RSSDell tries again with its XPS 730 high-end desktop gaming system
By Scott M. Fulton, III | Published May 2, 2008, 6:21 PM
After one of the worst starts in the history of PCs two years ago, Dell's XPS desktop series has come crawling back, but not without scrapes and bruises along the way. Yesterday it revealed a new 730 model it hopes can recapture Dell's glory.
There are two schools of thought in the consumer PC industry: One believes that the global economy is in such poor shape this year that computer purchases will end up being heavily curtailed, and that the discretionary segment of the market -- the high end -- will absorb the brunt of the blow. The other believes that since the bad economy will impact lower wage earners hardest, higher wage earners will continue spending as they have before, and thus the high end of the market will be an oasis in the desert.
Dell is clearly betting on there being genius among those in the latter school. Yesterday, it formally took the wraps off its heavily revised XPS desktop gaming system, giving it an updated case and a new number: the XPS 730. It's also betting that consumers will forgive the company for its first endeavor in the premium desktop market two years ago, the XPS 700. That system was plagued by a multitude of problems that delayed its shipment to customers for months; some who pre-ordered a system in April expecting for it to be shipped in July, waited until as late as November.
In the end, the company laid the blame on a faulty cooling assembly rather than any number of supply problems, for which there was plenty of evidence. Yesterday, with Michael Dell now acting as CEO as well as Chairman, the company took extra steps to prove in advance the same mistakes wouldn't be repeated, including its new patented ceramic cooling system developed jointly with Intel.
There could still be a minefield ahead for Dell, even if it has worked out its supply, manufacturing, and cooling problems this time around. The bad economy notwithstanding, Dell has taken a gamble by choosing nVidia's 790i Ultra SLI chipset as its primary platform. Though that chipset has scored tremendously high in enthusiast sites' tests, reports from the field indicate that motherboards from Asus, XFX, and EVGA using that chipset have all faced stability problems running Windows Vista. While Dell uses its own motherboard design for high-end systems rather than rely on third parties, the 790i's track record is already making gamers wary.
Among the common problems we noted testers are reporting with 790i-based motherboards (not Dell's) is that timing multipliers fail to stay set, and voltages tended to fluctuate. Builders are the types who can notice these problems right away (sometimes they're even the culprits themselves); but some of Dell's customers will not be the type of enthusiast who will instinctively know what's going on when they see a "blue screen of death" from Windows...or who can calmly explain what's happening to Dell's customer support.
An XPS 730 H2C equipped with Intel's absolute top-of-the-line Core 2 Extreme QX9770 processor and a single 1 TB hard drive with Windows Vista Ultimate pre-installed, is priced just one dollar shy of $7,000. We wondered, what would a system builder pay for a similar buildout if he bought all the pieces, or as near an approximation as is currently available, separately? In other words, what's the premium for Dell's builders alleviating its customers' potential headaches?
TigerDirect currently sells the 3.2 GHz QX9770 for $1,499; it would be up to the builder to do Dell's task of overclocking it to 3.8 GHz.
Perhaps the most stable -- or should we say instead, "least unstable" -- nForce 790i motherboard, according to customers' reviews, appears to be the XFX MBN790IUL9, which NewEgg currently sells for $349.99.
The XPS 730 uses Corsair Dominator DDR3 memory, which in the 2 GB module size sells for $459 at NewEgg. For the $7,000 model, there's twice as much RAM, so we double that cost to $918.
For the $7,000 model, Dell chose a pair of ATI Radeon 3870 graphics cards operating in Crossfire mode -- this even though the nForce motherboard might obviously prefer nVidia cards in SLI mode. We went with our gut instinct on brands and performance and chose Asus' rendition of the 3870 X2, which melds two GPUs into one card in Crossfire mode. NewEgg sells that for $439.99.
For the 1 TB drive, we chose Western Digital's Caviar RE2 GP, which NewEgg sells for $279.99.
The $7,000 model features two optical drives: a Blu-ray burner and a 16x DVD writer. As everyone knows now, a DVD burner is very cheap, and a good one runs about $40. Meanwhile, TigerDirect is offering a Philips 2x Blu-ray burner at $379.99.
Now, in all fairness, it's probably not possible to equal the very distinctive anodized aluminum "slant" design of Dell's XPS case; its original was actually quite nice, but for this one, the company pulled out all the stops. To be as fair as possible for our shopping comparison, we chose this custom-painted Wraith case by CSX, which is an after-market modified Cooler Master Cosmos S. It includes five fans, and for $999, it should; but it doesn't include a power supply or CPU cooler. In keeping with our money-is-no-object theme, we choose Cooler Master's Aquagate Max liquid CPU cooler at $299.99, and threw in a Real Power Pro 1250 W at $359.99.
And finally, we need to throw in a copy of Windows Vista Ultimate, which Buy.com is selling today at $262.99.
The final tally for our hypothetically equivocal system, not counting some of the extra accessories a builder will inevitably need along the way (like silicon grease), came up to $5,828.93, meaning that the premium for Dell constructing a fairly similar system on the customer's behalf is almost exactly 20%. Or, to look at it another way, at a consultant's standard rate of about $50/hour, that's just under 23.5 hours' work. If the XPS 730 is as solid as Dell promises it to be this time around, that premium is actually quite fair.
There are great alternatives to $7000 gaming computers like ...... Oh I don't know ...... something called a PS3 or an XBOX 360.
Dell has it's head up it's own a** as usual. There will be one or two suckers but this will be a financial disaster.
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You could use all the extra money to buy a computer for what 95% of the population uses them for, browsing the web and reading emails.
You would still have $5500 left over.
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|When I consider all the $3000 PC's I've purchased in the late 80's and through the 90's, the $7000 Dell is a relative bargain. In adjusted dollars it is about the same as any leading edge computer has been, and in terms of performance it is magnitude's of order better.
There is quite a psychological barrier in selling a $7000 computer when $499 gets you into the plain Dell, but I can't imagine Dell doing this just for fun - there must be a big enough market for them to make money...
The problem with all computers (that I know of) is that they all depreciate quickly. A 5 year old Ferrari still commands a premium price, and gives a new Ferrari a run. Anyone have a 5 year old PC that is worth more than $500?
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|It sounds stupid, but who honestly would spend $7k on a freaking computer? Granted it's "AWESOME" w/ the games, but who the hell cares? People that want awesome games will either settle for something a bit more realistic, or build it themselves.
I don't knock the article, b/c I think it's funny they're making that much profit, esp. since they get these things for so cheap (ESP WHEN THEY'RE BUILT IN JAPAN OR WHEREVER THEY HAVE THEIR PLANTS NOW).
In closing, eff Dell. Once I had gotten my dell, the only thing I liked about it was the way the case opened. The rest of the machine? Junk.
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|The thing that’s odd about all of this is where are the Alienware people? You would think after Dell’s acquisition (purchase) of Alienware a while ago; they’d have referred to those with the most experience, and success in building high end PCs.
Although we now refer to them as "Alien-Beware", only because they now have that dELL stink on them.
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|Nice write up - I like it because at first I'm like 7000 dollars... but then you went down the laundry list. But they are still crazy. 1st they buy in massive bulk which means they should be able to get the parts down another 5-10%. Which means anohter 500-700 in profit. As they would simple use a Ghosting tool after it's built (15 minutes) there isn't much labor in this anymore. I could see going for 500 profit on each, then again they won't sell to many at this price. The case is sweet though.
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|Junk.
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|Yes, one can probably build a comparable gaming rig for less than what Dell is charging for this system. However, by the time one figures in the cost of building, hardware and software research and acquisition, system burn-in, testing and back-end support - which any technician will usually charge $50+ an hour for (that's what I charge for a system build, even to friends) - one will probably find Dell's prices very reasonable.
I've built my own PC's as well. However, this time around I bought a Dell simply because I wasn't interested in the hassle of putting a system together and supporting the thing. And, if something goes wrong with it I make a phone call to Dell and they have to deal with it - not me. That's worth the slight premium I paid for the system.
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|Next time you are up for flushing $7K, just mail it to me instead.
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|Sorry. Double post
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|One of the best PCs out there. It will KO Mac. I got two Dell XPS gaming desktops with Vista ultimate in my room and the other one in our living room. I use one for gaming and the other one for game programming and modeling. Way to go...
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|Never. The Mac and Dell XPS are aimed at completely different demographics.
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|This price comparison is a total joke. A $1000 price comparison for the XPS case because it slants?
You tried your hardest to throw all the money you could at creating the "same" system, and you still came out over $1000 cheaper. Now imagine if you actually made reasonable decisions and chose the best components because of their performance, not their paint jobs.
I don't think I've been more disappointed by a BetaNews article.
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|I think it was fair...they did chose the best components, and a GOOD case, which was expensive.
It's still $1000 cheaper...but you do get the dell support, warranty and pre-built system with all the components already tested to work together, and the dell name. You don't get any of that when you build your own...is that worth $1000? Maybe...maybe not. At this price point, for most people willing to shell this kind of money out, it probably does, unless you're really bent on building your own system.
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|Well, I'm sorry to have disappointed you, but the goal of this piece was not to do a performance comparison. As we established from the beginning, the 790i chipset has demonstrated performance problems in its early going; looking for a performance chipset that doesn't demonstrate such problems, might be easy.
The goal was to locate as reasonable an approximation of the same components as possible, but in the situation of the custom case, which can't be replicated, to assume a best-case scenario where we declare the Dell case "really good" and go for a case that would at least raise eyebrows to the same level. And to be honest, we didn't throw money at the situation; I could have closed that gap maybe by half, by choosing brands or configurations that I wouldn't have been comfortable building myself if I had $7,000 in discretionary income to spend.
The result is a piece of data that you wouldn't have been able to get from a pure performance comparison: The premium a customer spends for having all the labor already done, and having the support on the back end, is about 20%. I think a lot of potential customers may find that premium quite reasonable.
-SF3
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|The major concern I have is really just with the choice of case. The XPS case probably costs Dell $50. It has a unique look, but in all honesty, most people find it ugly. There are great cases to be had for over $800 less than the one you chose for the comparison system.
Sure, I understand that people buy a prefabricated computer for specific reasons, but your conclusion was that Dell's markup is "almost exactly 20%". You are telling me that you aren't doing a performance comparison, and that's fine, but you are absolutely doing a price and markup comparison.
How can you come to a conclusion of a 20% markup when you're inflating the component cost of the comparison system? I just don't really think the comparison should have been a part of the article to begin with.
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|Of course the high end will keep selling. The rich don't suffer in a bad economy, just the middle class and the working poor. However its that middle class that buys the majority of PCs and everything else. If they stop providing the volume, it won't matter if every poor little rich boy in the world gets a new XPS - the industry will still be hurting.
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|The rich can suffer when the currency they are holding becomes valueless. Gates American stock if traded for dollars is worth much much less than it was 10 years ago traded for dollars.
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|The rich wouldn't waste there time with the XPS line. They would buy something from Alien Ware.
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|And the cash will end up in the same pocket
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|Not a very coherent comment, but if you're talking about a currency becoming totally devalued, that wouldn't be a bad economy..that would be a DEAD one.
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