Will Dell's prices go up after Christmas?

December 22, 2005 5:57 PM

Will Dell's prices go up or down after Christmas? In January?

I'm planning on buying a new computer sometime over the next month. I rather like Dell's XPS400, I like the bang for your buck, and I like the included 19" LCD. I'll probably get a memory and video card upgrade because I make comics and tend to have large Photoshop files open. Right now I can get all of that for $1069. I really want to do this in the next month or so, but I'd rather wait a little bit longer. However if I couldn't get a comparable deal in January I can do it right now. Should I?

posted by ScottMorris to computers & internet (26 comments total)

Just for the record, a video card upgrade has no bearing on Photoshop's performance at all. The increases better video cards offer come in the system's ability to render advanced 3D scenes at high frame rates, with special effects and high polygon counts.

Even applications like CAD and the like don't benefit from traditional video card upgrades, since you end up needing pixel-perfect percision, and things like ATI's FireGL card.

Completely not answering your question, but more memory will take you a great deal farther than a better video card, if you're not planning on gaming anytime soon.
posted by disillusioned at 6:11 PM on December 22, 2005

I'd venture to say that the 19" monitor include is the real wildcard here.

It's unlikely that you'll be able to get the exact same deal, but comparable? Sure, if you're flexible and feel like checking back on a regular basis.
posted by FlamingBore at 6:15 PM on December 22, 2005

Dell constantly runs "deals". Nonstop. That's their schtick. They are very adept at getting you to think you have to jump on this one-time-only offer, and if you wait too long the price will go up.

That is nonsense. If anything, you'll get a better computer for the same money in a month.

P.S.: Dell is icky. Build your own. :)
posted by trevyn at 6:19 PM on December 22, 2005

Yeah, FlamingBore, that's the one I'm really worried about. I really want to get an LCD, but I don't want to go much over $1,000.

And good call, disillusioned, I don't care about gaming so much. So even increasing the RAM on my video card won't make a difference?
posted by ScottMorris at 6:21 PM on December 22, 2005

Dell's prices always go down. If you can wait, the end of January is a good time to buy because it's the end of a financial quarter for them, so they often have crazy bargains to pump sales to look good for their investors.
posted by MegoSteve at 6:27 PM on December 22, 2005

The end of January is the end of a financial quarter? Don't think that's right...

Anyway, I've bought dozens of systems from Dell, so here's my advice:
1. Dell *always* has some kind of promotion: free shipping, double memory, free printer, etc. My general rule is to buy if the current promotion matches my desired configuration exactly. On the other hand, if the deal provides "free" upgrades or components that you wouldn't otherwise decide to purchase, it makes sense to wait for the next deal. For example, I usually skip the "free printer" deals, and take the double memory deals, since I don't need a printer, but can almost always use more memory. The freebie is always built into the price, so get one you want...
2. Hardware prices always go down in the long run. Never buy hardware now that you're not going to use immediately. Having said that, one month is not a long time, so I wouldn't expect prices to fall much just for waiting.
posted by blue mustard at 6:48 PM on December 22, 2005

I would check slickdeals regularly.. They constantly find combinations of deals and coupon codes to obtain the lowest possible prices (although almost all the deals lately have been laptops or accessories, but you can check the history to see some ).

Dell issues coupon codes which change from month to month. But there's often a 1- or 2- day period in which the expiration date for multiple codes overlap and you can apply both of them at the same time, saving a ton of money.
posted by helios at 6:55 PM on December 22, 2005

I agree with every one else... Dell is always running a special. If you don't like the ones they are offering now, wait a week.

However, I do want to pitch my 2 cents, upgrade to one of the 20" lcds (either 2001fp or 2005fpw) You will be thanking yourself later. The biggest difference between the 19s and the 20s is the pixel resolution. The 20s have a lot more and if you are doing any photo work you will like the 1600x1200 resolution better
posted by kashmir772 at 6:59 PM on December 22, 2005

It's worth checking out Dell's outlet site; I've found some very good deals there.
posted by Kat Allison at 7:18 PM on December 22, 2005

The end of January is the end of a financial quarter? Don't think that's right...

I do.
posted by Kwantsar at 7:40 PM on December 22, 2005

Dell ran a lot of deals in September and October, November and December have been kind of slow. If you can wait a few weeks, the good deals may return in mid-January.

Keep in mind that lots of people are buying gift computers in the first half of December. Still more people are buying new laptops for their kids to take back to school at the end of december and early January. By mid-Jan, things will be slow and it will actually make sense for Dell to offer some nice deals.

Also, it is rumored that Dell will be updating the larger monitors to include HDMI in mid January. When that happens, expect deals on monitors like the 2405FWP to be as good as, or better than, the recent ~$800 deal.
posted by b1tr0t at 7:49 PM on December 22, 2005

I second the slickdeals, and also recommend fatwallet (ONLY THE FORUMS -- the rest of the site won't help you at all). Register yourself on the forums (the searches are better) and check it AT LEAST two-three times a day (the good deals go fast). If you want to buy a new computer and aren't on a budget, wait until you see a really good deal and then buy (you'll know, because people in the forums will be freaking out about it -- or well, as near to that as possible, since everyone on fw seems to think dell has started to have shitty deals lately). FW regularly has posts about items that sell out within the hour, so checking back often is well worth it. I've scored some massive deals from there -- hell, my $40 no-rebate/coupon involved 120G PATA drive just showed up today (that one sold out in maybe 6 hours).

Ben's Bargains is also good.

Really, after these sites, I can't imagine buying something that's simply on sale. There better be a deal beyond that.

P.S.: Dell is icky. Build your own. :)

I know you're not entirely serious, but ... I used to always DIY, but dell gets parts for so fucking cheap it is REALLY hard to beat their prices if you're building a budget computer. IF you're building the baddest computer on the block, then by all means, put that together yourself, but if you're just looking for something for your college-bound kid, or just want a decent computer at a good price, you really can't beat dell. I tried to build a budget box in Sept 2004, and i'm STILL kicking myself, because I could have an equivalent computer WITH an flatscreen, AND a decent case (yeah, you always try to save money on the case, because the good ones are pricey, but dell makes great cases, AND they don't seem to add much to the price.)
posted by fishfucker at 9:56 PM on December 22, 2005 [1 favorite has favorites]

also, to specifically answer the question: yeah, I'd wait until after Xmas. I haven't seen really good dell deals for a bit, so maybe they'll drop them after the new year.
posted by fishfucker at 9:56 PM on December 22, 2005

To answer your follow up question about video cards, no not really.

Think about it this way—Photoshop itself uses your CPU to generate an image. It then sends said image to the screen. The added memory on a video card is generally used for caching textures. The GPU then renders the image using that texture data.

If you are frequently messing with incredibly large images... nope... still won't matter.

Go for more system RAM.
posted by disillusioned at 2:44 AM on December 23, 2005

disillusioned writes "Even applications like CAD and the like don't benefit from traditional video card upgrades, since you end up needing pixel-perfect percision, and things like ATI's FireGL card."

This is almost always untrue. The on board video card that ships with almost all motherboards blows. And they share main memory with the CPU instead of having dedicated RAM. You can buy something like a Radeon X600 with 256MB of DDR memory on board; dual head output (DVI + VGA supporting 1600X1200 on both screens); S-Video out; hardware DX9 and OpenGL acceleration all for C$100. Why would you cripple you system with some Trident or Intel on board GPU.

And go dual head if you've got the space. Even if you run a 15" CRT as your secondary. It is so nice to be able to toss all your toolbars and palette on the secondary and run your actual editting window nice and clean. Plus you can run your IM/email/browser on the secondary.
posted by Mitheral at 6:48 AM on December 23, 2005

holymoly, you're _the_ scott morris .. weee : )

that dell system is not particularly good (no dell system is) and if you want a new main monitor then don't buy a mediocre one.. you have your eyes on it all day long and your health and success hang on it

dell has some good monitors (the 1905, 2001, 2005, and 2405), read some reviews and make an educated decision then
the 2405 sale price of ~850-900$ is a very sweet deal

memory and hard drives make a bigger difference for working with photoshop and general desktop usage, cpu speed is not very important atm and graphics card doesn't matter as long as it is relatively new

dell deals always come back

there are no interesting new computer things coming up in the next months and what you can buy now is good enough for a few years, so waiting will only save you some money..

recent review of the xps400 at hardocp

----------
some suggestions for the xps400 (going step-by-step thru the online customization thingi at dell.com):
* keep the 2.8ghz proc (a little more power is not worth the extra money)
* 150$ for winxp pro?! umm, i suggest not paying extra
* they offer no cheap nvidia graphics card, so i'd keep the default x300, it has dvi, hypermemory is not too nice and ati's drivers can be a little worse than nvidia's, but you can always buy a geforce 6600 dual-dvi for ~100$
* take at least 2gb of ram, working with less than 2gb is painful, 4gb is a little pricey (sadly the 2gb option will give you 4 sticks with 512mb instead of 2 sticks with 1024mb each so the board will be "full", take this in account)
* not knowing which exact type or brand of hard drives they will give you and seeing the high prices i'd go with the 80gb default or 160gb +60$ option and nothing more (depends on how you backup things and whether you're comfortable adding hard drives by yourself)
* choose dual drives +50$ to get a dvd burner (~50$ is an ok price and they will give you an up-to-date brand model)
* don't add a floppy for the otherworldly price of 30$ (you seldom need them anymore) but take the media card reader +20$ if you use memory cards
* monitor options: check reviews and street prices to find the most reasonable price (you would make good profit by selling the default e193fp and getting the 1905/2001/2005/2405 by street price tho, think about that)
* the default 7.1 sound is really good enough for music listening and movies.. if you think about gaming the x-fi extreme +100$ is a nice price (cheaper than street price at the moment i think)
* none of the speakers options is appealing, you can grab creative 2.0 sets for ~20$ or the t3000 2.1 set for 35-40$, for audiophile or good 5.1 sound you get better value buying entertainment/home cinema sets
* take the default keyboard and the +10$ optical mouse, the mx518 mouse and the mx3000 keyboard+mouse are nice but both much cheaper on the street
* don't pay for microsoft office

sorry for a long post of unrequested shopping aid : )
posted by suni at 7:47 AM on December 23, 2005

By the way, I believe Windows Vista will be able to accelerate graphics by means of OpenGL, like the Macintosh does with Quartz Extreme and Quartz 2D Extreme. The amount of memory on your video card will probably make a big difference in this environment. If you think you will eventually run Vista on this machine, and can get a good deal on a fast video card with plenty of RAM by ordering it with the system, you might consider it.

(On the other hand, you will probably be able to get a better video card cheaper by the time Vista ships, so the bundled-with-system deal would have to be pretty damn good.)
posted by kindall at 9:01 AM on December 23, 2005

i dunno who would like to use vista when he can have macosx on every machine at roughly the same time..
vista even with every positive feature removed might not be out by june 2006

the x300se hypermem is completely vista-/aero-compatible, macosx86 will run with all dx9 graphics cards
posted by suni at 10:12 AM on December 23, 2005

i dunno who would like to use vista when he can have macosx on every machine at roughly the same time..

Scott's apparently buying a Dell, not a Macintosh.
posted by kindall at 12:23 PM on December 23, 2005

[ ] sign here if you are aware that macos runs on p4 and a64 since apple decided to switch to intel :D:D
posted by suni at 1:11 PM on December 23, 2005

The current developer versions of Mac OS X for Intel can be hacked to run on commodity hardware. Release versions most likely will not be able to do so, as I believe the company is not quite stupid enough to throw away its primary source of revenue just yet.
posted by kindall at 8:34 PM on December 23, 2005

i'm just guessing cringely-style, but i see os wars coming up

apple is not quite stupid enough to hang their future on this

i see mobo makers working as a second front against the tpm soon, i see apple happily becoming the new dell, and i see people willing to pay for macos (and aperture, final cut, logic, motion, quicktime, .., itunes even..) without getting their hardware thru apple
posted by suni at 8:19 AM on December 24, 2005

My expectation is that Apple will position the Intel-based Macintosh at least partly as a better way to run the handful of Windows applications that don't have reasonable Mac equivalents (after throwing some money at Darwine, or else just waiting for Microsoft to pick up the ball with a native version of VPC -- they'd like that, because it'd mean they'd sell a Windows license to every Mac user). They'll continue to charge a premium for the dongle used to copy-protect the OS (the dongle being the Macintosh itself), and people will continue to pay it. I do not believe they are at all interested in licensing the OS to every Intel-based PC manufacturer, because that would be stupid.

Even if TPM is cracked and it becomes possible to hack the OS to install on commodity hardware, which is a big if, no one outside a few nerds will want to run a machine that Apple will block from booting the next time a vital security update is delivered.
posted by kindall at 11:07 AM on December 24, 2005

why would it be stupid to have macos sold by every pc seller?

i don't have a clue what apple's gonna do with darwine in the next months or what's the legal situation..
they probably made a deal already with ms (some basic "meeting in the middle" agreement) and ms will not give up any win32 secrets

win-only and mac-only apps are pretty much even (in value, attractivity, necessity but the win side wants to run on macos too (now that macos will rise from its usual ~5% of users), apple just has their own nice apps as trump cards

people bought macs just for macos and certain apps even while getting scammed with weak overpriced hardware, and they were happy (you seldom hear "thanks bill, xp runs photoshop and battlefield, weee")

aren't most macos updates more of the "something gets more weird" or "randomly rearranging your music" kind? : )
i don't consider difficult updating a dealbreaker, especially not for the "few nerds".. the share of way-pavers is always needed and planned in and apple is regulating it (the amount/percentage) with the tpm (imperfect protection generates extra users.. i dunno a term for this)

the mobos will definitely be "normal" boards plus tpm for the first generations of intelmacs, imo they will never break compatibility with "normal" hardware (the dev releases carry many many drivers and amd too)
i'd say intel would('ve) like(d) to produce all mac boards and put tpm in the chipset (foxconn is waiting), but apple did not make a deal like this (used amd as a threat to get intel to play along) to go the "new dell" route soon..

apple is not a puter hardware maker (hasn't been for some time) and still they can sell apple brand puters for high prices, cos people want to buy complete puters with warranty/support/upgradability


waiting for macworld is hard : )


have a nice christmas, jerry : )
(didn't proofread)
posted by suni at 9:27 PM on December 24, 2005

why would it be stupid to have macos sold by every pc seller?

Because it would cause Apple's hardware sales to plummet, much as happened the last time Apple allowed other companies to sell computers that ran their OS.

Apple is a hardware company. The bulk of their profits come from hardware sales. On a big G5 system, they may make $600+ a unit. Intel-based Macs will undoubtedly be priced with a similar profit margin. For each Macintosh Apple doesn't sell, they will have to get that $600 from somewhere else, which means from OS licensing. Do you think Dell is going to pay Apple $600 for each copy of OS X it ships? Dell can figure out that doing such would eliminate its only competitive advantage (price) and there would be no reason to choose Dell hardware over legitimate Apple hardware.

You have to remember, I've been following this company for more than twenty years. They will not repeat the OS licensing debacle. Instead, they will invent a new and creative way to fail spectacularly. (They're overdue.)
posted by kindall at 7:33 AM on December 28, 2005

apple's profits come from bundling great software products with overpriced hardware products (and from gadgets)
the profit on a g5 is up to 50%.. it's a sad fact

the (my) solution to this problem is rather simple, the cheaper the puter you buy from apple the more you have to pay for apple software (and for updates and even upgrades)

just selling macos thru dell would be stupid, but selling machines for prices relatively competitive to dell's would be possible (the only difference would be the amount of machines they sell and the profit they want/need) and they all would run a free "starter version" of macos and xp (virtual and dual-boot xp, for a normal license price of ~100$)

apple can continue to take extra money for smaller form factors, for exclusive stuff (like selling dual-core yonah notebooks before everybody else), for every piece of hardware/accessories that is not just relabeled "normal" stuff.. and they can take lots of extra money for all the software products that xp-users are used to buying extra


..managers ruin everything
posted by suni at 1:00 PM on December 29, 2005