a system to satisfy various needs. Some aspects I may not care too much about or know much about, so a default choice or bias is fine, but there's almost always some aspect I do care about. And if you really don't care, you should probably look into just buying some ready-made HP or whatever (no idea which brand is best) box, and at least you'll get good somebody to put the thing together for you (and be responsible when it doesn't work).
Almost every type of "show me a filtered subset of something" website could benefit from your first feature - basically an "I've rejected this item for reasons your filters can't support, and never wish to see it again" button or checkbox.
Unfortunately, almost all such websites are supported by vendors paying to have their wares promoted to users, and letting users _not_ see them isn't what the vendors want. (e.g. in real estate searches, there are plenty of houses that meet all my criteria but which are terrible for other reasons and I'd prefer to never see in my results ever again.)
Thanks for your constructive feedback. We are still under active development and we are rolling out new features every week. Although analogy with PCPartPicker was inevitable, I'd like to say we're not aiming on being its clone, we're not providing price comparison and they are already doing a great job providing extensive compatibility checks so there's no point wasting time reproducing what is already available. Pangoly provides preconfigured builds with full compatibility checks that may satisfy most of the people needs (having the ability to also remove/add extra components) and it has a lot of useful features that noone else already provides. I agree with you for the "lack of reviews" part, we'll sort that out soon enough. Stay tuned!
So what benefit does your site provide? It sounds like all you really have is preconfigured builds in different levels of power - a sort of.. curated "best computer for $X" list.
Single product pros & cons, ratings, suggested builds for the component. Build guidelines, build performance index and power consumption, realtime best builds. Localized and multi currency. User friendly and beautifully designed, browsable with any device. And much more... As you probably are an expert user you most likely don't care about any of all those features because you already know what do you need and where to find it. As a matter of fact, I'm sure you also don't care that Facebook is localized in 97 languages, but trust me, a few people around the world do. I know missing features like advanced filtering might be frustrating for those who need them right now, but we're working hard trying to please everybody's needs and provide a better service!
Speaking of compatibility:
Does nobody care to check the mainboards support site for compatibility lists?
This one, for example: http://uk.pangoly.com/en/build/configure/pro
When you select the asrock mainboard, you are presented with these three choices of RAM: http://uk.pangoly.com/en/review/corsair-vengeance-16gb-2x8gb...
http://uk.pangoly.com/en/review/patriot-viper-3-16gb-2x8gb-2...
http://uk.pangoly.com/en/review/corsair-vengeance-pro-16gb-2...
And if you venture to that mainboards support site, it shows you a list of compatible RAM: http://www.asrock.com/mb/Intel/Fatal1ty%20Z97%20Professional...
End Result: Not one of the mentioned RAM options is on that list.
Why would that be important? Well, for one thing, it it weren't, there wouldn't be the need for the asrock people to maintain such a list, right? And, speaking from personal experience, I have had brand new builds bluescreen like nobody's business. Was the RAM faulty? Nope, send it back and got replacement of same make/model. Still bluescreens. It was only after I checked the mainboards compatibility lists and chose a RAM from that list when the bluescreens stopped! Nothing else was changed. And both types of RAM were "the same" as far as part pickers like this one is concerned. So, same Type, Speed, Dual Channel etc. The "only" difference here was that the one that caused bluescreens was not on the mainboards compatibility list.
I've had this issue as well, but that was over a decade ago, when using a smaller brand (ECS) mainboard for an Athlon XP. Eventually it was discovered that the mainboard didn't support Corsair memory, and the shop traded me some Kingston modules.
I have built many systems for myself, friends and family since, and never encountered this issue again.
In practice, just because RAM doesn't show on the list of compatible modules in the motherboard manual doesn't mean it won't work. We're thankfully past the Athlon XP days! I've generally had luck just making sure all the specs match.
Edit: Although, if RAM is listed on the Pangoly site that is in the approved list, that should be indicated somehow, as it's guaranteed to be compatible.
www.logicalincrements.com presents similar info in IMO a better format as well.
That's a really good site. I tend to build workstations these days, but have several friends asking me for gaming build advice; I can point them there.
Agreed. For the HN audience I would expect something like li, but with more interactivity.
Beautiful execution and a well-done site. Nice visual choices and a good responsive layout. Great example of waiting until a product has some polish before a Show HN.
Yesterday, Forbes did an article[1] about how console gamers are moving towards PC.
I think you could really knock it out of the park if you capitalized on that trend and added a portion of your site for folks looking to migrate. Something that shows how specs from different sets of cheaper hardware could mimic and beat the console they may be trying to migrate from. Perhaps something with a bit more of an educational front to it.
You could even go as far as video demonstrations showing how the performance of a $400.00 PC from your service could rival or beat a console.
There's a big trend/meme on the Internet right now regarding the "PC Master Race"[2] that I think you could explore for some inspiration, if you haven't. The trend started a few years ago[3] but has started to pick up more and more.
You may even find some great success with a section specifically for building customized, beautiful "Steam Boxes"[4] that are starting to appear more and more in living rooms in place of consoles.
[1] - http://www.forbes.com/sites/marcochiappetta/2014/07/14/the-c...
[2] - http://www.reddit.com/r/pcmasterrace/
[3] - http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/the-glorious-pc-gaming-master-...
> $400.00 PC from your service could rival or beat a console.
I recently got the itch to buy the Xbox One. I had the 360 before it with the Kinect and it was a passable party game machine, but I usually game on an old-ish desktop that maybe I've invested $600 in over the past four years. i5, 7000 series AMD card, 8gb ram, etc. Seems to handle any modern game I can throw at it.
With a copy of Watchdogs that Xbox turned out to be almost $700. Um, sure Watchdogs was fun, but having both just feels extraneous at this point and if I wasn't beyond my return date I'd just get rid of it. Just the price of games alone is rough. With Steam I can usually find a deal, but for console games I'm expected to usually pay full price, usually with the understanding that I'm also subsidizing my console's low price. How is $700 with one game low? You can almost make two mid-range gaming PCs with that if you're frugal enough.
That said, I'm sure it'll be great for multiplayer and kinect games, but with powerful PC hardware being so cheap, it does feel like a rip-off as console prices haven't really fallen in line with PC prices.
On the plus side, it has impressive fit and polish, the media tv stuff is nice, xbox live is well done, and even though the kinect is optional now I really hope they continue to develop games for it, preferable another Star Wars game on the new hardware. I'm hoping I get 5 years out of this system to depreciate the big one-time cost.
I'm just surprised there isn't a competitive $199 console out there. Even if it was semi-disposable (say every 24 months a new model with faster innards) it would still be worth it. I can get a Nexus 7 for that much. Its incredible I can't get a dedicated gaming machine (sans display, sans batter, etc) for around that much. Consoles are starting to feel like those old Texas Instruments calculators that cost the same amount and have the same exact features as the ones sold 20+ years ago.
You can get a last gen console (XB360, PS3) for what, $100 or less used/refurbished or $200 or less new? If someone never had that console, it's comparable with a lower end PC playing "last gen" PC games. And a good deal of console exclusives that never get ported to PC.
Buying a new console < 1 year after release is the equivalent of buying a new $1K+ gaming PC with a top-of-the-line video card.
I bought a used Xbox 360E, which is a really nice console, for $140AUD in almost unused condition. I felt that while there are stacks of games that are coming out that I want to play (Titanfall!) the simple fact is most of those games are also released on the 360. So, I saved hundreds of dollars for an experience that is good enough for me. I'll buy an Xbox One in 12 months time, when the price has come down and a games library has built up for it.
Gaming segments are weird. Console gamers generally pay 'full price', PC gamers generally want to pay half that, and mobile gamers have trouble with the concept of shelling out double digits.
and mobile gamers have trouble with the concept of shelling out double digits.
They make up for it by pouring insane amounts into pay-to-play sinkholes such as Clash of Clans.
> I'm just surprised there isn't a competitive $199 console out there.
Well, there's the Ouya, which is a nice little platform. You can get one an second controller and most of the games available for that price point :)
Specs and SDKs at https://www.ouya.tv/develop/
hth, adric
He said "competitive." The Ouya is dead.
> PC Master Race
Please don't perpetuate this inane meme. It is needlessly inflammatory and would probably alienate a healthy portion of your target market.
You say that, but you forget what the target market for gaming rigs actually is.
I game pretty extensively as a hobby but I also hold a serious 9-5. While I don't call people homophobic slurs and scream "oh my god no scoped" and all that, I can appreciate and keep up with the typical gaming attitudes in the market these days. To be honest, I look at gaming as a different persona and snap in and out of him at will; a few close folks in that circle of mine know what I actually do, but to them I'm just another "lol rekt" dude. Just like you'd expect some things out of a typical HN user, I expect some things out of a typical gamer. I also balance that with calling out the less-desirable portions of that culture, like homophobia, racism, and sexual harassment, when I can.
The master race thing is a tongue-in-cheek exercise which really, as a couple other folks have pointed out, has a more subtle message. If you allow yourself to be alienated by things that other folks find humorous -- and it's totally within your right to not find it humorous, by the way, I'm not saying that -- you're just going to have a bad time, that's all.
Gaming and the culture around it is not something to be taken seriously. Even e-sports have an element of insanity. To be entirely honest, I look at master race and calling console users "plebes" as the gaming generation getting older and discovering there's another one right behind them, and that one likes Call of Duty on Xbox and Minecraft. Really, though, you'd be hard pressed to find someone on either side who takes that sort of thing seriously. At the end of the day, we're all gamers doing what we enjoy.
Perpetuating the meme is perhaps unwise (and alienating as you pointed out).
That aside it is worth pointing out the advantages of a proper computer over cut down entertainment devices. Especially in a format that lets you customize and meet a certain price point.
Shame it's not easy to have comparative benchmarks against console hardware at this time, despite the newest generation being effectively x86 hardware we have no means of comparison due to the platforms being too locked down.
>That aside it is worth pointing out the advantages of a proper computer over cut down entertainment devices.
Sure, but calling console players 'plebes' probably isn't the best way to do it.
Agree, hence why I said drop the meme but keep the finer points. :)
In video gaming discussion inflammatory = good
Isn't it better to have passionate users who love using your service along with haters that love to hate you as opposed to having a market that just kinda likes you. That said you can tone down the nazi-ism while having dog whistle trigerring http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dog-whistle_politics with something like PC Master Build or PC Uber Class (I'm not in marketing but there's something that works in there).
I don't think I would characterize the reaction "Those PC gamers are really off-putting and I do not wish to associate with them" as "I just love to hate PC gamers."
As counterpoint a lot of the comments in this very discussion are on the distaste or appreciation of the concept of PC master race. Clearly it is a subject that gets people talking.
It seems as if the console makers have delivered developer friendly platforms this time but with that forgot to / decided not to pack in that extra punch they used to.
I'm talking about things like those sprite optimized graphics controllers when 2D still was king and the tightly integrated 3D chips later on (when consumer PCs were doing 3D exclusively with the CPU) - and let's not forget all those esoteric but very powerful CPU architectures (e.g. Cell processor).
This "PC Master Race" mentality has left a sour taste in my mouth. It is a joke to a few but it is starting to become serious (weather they refer to it as PC Master Race or not). Most arguments are made by technically unqualified enthusiasts on subjects like architecture, performance, and cost effectiveness.
I suppose the reason I'm bitter is because I'm constantly being told (online and lots of PC enthusiast friends) that my choice of gaming hardware (a console) is vastly inferior to a PC. Choosing a gaming platform is not a 100% performance to cost optimization problem.
Well, it really is technically inferior to a gaming PC. And I say this as somebody who owns several consoles and does not own a gaming PC. In making that choice, I had to accept that I would get less power than a PC user, at least for most of the console's lifespan. I use a console because that's what I'm comfortable with and it lets me play with my friends, not because I want to be at the cutting edge of gaming technology.
One thing the "master race" seems oblivious about is how owning a desktop computer has become a lifestyle choice. Many people have no need/desire to have a computer desk and office-style chair and a large screen in front of their face. (Perhaps it seems too much like work?) While not strictly "technical", the size/space/noise is a big disadvantage to PC gaming. (Although admittedly there are things like SteamBoxes.)
Would it shock you if I told you you can hook it up behind or under your living room TV, use a wireless mouse/kb/remote and use xbox controllers?
No, because I addressed that point with the reference to Steamboxes (or MediaPCs or whatever other name they have.)
I don't see your point how it's any more a lifestyle choice to have a (bigger) TV for your console.
Playing games on my 360 in the living room takes up a lot more space than the desk+chair in the other room.
And yes, I hardly use the living room, actually more often for games than watching TV or movies.
There are more axes to gaming quality than simply polygon performance. You have to be specific about what is superior.
I really can't name any technological aspect in which consoles are more powerful than a PC. That's kind of the point I was driving at.
The secret power of consoles is that the hardware doesn't change over the course of the console's life in a significant way. If I buy an XBox 360 on ebay, I know that ANY xbox-360 game will run on it. In contrast, PC gaming is a mess of compatibility questions.
If I want to play the new Wolfenstein, or Watch Dogs, or any "new" game, chances are my 2 year old PC will not be able to run it well (unless I spent $$$$ on it, rather than $$). If I want to play a new game with all the dials turned up to 9 (or 11), I basically expect to spend $1200-$1500 on a new PC every two to four years.
If I look at OLDER games, it's even worse: Will this game even install? I have a giant library of games which I would love to play, but I can't figure out how to get them to run on a current version of Windows. (Sea Dogs, Starfleet Command 3, etc.) These games are ten years old, and I can't even get the installers to run correctly -- or if I do, the game crashes for other "win 8 >> Win XP" reasons. I would pay money _again_ to be able to play some of these games in a reliable way (and have re-bought things for Steam), but most of the time they're not supported anymore.
My Wii will still play Windwaker (11 years old), and I can buy an XBox and any copy of Halo and be pretty confident that it'll run, even if ten years old (assuming the hardware hasn't failed).
I can guarantee that if you spend $1000 on new PC today, you'll be able to run all games at console quality for at least next 3-4 years, almost all in the next five years, and then still most of the games beyond that range. You'll also be able to run any of the thousands of games that have already been released on PC, a feat no console is able to do.
I bought my PC 3 years ago for around that much (in country with higher import cost and higher sales tax, so it would cost 700-800 dollars in the US), and I encountered only a single game that refuses to run smoothly at all times (Mirrors Edge).
> I can guarantee that if you spend $1000 on new PC today, you'll be able to run all games at console quality for at least next 3-4 years, almost all in the next five years
Or I could spend $400 on a console and play every single available game at "console quality" for the life of the console, which is a good deal longer than 5 years. That, coupled with the fact that console games in general look pretty good, is the reason PC gaming is in something of a decline.
Here's the thing: all the games you buy for that console will also be playable on that PC, as long as they're not console-exclusive, so if you buy PC today, and 7 years from now a new game will be released on both XBox One and PC, you'll be able to play in it on your PC. The 3-4 year mark is for the PC-exclusive games.
Funnily enough, on PC, you'll also be able to play in previous generation console games (provided they've also been released on PC), and even in some next generation games that will be released on XBox Two or PlayStation 5. You will also have better video quality on PC for some games, you'll get a solid workstation useful for more activities than just gaming, and any additional cost you'll bear buying the PC will be recovered on the games prices.
You're missing the point: if you buy a PC that is capable of playing games with console-quality graphics today, you will be able to play games with console quality graphics until consoles become more powerful. The fact that consoles are a fixed target means that multi-platform games almost necessarily include that fixed target as a lower bound.
I game (infrequently) on a 2010 MacBook Pro. It has a 512MB GPU, not enough to play new PC-exclusive games by a long shot, but if the game has a Xbox360 or PS3 port then I'm good. Turn everything as low as needed (as close to console quality to be frank) and off I go. Hook up a PS3 controller and my TV and I couldn't tell you the difference - I played Skyrim that way.
> if you buy a PC that is capable of playing games with console-quality graphics today, you will be able to play games with console quality graphics until consoles become more powerful.
OK, but it's not economical by any stretch of the imagination. Given the $1000 example above, you can by 2 entire generations of a single console and get halfway to the third for the same amount of money. That'll keep you playing the "latest games" for what, 16 years if you go by the Xbox360's 8 year lifespan per generation? The numbers really don't add up for PCs anymore.
Mirror's Edge has a poor implementation of Nvidia's PhysX, so many people need to disable that in settings in order to run the game properly on AMD's Radeon graphics cards. This could be the case for your rig.
This is an example of a conversation console gamers don't need to have.
If I want to play the new Wolfenstein, or Watch Dogs, or any "new" game, chances are my 2 year old PC
My 5-year-old PC, which was nice at the time, hasn't hit a problem yet, with the exception of some games from the 90s. How many console games from the 90s does the XBox 360 take?
If I want to play a new game with all the dials turned up to 9 (or 11)
That's an unfair comparison, because the XBox most certainly, most definitely, and most absolutely does not have 'all the dials turned up to 9', let alone 11. The simpler, coarser graphics on the xbox are a common meme that's made fun of.
That is true, and it's one of the reasons I like consoles. There is just no thinking required, which is really nice.
On the other hand, I think the rate at which PCs obsolesce compared to consoles is often exaggerated. For example, I played Bioshock Infinite at max settings on my circa-2010 MacBook Pro, which was 3 years old when the game came out and was never exactly a gaming machine. And people with fairly mediocre PC setups are able to play Watch Dogs with better graphics than I get on my Xbox One.
More powerful? No. But they are still better in some ways:
* No DRM. I have been burnt several times by PC games on this front.
* No viruses or malware to worry about
* Far fewer updates to install and in general less maintenance
* Warranty - if I build a PC myself and it breaks, I need to fix it (I recognise that for more technical users and/or people with more time, it's a plus that you can fix a PC yourself - but that isn't everyone)
* Compatibility. It's hardly rare to run into issues if you try to play a PC game on launch date, and often graphics card driver updates fix some games and break others.
* Noise and size (it's hard to make a small quiet and powerful PC on a budget)
* Peripherals - there is a standardized set that "just works" for a console. On the PC, maybe half of my Steam library supports my controller out of the box.
And one non-technical aspect which isn't a concern for everyone, but is for many:
* My friends are all on [XBox Live|PSN] and I want to play with them
My stance? I game on PC, PS3, PS2, Xbox 360, Wii, 3DS, iPad, and occasionally on an Android phone. They're all great in their own way. I wouldn't say any of them was better than all of the others on all axes I care about - but if pushed to have just one, I would pick the PC.
* No DRM. I have been burnt several times by PC games on this front.
True, sometimes drm is an issue. To me drm hasnt been an issue for quite a few years.. I think it was with the last game I bought a hardcopy of. If you are talking about the gaming services everyone has different views on different vendors. It can be argued that the need for the console itself, created by a single manufacturer with sole control, is drm in itself.
* No viruses or malware to worry about
If you dont click suspicious banners or run spam executables you wont run into viruses (If you are a legit customer, if you download from piratebay or similar you can only blame yourself). I have been an active gamer most of my life (31 years old now) and I think I ran into my last virus back in windows xp.
* Far fewer updates to install and in general less maintenance
So you live with bugs for longer? Must suck... The awesome thing about pc gaming is that whenever you log on some issue you had in the past might be gone. Updates are there to improve your gaming. If you are talking about your OS, you forget that your computer is not just a game station, it is also a tool. The updates are there to keep things running smoothly.
* Warranty - if I build a PC myself and it breaks, I need to fix it (I recognise that for more technical users and/or people with more time, it's a plus that you can fix a PC yourself - but that isn't everyone)
If it breaks, call a repair guy. I refer again to my point about the computer not being a dedicated gaming platform.
* Compatibility. It's hardly rare to run into issues if you try to play a PC game on launch date, and often graphics card driver updates fix some games and break others.
What does launch day have to do with compatibility? I have never suffered not having up to date drivers if a high profile game using some weird functions not covered by previous drivers is about to be released. Again, I am an avid computer gamer.
* Noise and size (it's hard to make a small quiet and powerful PC on a budget)
No its not. Have you tried? It is cheaper to make a powerful and noisy computer, but silence is not super pricey, ya see. Your little console is partly built with pc components, so you should be able to create an equally powerful machine with the same noise level for just about the same price.
* Peripherals - there is a standardized set that "just works" for a console. On the PC, maybe half of my Steam library supports my controller out of the box.
Not every game uses a kinekt. Not every game uses a joystick. I have a pretty beat up x-box clone gamepad, a cheap joystick and a track ir at home. Never had any issues with them. For most games I prefer the keyboard tho so this might be a bigger issue for others.
And one non-technical aspect which isn't a concern for everyone, but is for many: * My friends are all on [XBox Live|PSN] and I want to play with them
And there we get to the meat and potatoes of your post. You game with your friends, all your friends are on other platforms, so you do as well. That is fine. There is nothing wrong with it. You shouldn't listen to the hype that tells you consoles suck. They don't. They have points about them that are very valid (ease of use, portability, instant gaming). Just dont buy into the hype and use arguments made by 12 year old youtube jockeys to make your point. You do not need to excuse your gaming habits. Just go play, its fun.
Agreed. I love my PS3, and have a PS4 as well. I don't have a gaming PC, because I'm completely happy with the games that are released on consoles, and don't have the interest in building a gaming PC. The games I like are released for consoles first, and often aren't released on PC at all, and when they are, it seems like a lot of times they are just shitty ports.
Console provides the best experience for me. Anyone that tells me differently is simply wrong, because it's subjective.
It annoys me too, but for a different reason.
I've been a PC gamer since far before it was "popular". So I have obviously always preferred it. Nothing has really changed in the arena of PC gaming vs Consoles in terms of the actual differences between them, but now all of the sudden everybody's jumping on this bandwagon.
The same people who said Halo revolutionized multiplayer gaming are the ones spamming about "PC Master Race" now. (Not trying to pick on Halo in particular, but I use it as an example because I feel there were many PC games released before it which provided the same or better multiplayer FPS experience)
I agree. These PC/Console flame wars have been going on since the beginning of the internet. To say that either is "superior" is pretty meaningless, you can argue why one is better in certain respects, but in the end declaring one to be better than the other is totally subjective.
It is interesting to look at the history, where the original "flame wars" were Arcade vs private gaming. Pong was an arcade game, and then it was a thing you could plug into your TV, arcade machines (the 'consoles' of their time) got better, and personal computers got better (they fed off the same technology eco-system after all). Then 'consoles' which were nearly as good as the Arcade machines but not as good as full blown computers, but they were cheaper than full blown computers. And then the C64/Atari campaign where they could be "a console AND a computer" and then the Amiga which was better than Consoles of the day and a computer, which inspired other computers (PCs mostly but some Macs) to get better, which nearly wiped out Console sales, until Sony dropped the PlayStation on the scene which was as good as a much more expensive PC, and then Sega and Nintendo fought back and upped their 'console' game with the Jaquar and the Game Cube, except 3Dfx has just put out a really cost effective 3D accelerator card and now PCs jumped ahead fast, and Consoles needed to sell for a long time to make up their costs (money was made on software not hardware) so the rapid evolution of 3D hardware gave PCs an edge as people swapped out video cards and then motherboards with faster and still faster video 'slots', and now the consoles were way behind, except they could still be cheaper than the high end PCs, and now a lot of the performance changes relative to games has flattened and ever since the Xbox where Microsoft showed you could essentially repackage a PC as a console, well the differences have become shallower and shallower.
Thanks for the summary, my video game knowledge doesn't go back that far, haha. I agree though that the differences between consoles and PC's are starting to blur. For that reason I'm rooting for SteamOS. I think it won't be an easy transition, because gamers are so entrenched in their ecosystems, but I would love to see the strengths of both platforms together and do away with some of the old principles the gaming world is holding onto.
Yesterday, Forbes did an article[1] about how console gamers are moving towards PC.
A contributor, essentially using Forbes as a blog platform, claimed that. The article is a baseless fluff piece pandering to an audience.
I really believe that the whole contributor model has seriously undermined Forbes' already strained credibility: Endlessly people attribute these often specious claims to the magazine itself.
Thanks! I'm the owner, so here's a brief overview of the available features:
- Build configuration starting from user's preferred budget. The suggested components are always safe to be used in the same build and it's also possible to add optional parts like peripherals.
- Automatic build creation starting from user's preferred component.
- Sharing: once the build is completed it's possible to share it on the most popular social networks (Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Reddit), on forums (BBCode) o by Email.
- Build guidelines: for every component type we provide general guidelines and best practices for the picking, also suggesting the highest rated products currently available on the market.
- Product reviews: our rating, pros and cons, q&a, price history, suggested PC builds for the selected component and compatibility.
- Price analysis and trends.
- Multilanguage and multicurrency.
- Responsive design: the website provides an optimal viewing experience on all devices (desktops, tablets and smartphones).One thing that I noticed was the lack of Xeon processors for Intel. When I built my current rig, I could get an i7 level chip for an i5 price, but without integrated video. This is totally fine for gaming rigs and something that isn't uncommon. Was that a specific decision?
So... Nice site so far but it would be nice if you offer some additional features over your competitors.
I personally do not need the latest and greatest, however it would be nice to help me optimize on a different set of factors.
For example, I have a lot of interest in building power efficient machines. Rather than having to look up power consumption for individual parts, it would be great if you had the ability to generate optimal configurations given power and noise considerations.
Similarly, if you could have a generator for minimally different Hackintoshes (eg OS X running with minimum hacks), I think you would find a lot of interest from that particular user base.
PS. Playing around with the various configurators for different parts, it seems that there are options missing. For example:
1) Can't find 16GB Ballastix Sport Low Profile memory
2) Can't find Intel low power processors; T-series
3) Can't filter on 80 Plus level for power supplies
4) For a low(er) power build, I do not want the largest power supply. Conversely, I want the lowest capable of powering my setup.
5) Ability to easily find a video card meeting my needs: single slot GPU Nvidia Maxwell suitable for HTPC.
Would be great to link up with sites that offer pre-configured builds for specific purposes.
For example, about some Hackintosh friendly builds?
I'd allow people to unselect a second hard drive, especially since 256GB SSDs are an option.
How would one search for processor + motherboard support for VT-d or vPro?
Cool! Some humble UI suggestions:
- I don't really need to see big pictures of everything (except the case and peripherals). It's kind of visually noisy, and it doesn't help me make any decisions. Maybe just a small thumbnail would suffice.
- It'd be nice to be able to instantly visually compare the most important traits of each component. For example, for SSDs, I'd like to see Price, Size, and Speed. If you just had a bar for each of those things, I'd be able to instantly see the tradeoffs I'm making. The hover-over info is nice too, it's good to see if I'm trading price for durability, or some other less common metric. Maybe this kind of info could replace the big images?
To add to the tradeoffs point - it would be great it you could generate a pareto efficient frontier given the users "desired traits".
This may just be my own personal gripe but I get serious information overload from component buying. A nice frontier could filter the dozens of options to just a handful with meaningful tradeoffs worth considering.
When I build a PC, the number one feature I want is ECC memory. It can be tricky to find a non-server configuration that supports it (you historically need a "good" bios that is smart enough to enable it for AMD, and you typically need a Xeon flavor CPU + workstation level board for Intel; caveat, it has been 2.5 years since my last build).
I was hoping that this tool might make finding non-server parts that support ECC easier, but alas, that does not seem to be the case.
I'm genuinely curious, why is it your number one feature? I know that ECC provides error correction, but aside from server use, is it really that critical?
Memory errors are a significant cause [citation needed!] of system instability. If you want a reliable machine, even a desktop, that is going to keep working, then ECC is very useful.
If you've decided upon ECC as a must, then it would be great for a system builder tool to then show you options based upon that choice.
And for some high end use case you might want to be looking at xenon's or even dual xenon's.
I could see a big data or HPC developer wanting to have a desktop that used the same processor as the cluster they are writing for - mainly in the case where your tuning for max performance and want to able to develop using the same complier flags.
It's less about the stability and more about data integrity. Crashes suck, but they suck a hell of a lot less than corrupt filesystems and backups.
I think I'm the vein of this product's philosophy, maybe a "stability" or "reliability" metric along with the performance and price metrics.
This is an old page, but convinced me years ago to go with ECC memory whenever I build a new machine.
http://cr.yp.to/hardware/ecc.html
He hasn't updated is build in a while, though. http://cr.yp.to/hardware/build-20090123.html
Here's some advice:
I can never remember any details regarding the Intel chipsets. Is a given CPU a Haswell processor? Ivy bridge? Should I wait for Broadwell? Am I misremembering code words entirely? I would love it if this site helped me figure out which chipset I'll be getting, in case I care.
For the record, the naming scheme is something like this: e.g. i7 4770K
i[digit] is the series, i3 means starter, i5 mainstream and i7 performance (that's not entirely accurate but it is accurate enough).
Then the four digit number is of no obvious logic across the generations. But, the first digit shows the generation, so 4 means haswell, which is the fourth Core iX generation. 3 is ivy bridge, 2 is sandy bridge and the lack of it means nehalem. And beyond that, the higher the number, the more powerful it is.
The last letter is optional. K means unlocked, S or T mean low power consumption.
Ooh, helpful! I haven't upgraded my home system in a while, so I have a Core 2 Quad Q9450. Imagine my confusion when I started seeing numbers in the 2, 3, and 4k range. Thanks for decoding it for me!
K also means virtualization features are missing. Hugely important, these days.
I thought 'K' meant unlocked multipliers.
You're right about virtualization, though. Some features are missing.
I really like it but I think it can be simplified. At least the original presentation of options. e.g.
* The names Advanced and Pro are too similar.
* "For AMD lovers, a cheaper alternative of the Gamer configuration" OK, but then this could be folded into the Gamer configuration as an alternate flavour.
Can you get this down to three or four options and move the rest to the expert users section?
Agreed.
It would be nice if for each tier there were an Intel option and an AMD option ... and an ATi and nVidia option.
Seems like there's a good mid-ground between pre-configured systems and expert mode. A mode which offers some alerts for silly mistakes (or prevents them from being made in the first place) would be nice. i.e. an Intel chip paired with an AMD socketed motherboard.
Indeed. But alerts would be a nice addition to expert mode anyway. You can't build a PC with a processor that does not fit in the socket, expert or not. Pre filtered list of motherboards or cpu based on selected cpu or motherboards would be nice. Anyway, great website.
Can someone tell me what he used to code that website? Javascript and bootstrap or something else?
http://builtwith.com/?http%3a%2f%2fpangoly.com%2fen%2f
Have you used BuiltWith? Looks like asp.net, jquery, bootstrap, and what not.
There's a chrome extension too.
Agreed! This seems a bit more polished than http://pcpartpicker.com/ in that regard
Why can't you perform compatibility checks on hardware in free build mode? That would take so much headache out of the composing, and be an awesome middle ground between the prebuilt ones and the completely free builder.
I like how polished this site is. It would be a good companion to this parts recommendation guide: http://www.logicalincrements.com/
However, I disagree that a "Pro" build is necessary for software development, as suggested by the description. I've gotten by writing software on a netbook.
Likewise, I've gotten by writing software with a pen and paper.
There's an unfortunate consequence of the tendency for developers to have "Pro" hardware: their software often doesn't get tested on older hardware. Some examples:
About 8 years ago, I tried to install a KDE-based Linux distribution on a PC that was then only 2 years old. The screen resolution defaulted to 800x600. I opened the settings panel to try and adjust it to 1280x1024 (the maximum for that monitor), but the settings window was larger than my screen, and the icon for screen resolution was off the bottom of my screen! I couldn't get to it.
About 4 years ago, I was taking a Software Engineering course where our assignments were doled out with Eclipse project files. No problem, I installed Eclipse on my Macbook (which at the time was only one year old), and fired it up. It was using over a gig of RAM, and OS X using another half a gig. I couldn't open a web browser without swapping.
Today the problem is even worse. Modern software gobbles so much memory -- it's ridiculous. Web browsers and desktop environments are especially bad, and systemd uses loads of RAM, too. I realize it's not all bloat, but this memory explosion is leaving users with older computers in the dust. Not everyone can afford to upgrade to the latest and greatest every year.
I urge developers to keep their end users (even other developers) and their potentially meager hardware in mind.
> Web browsers and desktop environments are especially bad
Most web browsers are actually pretty memory efficient these days. Unfortunately, the websites they're viewing aren't because they're designed and coded by people with "pro" hardware too.
I find the biggest problem is web applications. Google+ and Facebook are abysmally slow for me, even though I am on a very powerful machine. I shudder to think what they are like on something even a couple of years old.
But how efficient as a developer are you on your netbook when compared to a dual or tripled screened desktop workstation.
Yeah, probably too overarching, but it depends on what you are doing. For example, are you "getting by" on your notebook parallel compiling 1m+ LoC C++ projects? Probably not.
Probably not. I supplied one extreme but surely one of the lesser builds for suffice for most developers.
Nice. One comment - I think it's not always showing the 'best' options in the initial 3.
e.g.
1 - Select Advanced
2 - the two processor options shown are (+11% cost, +13% perf) and (+7% cost, +3%perf). If I expand "more options", I can see a (+9 %cost, +16%perf) in there which is preumably superior to either of the two shown.
But this is awesome - please keep it going and improving it :-)
Maybe the algorithm scores based on more than just cost and performance - perhaps review scores as well?
Although i'm unsure of the legality, you might want to add hackintosh/OSX86 setups in there as well, matching the right hardware combos is a big part of getting it all setup and the latest configs change often
I'd (figuratively) kill for that feature as well. If you aren't following Hackintosh guides regularly, you fall behind far too quickly.
This would be an awesome feature.
While it's pretty, the site doesn't allow for much in the way of customizing one's criteria. Or it's very non-obvious on how to do so. For example, I might want a gaming system with a apx $150 video card rather than a $200 to $300 one. Perhaps I have hard drives already and don't need a new one. Why the rather pricey power supplies? The CPU choices are limited and don't reflect current options. What about cooling options? Why the limited case choices? etc, etc, etc.
I agree - since I'm in the middle of building a machine, I would think that I would be the target market. One of the first things I noticed was that the power supplies were overpriced but the mobo combinations were entirely based on price as opposed to features. The site looks good but I think it needs more tweakability.
Reminds me of Ars System Guides
I haven't read in a while but they're still doing them:
http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2014/04/ars-technica-system-g...
they have decent forums too
http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewforum.php?f=8
A hackintosh section would be good. The one I used to build mine years ago is gone..
So the business model is based on piping customers to amazon ? thats neat, however i found that amazon germany lacks the diversity that many of the big online hardware retailers have around here. Is it only stuff that amazon sells or also marketplace ?
How can you suggest builds for the budget if you don't have a real store providing updated components prices? Amazon is by far the most popular online store so I think it's a safe bet using it as a de facto standard.
Did you read the question?
It seems like a beautiful tool, however not having options to pick components I have a strong preference for such as Hitachi hard drives, and Silverstone cases for instance means I can't use it to build systems I might actually want to build ever.
I agree with other comments that if you want it to appeal to hobbyists you need a pretty massive build out of options.
Looks great so far!
Any thoughts into a comparison tool?
I have a PC that was pretty powerful when I built it, but has aged (5-6 years old now).
I'd love to find a way to easily compare my current system to these ones. For instance, the 'AMDicted' sounds good, but I can't easily tell if it's an upgrade from my current rig or not.
It really needs a section for "Operating System". Windows isn't free, and most build-your-owns will be a Windows machine. Other appropriate options should be available (linux/bsd/etc) along with a 'no OS' options, for people who might already have a free license.
This tool looks fantastic.
I recently put together a couple of machines from parts, and having not done so for many years, found it extremely difficult to do so. A tool like this, that could highlight compatible CPUs, motherboards and so on, would have been very helpful!
A few (highly specific) features that would be useful:
* For the cheaper machines, there are some very good value case/PSU combos on Amazon (and elsewhere). It would be great to include these in the list of components. I know bargain-basement PSUs have a reputation for being poor quality, but there are reliabile ones out there (I ended up buying three different cheap case+CPUs and they have all been perfect under high load)
* I found it extremely hard to discover which CPUs came with their own heatsink+fan. Any way to clarify this would be very useful.
Agreed! It's extremely impressive in terms of design + functionality.
If you're not worried about spilling secret sauce, I'd be interested in a post (or link if you've already got the information there) about what data sources you have hooked up to various metrics.
One thing that bugs me at first glance is that after I pick a preset denoted with a "starting price", when it gets to the next page with the component breakdown the starting price is $100-300 higher.
May I suggest including linux compatibility for hardware? [e.g. graphics cards tends to not always support it]
I really really hate browsing shops and reviews and manufacturer sites and all that, trying to find the build I want.. so a website to help with that would be nice. Unfortunately this is not it. The selection is not there, and it doesn't really allow me to set any criteria (without which I could buy anything and there'd be no problem to solve). The site also fails to provide an easy-to-glance overview of the differences between alternatives.
I pretty much bounce between newegg and tigerdirect when building a machine. Once you have a case and motherboard, everything falls into place based on my budget.
I'm looking to start a new build soon. This case is speaking to me.
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-det...
Have you tried http://pcpartpicker.com/ ?
I used it for my last build. You can select a variety of different vendors, browse parts compare prices, etc. It does a pretty good job doing the compatibility checks for you as well (I can do them myself, but my heart just wasn't in it this time, so it was handy).
I basically assembled my build with pcpartpicker, selected newegg, amazon and microcenter, then bundled it all up and ordered it. The microcenter one was neat because they actually found the processor I wanted at a local microcenter, for in store pickup, at a hundred bucks cheaper than anywhere else (not a technically crazy hurdle, but really convenient and pleasantly surprising).
Wondering how it compares to the site linked (I haven't looked through it yet; they could be totally different, but I'm going to check it out in a sec)
Seems like PCPP makes it much easier to filter on specific criteria (say, you only want to see 7200RPM HDDs) but the linked site seems much more user friendly, particularly for beginners.
Edit: Also, the first several builds I made to test the site out all appear to be shipping from Amazon. Not sure if this supports multiple vendors or not.
You may want to check out HoverHound, a chrome/firefox plugin.
It'll let you compare the price of a part on newegg with the current price on amazon and tigerdirect.
When I rebuilt my htpc about 6 months ago, I was surprised to find that many of the parts were actually cheaper on amazon.
The hardest part for me about building a pc is making sure I get the proper RAM config, and this doesn't seem to help much. I want LOTS of ram (32gb), so let me pick a motherboard with 4 slots easily, and then make sure the selections have to be compatible. Same sort of issue with a video card. I want dual DVI for output to 2 monitors, that is more important than speed for me.
A HTPC option would be nice.
I wish somebody would make a similar web tool for the power users. I spend at least few days every few years browsing countless sites and forums trying to choose an optimal build when upgrading my desktop. It should satisfy at least these requirements:
1) include most of available parts, not just few trendy ones (in this site I got only 8 motherboards and 6 CPU's for AMD)
2) do price/performance analysis on fly (with referenced to sources) and unobtrusively show better candidates on this aspect in the same price range
3) show small summary on parts when clicked: exhaustive specifications, release date, current price (depending on region), available newer versions or successors (if any)
4) no ugly tablet orientated design with big pictures (and why would I care how my RAM looks like anyway?), but clean, slim list with advanced details. This site looks super ugly on my 22", full HD monitor.
I understand that the biggest problem is to maintain up-to-date database, but I would even pay few bucks to use such tool to save my time.
This is awesome. I remember building my first computer at 12 years old. :) A nice fat gaming rig with dual boot to Linux. My parents bought it for me after I got all "E's for effort!"
At the time all I had to go by was a "how to build your own computer" book. I would have loved something like this.
Did your mobo have soft-jumpers?
Kids today :-) I remember upgrading a IBM compatible using DIP chips on the mother board.
Hello
I haven't used pcpartpicker, but went to have a quick look compared to yours. I can see a lot of work has gone into it. I like that you don't have to navigate away from the page.
1) Images are bit big 2) At first I struggled finding the divisions of parts. Maybe close all accordions except the first. This way it might feel more like steps. Currently all "steps" are open and options seem endless as its a page full of objects. Remember when scanning over a page, we basically first see a sillhoutte of major objects. 3) Maybe number accordions, so seems more like steps 1) Motherboard 2) CPU 4) Show important information without any action require by the user. Example some of the CPU's cannot immediately identify the Speed without reading the whole title.
Well done. Hopefully you see comments not as negative but constructive.
All of the best forwards
I like it a lot, but it would be cool to hear some of the technical details. Such as:
- Technology stack?
- How do you keep product pricing up-to-date? Do you have a persistent process that iterates over your known product list, querying Amazon's Product Advertising API (staying within rate limits)? If that's the case would love to hear more details on language and libraries used as I'm working on something similar.
- How do you discover new products to list?
- What storage backend do you use to store historic pricing data? Regular relational database or something more exotic like InfluxDB?
- Any plans on introducing new retailers besides Amazon? If so, how will you correlate products into canonical listings if the product does not have UPC information?
Things like that.
I found myself looking for a 'upgrade your shiny old PC' section...
Site is appealing, but would be more useful if you could put in everything you already have, then look at which piece/pieces could be upgraded, with $/wattage/performance changes...
Very nice.
I'm sure I'm not alone in having kicked around ideas for something like this for a long time.
Comparing PC builds has been an informal competition / game on various forums for many years.
I expect having more in the way of features to share, compare and feature/track builds could be very popular.
There are people who take great pride in meticulous builds. Giving them a platform to share their work would be great.
Likewise, have a look at any 'Lets Play' vid on YouTube or whatever and you'll see dozens of questions about the configuration that produced the video.
Hooking up with a popular 'caster such that they link to 'their' builds on Pangoly could be a great source of traffic.
Looking forward to seeing how this pans out.
> Comparing PC builds has been an informal competition / game on various forums for many years.
Exactly... the good ol' days at XtremeSystems forums come to my mind... :rolleyes:
This is really cool -- now when people ask me how hard it is to build their own PC I can show them this site... Usually my answer is "it's just as easy as picking the right things, and putting round pegs into round holes"
This doesn't seem very different from PcPartPicker.com or the LogicalIncrements.com guide. Nearly every hardware review site will also have a running list of recommended builds.[0]
Of course, you mentioned similar websites but I think they have different purposes compared to Pangoly. PCPartPicker offers a huge set of components with different stores so you can find the best price available for almost anything, but it struggle with users having little building experience that are trying to find what's the current best build options for their budget. On the other hand logicalincrements offers a nice viewing experience of components tiers but it lacks building customizations. I think having another option and point of view is not harmful at all :)
Exactly, competition is great don't let anybody discourage you. I already shared your site with some friends and they all like it a lot.
+1 -- I made that comment after sending it out to a friend of mine at work
Does anyone else remember Geek.com's value/mid/high end gaming PC build articles? Each month they'd revise each setup and I always used it as a guide when building or costing machines.
I tried to find them this morning, but didn't have luck. Did they ditch this feature?
Edit: What I liked about the feature is that despite being a "tech" and having built several PC's in the past, I can no longer keep current with hardware developments. The Geek.com guides allowed me to jump right in, without a weekend of research to get up to speed on the latest CPU's, GPU's and various hardware components.
If you're looking for something similar that's always kept up to date, check out the PcPer hardware leader board. They have a low/mid/high/dream system suggestion.
They don't update as often, but I've always liked the Ars Technica system guides, e.g.: http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2014/04/ars-technica-system-g...
First of all, what is that shiny gold motherboard [0] on the front page? Secondly, I recommend that you add Amazon reviews as another feature - just like price and performance. Also, I think you should add in some kind of metric for mice and keyboards - # of buttons, DPI, activation weight, etc. Finally, I really like the UI of your site. Although it may not be as feature-rich as some competitors, it seems many HNers have forgotten the importance of a good design.
> First of all, what is that shiny gold motherboard [0] on the front page?
It's the ASUS Z87 Deluxe (http://www.asus.com/Motherboards/Z87DELUXE/)
THANK YOU! That was driving me insane.
Suggestion: on the starting page, the "Highlights" for each starting configuration include both technical details ("AMD APU A6/A8 Series Dual/Quad Core") and a blurb describing what this configuration is good for ("Ideal for browsing the Internet, watching movies and chatting"). Furthermore, the latter always comes last on the list. I think that the blurb should come first, and that it shouldn't be part of the "checklist", but should rather be in highlighted near the top somewhere (maybe above or below the price).
Love the idea. A maybe tangential question for you or sites like yours...
So this might be all "tyranny of choice". But what is the difference between certain parts? Like if there are two motherboards and both of them cost ballpark $200 and support the same mainstream inputs/components, how do I know which one to choose?
It's moments like those that paralyze me from taking advantage of these services. Or why I like buying Apple where I don't really have a choice (implicit to the fact that I don't care which motherboard I'm getting other than Apple-curated).
This teaches a very good lesson I'll never forget. I have to invest more of my idle time on my side projects. I bought a domain to do this but never got around to finish it. Wonderful execution. Kudos.
Maybe it's just me, but I don't really care how my motherboard looks like. Means: I don't need to see those product photos, they could make space for more important information.
This is perfectly timed (for me) as I plan to build a gaming computer soon. I've lived off a laptop and an older desktop for a bunch of years but have money sitting saved for a new desktop.
Overall, I really like the site rating and the rational pros/cons between the different options.
The description of the AMD gamer computer made me realize there were more options than three, I didn't intuitively realize I could scroll down for more computer builds at first. That is probably more a me problem than a mass problem, however.
I would like to offer some critical feedback. I just took a look at PcPartPicker and it seems so much better.
On my monitor I can see at most 9 components at a time on your site. On PcPartPicker its about 28. I don't see the images serving any purpose. Why should I look at an image of the processor's box? What information does it give me?
I also recommend the book Visual Display of Quantitative Information. It's in the YC library and its fantastic.
I'd prefer to be able to have motherboards suggestions based on requested features. Like, so many USB ports, SATA ports and this socket for AMD CPU.
I first hit this on mobile and it was just about unusable. I couldn't find out how to switch over to the desktop version and had to wait until I was at a desktop to take a look.
Other than the mobile issues, it's a nice idea and pretty clean looking site. I'd reduce the images in size, especially the gigantic brand logos scrolling across the bottom. Make it more of a dashboard and less like a slideshow.
I'd be interested in a service such as this for building custom servers. I currently custom design and pay to have them built for my company.
Serious question: why? I would think that for servers, the lower cost and easier replaceability of buying standardized machines from an OEM would outweigh any benefits you could get from hand-selecting components.
In the UK there has existed for several years something almost exactly like this in the form of [PC Specialist][0]. Well worth checking out and in my experience more pleasant to interact with than this website (a simpler interface, without all the unnecessarily huge images and so on).
It would be nice if after configuring a pc, I could just copy the URL and send it to someone and have it display the pc I had configured.
Still, cool site!
Ditch the notices/warnings. Eg:
> Don't worry about hardware compatibility, the following components are safe to be used in the same PC build.
The most daunting part of building a custom computer is usually validation of the component quality and, more importantly, how they'll wind up working together.
A rating / review of component selection by power-users is all that's missing here for me.
Beyond that this is brilliant and simple - I'm surprised that NewEgg doesn't offer something like this.
I find it unfortunate that I can't completely remove the graphics card from the mid-range system, and I'm not allowed to select a SSD for it either. If I could do those things I would be able to compare this site directly to the PC I built yesterday.
Also I notice that you're missing estimated tax, shipping, and a Windows license from the price.
#1 Almost all games are created by PC, and port to console, not the other way around.
#2 Almost all games can play on PC, maybe just with lower setting.
#3 PC games are for people who like to discover => example how someone found out how to enable watch dog's E3 graph setting. But you have no control over console.
#4 Almost all console games are created by Pc, oh wait.
Feature request: I want to buy a new gaming machine but the sticker shock is a little much right now. Is it possible to save my configuration and get price alerts when a component goes on sale? Bonus points: could I configure multiple acceptable components and get an alert when any of those products goes on sale?
It's cool :-) I've also been working on a similar project [0]. A side project, started around an year ago. Initially it was focused primarily on Indian users, now, I'm adding support for other currencies as well.
Missing the new devils' canyon intel CPUs. If I were building a PC right now, it would use an i5-4690K.
A well-executed and beautiful site, but it would be nice to have Xeon options for the professional builds.
Having two extra configurations for Linux gamers (open source and proprietary) would be pretty cool!
The site looks great, but the "Learn" section is badly in need of some copy editing. Subject/verb pluralization disagreement and odd grammatical structure (to a native English speaker, many of the sentences sound awkward) are the biggest issues.
I've been looking for a site like this for a while. The only issue I had was picking the $605 configuration and wanting 16 gig of memory and blue ray. What you initially choose sometimes limits capacity later, though not with hard drives.
Are you familiar with http://pcpartpicker.com?
Really neat! I'd like to see something where I could say "I want 32GB of RAM" and that would constrain my motherboard choices, for example. I could also see the same kind of thing working with power supplies and video cards.
Accessories should be part of the options. You need cables for example to connect the HDs to the MB, DVI adapters for older monitors, etc. Some people may have a spare one, while others will have to make an additional trip to the store.
SATA cables are included with the motherboard, and DVI adapters are included with the video card. Neither of those should be an expected purchase when building a new machine.
Nice site! Some suggestions:
* Allow users to specify a form factor (like HTPC, μATX, mini ATX, ATX, ...) and filter components like mainboard and case by this.
* Allow users to use a different Amazon site for pricing info (.de/.fr would be nice for me personally)
Agreed on the form factor filter. I'm currently planning out a high-powered mATX gaming/dev machine, but this site as it currently functions wouldn't let me do this.
How does this compare to pcpartpicker? I don't see any option to use euros as the currency without getting an italian user interface. Are the prices at all localized, if so, do you have plans to support any other countries?
yes, more countries and localizations are on their way.
Great. Looking forward for Dutch prices, that would be great. FYI an entire translation seems unnecessary, and in my experience (at least with dutch peole) most will prefer an english interface though that is usually because translations are so bad.
Incase you were unaware, these guys (http://www.reddit.com/r/buildapc) _are_ your target audience. And your main competitor is pcpartpicker
Looks great, but I spent forever trying to figure out why clicking the tiles didn't do anything. I finally found that touching the tiles works.
I'm on a windows 8 touchscreen laptop, running the latest version of chrome.
Why no info on multi-processor systems? Google provides their chrome engineers with 16 core, 64gig systems. Dreamworks provides even larger machines. So anything labeled "Expert" seems to need better options
I don't work for google, but I wouldn't build specific machines but instead spin up a VM as needed.
I would really like to to tweak the price. I.E. get a suggestion what i could get for 50 pounds more. Also I can't figure out how to select "none" for components. I.e. Most people already have a case.
I like the design, but I would like a better overview when picking motherboards. Perhaps include number of PCI-E slots, number of USB slots, type of audio built in, type of video built in, that sort of thing.
I think the only thing missing here are the CPU coolers. Edit: Nevermind, found them. :)
Otherwise it looks like a cool way to pick a build, especially since it's been so long since I have looked into building a desktop.
Tangential offshoot topic: So for my soon to arrive Oculus Rift, what's the cheapest PC I can build with this site? Could i start with the cheapest option and just add a beefy graphics card?
Not enough choices in my opinion. If it were to implement close to the amount of hardware choices as PCPartPicker then it would be very practical. The site layout and design is very nice though.
This is really cool. Two things I find vital when I'm shopping for components are reviews and brands. It'd be nice to filter based on Newegg reviews or select a certain set of brands.
Wow, it's been so long since I've built a desktop I had to look up APU. (a CPU that does more than just central processing, possible a GPU on the same chip)
This is really really awesome and I'm gonna need something like this in the coming months. Only bad thing is that I need the price in € as I live in France.
Not sure if it would be possible to add the price for a similar configured PC from the major pc vendor sites like HP, Lenovo,Dell etc for comparison purposes.
This is a really cool tool for beginners or just shopping around to get the best deal. I def would have appreciated this when I first started out.
Buying a new PC these week, started with the custom selection and went to choose the motherboard (Asus Maximus VI) it wasn't there, gave up.
Nice work, really like the UI, much simpler to use than other tools.
It'd be nice if you could add some mini-itx options for HPTC and/or Steam Machine.
Bummer, I already have the stuff they have under "Pro" in my desktop and my laptop, and I think it is still too slow :-/
Looks good, I'll be putting together a lab computer pretty soon, and will give this a shot for comparing possible configurations.
failed for my first attempt: how can't i customize my dual-socket opteron 64Gb RAM workstation ?... ( mobo ASUS KGPE-d16 )
Cool project - Wish I could remove some of the mandatory components - I could not figure out a way to remove the hard drive.
no need to. remove it from Amazon cart.
I'd really like to see some Mini-ITX/Micro-ATX choices on there for people that want to build smaller systems.
Always dreamed of a site like this when I was a kid, still do, but now it looks like it's finally here! Nice work.
Very well built. Kudos to the founders. Also should add other options like home media centers and other stuff.
Nice service for those of us who find it hard to follow the ever changing hardware landscape. Thanks!
For Power Supplies what is "80Plus Bronze"?
Why isn't the Power listed in the on hover dropdown?
80+ Bronze is a certification of power efficiency. It's really the minimum quality you should be buying. Some people might prefer 80+ Silver, Gold, and Platinum rated PSUs, but they are not generally worth the slightly improved efficiency.
With any mild usage these guys are looking to make a killing in Amazon affiliate earnings.
I can't assemble an i3 with 16 GB of RAM and no graphics card. Some work is needed.
Thats a really nice way tool to generate income from amazon referrals. :)
This looks really cool.
I haven't built my own PC for a number of years and probably wouldn't consider it any more to be honest (MacBook FTW). I will however recommend this to anyone who does ask me about self-builds :)
Modern laptops have been adequate for most tasks for quite some time (T61 ftw, personally). On the other hand, if you are CPU/GPU/RAM limited (eg rendering..), then you will still greatly benefit from the additional power a desktop build will bring. And it's refreshing to see the continuing progress of stats, while laptops have seemingly stagnated (6 cores and 64GiB RAM? Nifty!).
OP, I think you have a ways to go to match the utility of pcpartpicker. But if you want a possible leg-up on them, then look into supporting workstation builds with Xeon/Cxxx/ECC (they don't really cost more than comparable "consumer" builds, and if you value stability more than overclocking, they make a lot of sense). Niches can be powerful.
What does this do that PC Part Picker can't?
DesktopHound.com circa 2008 did the same thing.
Am about to buy/build PC right now. It will be a six-core socket 2011 CPU with a couple of 780s. All the CPUs are little 1150s. Guess I'm not your target audience?
Works automagically for Canada, awesome
very nice site. operating system options are limited to windows though.
Wow, this is really neat!
s/Wattage/Power Usage/?
completely rip off!
Does anyone use a PC? Most use a Macbook.