Is This a Good Deal from Dell? Need Advice

[TheHans]

I haven't looked at your specs very closely, but the prices seem the be average for what you're getting. However, if it were me, I'd go for one of their basic systems and buy the LCD, speakers, and memory elsewhere.

Hi,

I *so* agree about their memory, but the rep. wouldn't take more off the computer and still give us the $10 shipping. The computers were supposed to be $799 (minimum) to get that shipping instead of the $79 and he'd already agreed to keep the $10 shipping for both even though I'd already negotiated one down to $719 and one to $759. I think I've seen the phrase "the shipping killed it" more than once on these forums with relation to Dell. We thought about getting a more "basic" 3000 without any bells and whistles, as you suggested, but by the time you add the shipping, add the shipping on where ever we might buy LCD monitors, memory and yes, even a DVD drive *and* Office, it worked out to *more* than what we would pay. At least by what I could figure. So, considering the shipping was $20 (total) I'm pretty satisfied from that point of view.

Also, since we *need* to have Office and this was significant, having him give us Office for $158 was something we had to take into account overall. We don't have the option of getting Office at a university where it sells for peanuts, so the $158 was extremely cheap. For example, Tigerdirect.ca sells Office for $169 (I think it is), but you also have to pay shipping for it.

But having gone on and on here I have to say...you're *so* right about the price of Dell's memory. It's overpriced.

On another note, we ordered our systems at about 4:30PM Pacific Time yesterday and the Office arrived at 8:30AM this morning. That seems pretty fast, I must admit. Too bad the Purolator guy woke us up :-)

TheHans

[synaptech]

Yeah I agree that if they were going to up the shipping then you did the right thing. Besides, you have complete packages now and they were delivered pretty freakin quick.

[poedua]

Hi,

I *so* agree about their memory, but the rep. wouldn't take more off the computer and still give us the $10 shipping. The computers were supposed to be $799 (minimum) to get that shipping instead of the $79 and he'd already agreed to keep the $10 shipping for both even though I'd already negotiated one down to $719 and one to $759. I think I've seen the phrase "the shipping killed it" more than once on these forums with relation to Dell. We thought about getting a more "basic" 3000 without any bells and whistles, as you suggested, but by the time you add the shipping, add the shipping on where ever we might buy LCD monitors, memory and yes, even a DVD drive *and* Office, it worked out to *more* than what we would pay. At least by what I could figure. So, considering the shipping was $20 (total) I'm pretty satisfied from that point of view.

Also, since we *need* to have Office and this was significant, having him give us Office for $158 was something we had to take into account overall. We don't have the option of getting Office at a university where it sells for peanuts, so the $158 was extremely cheap. For example, Tigerdirect.ca sells Office for $169 (I think it is), but you also have to pay shipping for it.

But having gone on and on here I have to say...you're *so* right about the price of Dell's memory. It's overpriced.

On another note, we ordered our systems at about 4:30PM Pacific Time yesterday and the Office arrived at 8:30AM this morning. That seems pretty fast, I must admit. Too bad the Purolator guy woke us up :-)

TheHans

In the event it helps, a March 2005 article ( below ) ranked the Dell 3000 a " Best Buy " - and it's not even a Pentium like yours, but a Celeron.

http://www.pcworld.com/reviews/artic...,119494,00.asp

Good Choice