At Sim Lim Square, it seems that buying a camera is very much different from buying a desktop. The main challenge in buying a camera is the haggling. The prices of the cameras in many shops are negotiable. On the other hand, prices for desktops are fixed. The only discounts that can be possible are those you get when you pay by cash because they would round down the prices. What a potential customer really needs to spend his time and efforts on is to find out which shop has most of the components still in stock.
Yesterday I spent half an hour gathering catalogues and comparing prices, only to realize they are all the same. The differences were around a mere dollar, but some components that I was searching for was already missing from those lists at that first stage of my buying process. Half the shops I visited didn't have AMD Phenom II X4 955 and Palit GTX285 1GB on their catalogues at all.
Next I went to Best Price, which was one of the three that had most of what I want. During the discussion with the salesman, I found two reasons that stopped me from buying from them. First, they only perform hardware installation services, ie they do not install the Operating System and device drivers for you. Second, even though I had already circled the closest substitutes for the one or two missing components in their list, it turned out half of all the components I marked there were out of stock, so that what they could give me was a completely different computer from what I'd wanted.
Finally I went to Fuwell, the shop I went to a long time ago to buy my last desktop. It was recommended to me by a friend during NS and it is still the better shop of the two I've visited there.
They had only 1 thing missing in their catalogue - the Corsair 620W PSU. After asking the salesman, several other things were out of stock - Palit GTX285, Western Digital Caviar Black 640GB hard drive, and Microsoft Wired Keyboard and Mouse. For the video card, he recommended the MSI GeForce GTX285 1GB which, he claimed, was the closest substitute. For the hard disk I picked the 500GB version of the original. For the keyboard and mouse he replaced with Logitech Wired Keyboard and Mouse, which costs a dollar less. However, the video card would cost $80 more.
In any case, nothing is perfect. Fuwell has a better selection (and that is actually quite important if you had gone there with a list of components in mind), but their prices are slightly higher. The differences are really not huge; for example I noticed that my RAM was priced at $50 for 2GB when other shops were selling it at $49. Not big, but noticeable.
The third shop I didn't visit. Video-Pro had everything I wanted in the list, but my random walk took me to Best Price first and then to Fuwell. Somehow I just didn't see Video Pro after my first tour.
Anyway, it is also possible that some shops may be lying about certain item being out of stock in order to force customers to get more expensive components. No one wants to buy a worse computer than what they have in mind. I downgraded my hard drive from 640GB to 500GB instead of picking 750GB only because I thought 640Gb was already slightly overkill.
Haha! I just got an email from Runes of Magic saying I can get free a total of 40 Diamonds, 20 for every server on which I have a lv10+ character. I'm a little tempted now, but... THE LAST REMNANT! I CAN PLAY THE LAST REMNANT NAO! MUAHAHAHAHA!
But first, I gotta transfer bookmarks and passwords to my new computer...
Hey... I didn't know desktops these days come with Power Options. Interesting. Another new addition to my QuickLaunch.
Ooo... I'm SO going to play Mass Effect again on this computer. With everything on the highest settings this time, except the Volume.
I'm crying. The sheer magnificence of The Last Remnant with all Video options on High at a resolution of 1680X1050 (full screen) is making weep tears of joy. After all these years playing the best games on the shittiest possible options and dealing with crashes despite the preemptive actions, this... blew my mind!
Tonight, I will try the same with Empires. Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!
Btw, I'm typing this only because I copying stuff from my laptop.
Now I have the Western Digital 3.5" 1TB external hard disk. Physical size is not a problem for me, so I bought it together with my computer yesterday. And also a 2.5" 320Gb external hard drive for my bro's friend. I thought smaller device wasn't worth the price because for the price difference between these 2 was only $50. The 320Gb cost $129 while mine cost $179 and has three times the capacity of the former. Of course, it was also more than three times as big. Not exactly very portable, but neither is it an issue.
Chuck was a pretty good show. I just finished the second season and it ended in a way that was reminiscent of the Matrix. Oh I can't go any further or I'll spoil the show for you.
Anyway, for those who haven't heard of Chuck, it's a TV series that revolves around this guy named Chuck Bartowski. He worked at a fictional electronics store, Buy More, where he was a computer technician. From what I gathered (I didn't watch the first season), he opened an email from an old acquaintance which contained a top secret CIA thing, the Intersect, containing images that uploaded a whole CIA encyclopedia (or something like that) subliminally into his brain. Hence he became a human Intersect.
From then on, whenever he saw a keyword, symbol or face he would "flash" and remember the relevant information about the trigger. The CIA found out about this and sent two agents to provide round-the-clock protection while they searched for a way to both help him and fight a secret organization known as Fulcrum.
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