Hope anyone thinking about buying a PC from PCS finds this review useful.
I felt like I could use a much more powerful PC and, as a previous PCS customer, visited their site to spec up some machines. The idea was to get the fastest machine I could afford for all of my media requirements.
I had about £1500 budget and when it comes to high spec'd PC's I found nobody, and I did a few comparisons, comes close to PCS in value for money.
Sharing specs in the forum
This is such a useful aspect of PCS's site. There are some very knowledgeable guys in the forum dishing out great advice left right and centre. I was given some helpful info on choices for: CPU, case and PSU.
I'm very grateful to the guys who advised me because I really think I've got a much better machine. Particularly the advice I got on case choice. I'm so glad I changed it to the Corsair 400 R, even if it did cost a little more.
I found forum advice, at this stage of the process, was available immediately and given in much more depth than in some emails PCS sent responding to questions I asked them.
One thing I didn't quite get in the configurator, and hopefully PCS can make it more obvious to config users, was a clear idea of connectivity.
I would have liked to know exactly, based on chosen motherboard and case, the number of USB 3.0 ports, firewire ports etc available. I opted for additional USB 3.0 and firewire ports because I thought, if you wanted them, you had to spec them.
However, I don't think this is so. If the case has USB 3 & Firewire ports and the motherboard has the connections then you're ok.
For example my Corsair case has two USB 3.0 ports and a Firewire port as standard. My Asus motherboard supports both types. So I didn't actually need to spec additional USB3/Firewire connectivity.
It's not a big deal, more connectivity is always useful, I just think it'd be better if it was stated exactly while in configuration.
The Final Spec
This is the final specification....
Case CORSAIR CARBIDE SERIES™ 400R MID TOWER CASE
Processor (CPU) AMD BULLDOZER EIGHT CORE FX-8150 (3.60GHz/8MB CACHE/AM3)
Motherboard ASUS® M5A97: AM3+ PLATFORM, DUAL DDR3, SATA 6.0GB/s, USB 3.0
Memory (RAM) 16GB KINGSTON HYPER-X GENESIS DUAL-DDR3 1600MHz, X.M.P (4 x 4GB KIT)
Graphics Card 1GB AMD RADEON™ HD6870 - 2 DVI,HDMI,2 mDP - DX® 11, Eyefinity 4 Capable
Memory - 1st Hard Disk 120GB INTEL® 320 SERIES SSD, SATA 3 Gb/s (upto 270MB/sR | 130MB/sW)
2nd Hard Disk 2TB WD CAVIAR BLACK WD2002FAEX, SATA 6 Gb/s, 64MB CACHE (7200rpm)
3rd Hard Disk 3TB WD CAVIAR GREEN WD30EZRX, SATA 6 Gb/s, 64MB CACHE
1st DVD/BLU-RAY Drive 10x LG BLU-RAY RE-WRITER DRIVE, 16x DVD ±R/±RW (£65)
2nd DVD/BLU-RAY Drive 12x BLU-RAY RE-WRITER DRIVE, 16x DVD ±R/±RW (£69)
Power Supply CORSAIR 650W ENTHUSIAST SERIES™ TX650 V2-80 PLUS® BRONZE (£69)
Processor Cooling TITAN FENRIR EVO EXTREME HEATPIPE CPU COOLER (£39)
Sound Card Sound Blaster® X-Fi™ Xtreme Audio (£32)
Network Facilities 10/100/1000 GIGABIT LAN PORT - AS STANDARD ON ALL PCs
USB Options 2 PORT USB 3.0 INTERNAL PCI EXPRESS CARD
Firewire & Video Editing 3 Port IEEE 1394a Firewire PCI Card (£9)
TV Card PCTV SYSTEMS DUAL TUNER TV CARD & WINDOWS MEDIA CENTRE REMOTE
Operating System Genuine Windows 7 Professional 64 Bit - inc DVD & Licence (£109)
Office Software FREE Microsoft® Office Starter 2010 (Limited functionality Word & Excel)
Production Time
I placed my order on the 4th January. The PC(now named Mrs Peel) was delivered on 24th January.
I made an order amendment during the building phase which delayed delivery a little. However, I have no complaints about the time taken to build. It's a custom build and anything up to a month for delivery seems fair enough to me.
Email updates were sent as my build went through the production phases.
I did contact PCS on a couple of occasions to enquire about progress, I was a bit like a kid on Christmas eve, just couldn't wait! Telephone support were extremely helpful and knowing how busy PCS are just now I really appreciate their efforts on my behalf. I also appreciated their honesty. There were no unrealistic delivery estimates just to get rid of me. They were upfront about how busy production was and when I could expect delivery.
Delivery
An email let me know my PC was dispatched on a next day delivery basis. The courier was DPD and a tracking number was provided as a link to DPD's website where I could see delivery progress.
The following day I was texted by the courier to confirm delivery between 12.36 and 13.36. If I remember correctly delivery time was 12.55.
The box was in perfect condition and the courier had obviously paid due care and attention to his fragile delivery. Good service from DPD.
I took delivery at work and one thing I didn't take account of was how big the box was. It was a bit of an exercises getting it to fit into my car. And I drive a Mazda estate. For anyone getting theirs delivered to the office make sure your transport is big enough!
Unboxing
Packaging was extremely good. The PC was very well protected in its box. There was special inflatable packaging inside the case to protect motherboard and fans.
An additional welcome box was provided with all the manuals, discs etc.
Everything looked the part. There's no doubt PCS are a serious company.
Up and running
I'm still running her in but Mrs Peel is easily the fastest PC I have owned. Just what I was looking for. I would recommend a SSD to everyone. The performance improvement is very obvious. And the OS just feels more robust to me as well.
My Windows Experience Index is 7.6. That's not too shabby at all
In the first few days I have had an extremely good user experience.
Conclusion
5 stars for PCS. Their service, the PCS community, the quality of their product, I'm a very happy customer.
I'd recommend PCS any day.
The Pics!
I've uploaded the pics to Imageshack, thanks Corfate, and pasted the links above....hope they work!
Cheers all.
I felt like I could use a much more powerful PC and, as a previous PCS customer, visited their site to spec up some machines. The idea was to get the fastest machine I could afford for all of my media requirements.
I had about £1500 budget and when it comes to high spec'd PC's I found nobody, and I did a few comparisons, comes close to PCS in value for money.
Sharing specs in the forum
This is such a useful aspect of PCS's site. There are some very knowledgeable guys in the forum dishing out great advice left right and centre. I was given some helpful info on choices for: CPU, case and PSU.
I'm very grateful to the guys who advised me because I really think I've got a much better machine. Particularly the advice I got on case choice. I'm so glad I changed it to the Corsair 400 R, even if it did cost a little more.
I found forum advice, at this stage of the process, was available immediately and given in much more depth than in some emails PCS sent responding to questions I asked them.
One thing I didn't quite get in the configurator, and hopefully PCS can make it more obvious to config users, was a clear idea of connectivity.
I would have liked to know exactly, based on chosen motherboard and case, the number of USB 3.0 ports, firewire ports etc available. I opted for additional USB 3.0 and firewire ports because I thought, if you wanted them, you had to spec them.
However, I don't think this is so. If the case has USB 3 & Firewire ports and the motherboard has the connections then you're ok.
For example my Corsair case has two USB 3.0 ports and a Firewire port as standard. My Asus motherboard supports both types. So I didn't actually need to spec additional USB3/Firewire connectivity.
It's not a big deal, more connectivity is always useful, I just think it'd be better if it was stated exactly while in configuration.
The Final Spec
This is the final specification....
Case CORSAIR CARBIDE SERIES™ 400R MID TOWER CASE
Processor (CPU) AMD BULLDOZER EIGHT CORE FX-8150 (3.60GHz/8MB CACHE/AM3)
Motherboard ASUS® M5A97: AM3+ PLATFORM, DUAL DDR3, SATA 6.0GB/s, USB 3.0
Memory (RAM) 16GB KINGSTON HYPER-X GENESIS DUAL-DDR3 1600MHz, X.M.P (4 x 4GB KIT)
Graphics Card 1GB AMD RADEON™ HD6870 - 2 DVI,HDMI,2 mDP - DX® 11, Eyefinity 4 Capable
Memory - 1st Hard Disk 120GB INTEL® 320 SERIES SSD, SATA 3 Gb/s (upto 270MB/sR | 130MB/sW)
2nd Hard Disk 2TB WD CAVIAR BLACK WD2002FAEX, SATA 6 Gb/s, 64MB CACHE (7200rpm)
3rd Hard Disk 3TB WD CAVIAR GREEN WD30EZRX, SATA 6 Gb/s, 64MB CACHE
1st DVD/BLU-RAY Drive 10x LG BLU-RAY RE-WRITER DRIVE, 16x DVD ±R/±RW (£65)
2nd DVD/BLU-RAY Drive 12x BLU-RAY RE-WRITER DRIVE, 16x DVD ±R/±RW (£69)
Power Supply CORSAIR 650W ENTHUSIAST SERIES™ TX650 V2-80 PLUS® BRONZE (£69)
Processor Cooling TITAN FENRIR EVO EXTREME HEATPIPE CPU COOLER (£39)
Sound Card Sound Blaster® X-Fi™ Xtreme Audio (£32)
Network Facilities 10/100/1000 GIGABIT LAN PORT - AS STANDARD ON ALL PCs
USB Options 2 PORT USB 3.0 INTERNAL PCI EXPRESS CARD
Firewire & Video Editing 3 Port IEEE 1394a Firewire PCI Card (£9)
TV Card PCTV SYSTEMS DUAL TUNER TV CARD & WINDOWS MEDIA CENTRE REMOTE
Operating System Genuine Windows 7 Professional 64 Bit - inc DVD & Licence (£109)
Office Software FREE Microsoft® Office Starter 2010 (Limited functionality Word & Excel)
Production Time
I placed my order on the 4th January. The PC(now named Mrs Peel) was delivered on 24th January.
I made an order amendment during the building phase which delayed delivery a little. However, I have no complaints about the time taken to build. It's a custom build and anything up to a month for delivery seems fair enough to me.
Email updates were sent as my build went through the production phases.
I did contact PCS on a couple of occasions to enquire about progress, I was a bit like a kid on Christmas eve, just couldn't wait! Telephone support were extremely helpful and knowing how busy PCS are just now I really appreciate their efforts on my behalf. I also appreciated their honesty. There were no unrealistic delivery estimates just to get rid of me. They were upfront about how busy production was and when I could expect delivery.
Delivery
An email let me know my PC was dispatched on a next day delivery basis. The courier was DPD and a tracking number was provided as a link to DPD's website where I could see delivery progress.
The following day I was texted by the courier to confirm delivery between 12.36 and 13.36. If I remember correctly delivery time was 12.55.
The box was in perfect condition and the courier had obviously paid due care and attention to his fragile delivery. Good service from DPD.
I took delivery at work and one thing I didn't take account of was how big the box was. It was a bit of an exercises getting it to fit into my car. And I drive a Mazda estate. For anyone getting theirs delivered to the office make sure your transport is big enough!
Unboxing
Packaging was extremely good. The PC was very well protected in its box. There was special inflatable packaging inside the case to protect motherboard and fans.
An additional welcome box was provided with all the manuals, discs etc.
Everything looked the part. There's no doubt PCS are a serious company.
Up and running
I'm still running her in but Mrs Peel is easily the fastest PC I have owned. Just what I was looking for. I would recommend a SSD to everyone. The performance improvement is very obvious. And the OS just feels more robust to me as well.
My Windows Experience Index is 7.6. That's not too shabby at all
In the first few days I have had an extremely good user experience.
Conclusion
5 stars for PCS. Their service, the PCS community, the quality of their product, I'm a very happy customer.
I'd recommend PCS any day.
The Pics!
I've uploaded the pics to Imageshack, thanks Corfate, and pasted the links above....hope they work!
Cheers all.
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