Recommendations for Prebuilt Gaming desktops?

[cytosin]

Before you all say build your own, I don't want to deal with troubleshooting any issues on my pc, would rather just send it to someone to deal with.

So far, the mainstream brands seem to be Aftershock, Mansa and Dreamcore but they seem overpriced and use poor quality parts.

Dynacore is selling desktops from Invader PC? Some kind of custom pc builder shop. Prices look super good, but I don't know how reputable they are. Specs for what caught my eye are below:
(All Desktops come with 3 year warranty, individual parts have their own local warranty periods)

MASTER MK 5 | R5 5600X + RTX 4070TI - IM5600X4070Ti-WB26 (S$2,198.00)​

​

Processor	AMD RYZEN 5 5600X 6CORE 12THREAD
Motherboard	ASUS PRIME B550M-A WIFI II-AM4
Cooler	ID-COOLING SE-214-XT ARGB 180W
Ram	KINGSTON FURY BEAST RGB 3600MHz 16GB(8GBx2)
Graphics Card	ASUS TUF GAMING RTX4070Ti 12G GAMING
SSD	WD BLACK SN770 1TB M.2 NVMe
Power Supply	SILVERSTONE DA850-850W 80+ GOLD FULL MODULAR PSU
Wi-Fi + BT	WiFi 6 + BT 5.2
Chassis	MONTECH AIR 100 ARGB TEMPERED GLASS

SUPREME MK 5 | R7 5700X + RTX 4070TI - IS5700X4070Ti-WB28 (S$2,355.00)​

Processor	AMD RYZEN 7 5700X 3.4GHz 8CORE/16THREAD
Motherboard	ASUS PRIME B550M-A WIFI II
Cooler	ID-COOLING SE-214-XT ARGB 180W
Ram	KINGSTON FURY BEAST RGB 3600MHz 16GB(8GBx2)
Graphics Card	ASUS TUF GAMING RTX4070Ti 12G GAMING
SSD	WD BLACK SN770 1TB M.2 NVMe
Power Supply	SILVERSTONE DA850-850W 80+ GOLD FULL MODULAR PSU
Wi-Fi + BT	WiFi 6 + BT 5.2
Chassis	LIANLI LANCOOL 216 RGB TEMPERED GLASS ATX

Other interesting stores are leapfrogglobal, PC Themes (Kinda ex though), PCKaki, etc.

I just want a gaming pc that that can run 144hz 1440p on max settings for all games (we don't talk about hogwarts legacy)

P.S who is Fortran and how do I get his help?

 

[keywin]

What does HWZ have to say about Aftershock PCs? can get from them too?

 

[tigerwoods]

What does HWZ have to say about Aftershock PCs? can get from them too?

I have no problem using Aftershock PC. But they are many Aftershock PC haters here.

 

[Phen8210]

Nah, prebuilt = 0 troubleshooting is a big misconception.

If you buy a prebuilt and encounter tricky issues, you will still need to do troubleshooting. If you don't even know why things are happening, and what is triggering them, the chances are that they also don't know.

If you encounter basic issues sure they can get it 'fixed' without much hassle, but for such issues, you can google and find the solution in 1-2 min yourself. After all, this type of basic troubleshooting is part of your responsibility as a user too.

For complicated matters, they may just replace random parts in hopes that the problem gets fixed, and that is why some customers find that nothing has changed when getting it back. Most tech-savvy people are in real IT industries, not PC marketing/reselling companies. With low-effort business models, these companies can't afford to have real tech-savvy people in there. Some of the people repairing/building your PC are those with little to no experience type, if you don't believe this just go and see their hiring page, and there is no difference between them and the typical person on street.

Next, most prebuilt are going to have a couple of poor-quality parts, esp Aftershock PC. The rest are more or less the same, and the only difference depends on whoever put out the bigger bait to lure customers in, that's the only thing that drives their sales. It's not the quality, service, or product (they have non), it's all manipulation.

 

[Yongkit]

Nah, prebuilt = 0 troubleshooting is a big misconception.

If you buy a prebuilt and encounter tricky issues, you will still need to do troubleshooting. If you don't even know why things are happening, and what is triggering them, the chances are that they also don't know.

If you encounter basic issues sure they can get it 'fixed' without much hassle, but for such issues, you can google and find the solution in 1-2 min yourself. After all, this type of basic troubleshooting is part of your responsibility as a user too.

For complicated matters, they may just replace random parts in hopes that the problem gets fixed, and that is why some customers find that nothing has changed when getting it back. Most tech-savvy people are in real IT industries, not PC marketing/reselling companies. With low-effort business models, these companies can't afford to have real tech-savvy people in there. Some of the people repairing/building your PC are those with little to no experience type, if you don't believe this just go and see their hiring page, and there is no difference between them and the typical person on street.

Next, most prebuilt are going to have a couple of poor-quality parts, esp Aftershock PC. The rest are more or less the same, and the only difference depends on whoever put out the bigger bait to lure customers in, that's the only thing that drives their sales. It's not the quality, service, or product (they have non), it's all manipulation.

Normally there are expectations vs reality shock, when it come to warranty claims if the user do not understand the terms and conditions setup by the PC builder.

 

[Phen8210]

Normally there are expectations vs reality shock, when it come to warranty claims if the user do not understand the terms and conditions setup by the PC builder.

Yeap.

Also, my first PC was pre-built and I had to learn to troubleshoot.

Even my friend that bought from APC had to perform basic troubleshooting, then eventually realized that there was no point in buying prebuilt.

Every once in a while, minor hiccups are going to appear, and if users contact support for everything, the PC is going to spend more time in the service center than their home.

For example, if a user launch software and get such errors, are they really going to contact support?

It can be resolved in 5 minutes with google and has nothing to do with being tech-savvy or not.





If the user knows how to contact support, they also have the ability to google and fix such issues themselves.

Ultimately, It's just reading English and following simple steps, which isn't even tech knowledge.

 

[Yongkit]

Yeap.

Also, my first PC was pre-built and I had to learn to troubleshoot.

Even my friend that bought from APC had to perform basic troubleshooting, then eventually realized that there was no point in buying prebuilt.

Every once in a while, minor hiccups are going to appear, and if users contact support for everything, the PC is going to spend more time in the service center than their home.

For example, if a user launch software and get such errors, are they really going to contact support?

It can be resolved in 5 minutes with google and has nothing to do with being tech-savvy or not.
View attachment 38404


View attachment 38403

If the user knows how to contact support, they also have the ability to google and fix such issues themselves.

Ultimately, It's just reading English and following simple steps, which isn't even tech knowledge.

True generally their warranty term does not cover any 3rd party software issue, however for windows or system driver cause hardware does not operate as intended should be within the scope of warranty.

Back to TS enquiry on the system seems mainly focus on gaming as such using with 4070ti should be fairly attainable for 1440p 144hz without ray trace enabled.

As to which system to choose basically really depends on TS budget between 5600x (6C12T) and 5700x (8C16T).

I probably would choose 5700x for the same power draw yet more headroom for handling multi tasking and not bottleneck 4070ti even at stock configuration with single tower air cooler.

 

[summer_dell]

well you can still..

1. buy all parts from reputable shop in simlim and pay extra 10 dollar ( or maybe increase liao not so sure now the pricing ) have them build up everything for you. test everything before you leave like usb no issue, os no issue etc.

2. thereafter, any issue pops up just send it in to a reputable repair shop and have them troubleshoot and repair for you ~

from my experience, all my parts never give me problem in their warranty period one eveyttime after warranty over then chut tai ji.. jin emo

 

[cytosin]

Nah, prebuilt = 0 troubleshooting is a big misconception.

If you buy a prebuilt and encounter tricky issues, you will still need to do troubleshooting. If you don't even know why things are happening, and what is triggering them, the chances are that they also don't know.

If you encounter basic issues sure they can get it 'fixed' without much hassle, but for such issues, you can google and find the solution in 1-2 min yourself. After all, this type of basic troubleshooting is part of your responsibility as a user too.

For complicated matters, they may just replace random parts in hopes that the problem gets fixed, and that is why some customers find that nothing has changed when getting it back. Most tech-savvy people are in real IT industries, not PC marketing/reselling companies. With low-effort business models, these companies can't afford to have real tech-savvy people in there. Some of the people repairing/building your PC are those with little to no experience type, if you don't believe this just go and see their hiring page, and there is no difference between them and the typical person on street.

Next, most prebuilt are going to have a couple of poor-quality parts, esp Aftershock PC. The rest are more or less the same, and the only difference depends on whoever put out the bigger bait to lure customers in, that's the only thing that drives their sales. It's not the quality, service, or product (they have non), it's all manipulation.

Even Sim Lim Square shops like dynacore and PCKaki? Software issues ain't a problem, what I'm scared of is hardware problems. If I can't even turn on my pc, how am I going to diagnose it? It's not like I have working spare parts to swap around and test like a pc shop will.

If let say your GPU dies, returning it to manufacturer for warranty is gonna take awhile... I am willing to pay a premium if they can straight up replace my part onsite (with an equal part ofc not some random crap) or loan me a placeholder.

If their aftersales support is **** though, I might as well just send dynacore @NightRaven49's build and call it a day

 

[cytosin]

True generally their warranty term does not cover any 3rd party software issue, however for windows or system driver cause hardware does not operate as intended should be within the scope of warranty.

Back to TS enquiry on the system seems mainly focus on gaming as such using with 4070ti should be fairly attainable for 1440p 144hz without ray trace enabled.

As to which system to choose basically really depends on TS budget between 5600x (6C12T) and 5700x (8C16T).

I probably would choose 5700x for the same power draw yet more headroom for handling multi tasking and not bottleneck 4070ti even at stock configuration with single tower air cooler.

To be honest I don't like either option that much also...

I would rather go with 5600 for budget (drop the X, no need for integrated) or splurge on 5800x3d for the fps

I heard FPS wise 5700x and 5600x bottleneck is pretty much the same, not sure if I wanna spend an extra 150 for it. This pc is gonna be purely for gaming, I'll be connecting to my work laptop for productivity.

 

[Mach3.2]

Nah, prebuilt = 0 troubleshooting is a big misconception.

If you buy a prebuilt and encounter tricky issues, you will still need to do troubleshooting. If you don't even know why things are happening, and what is triggering them, the chances are that they also don't know.

If you encounter basic issues sure they can get it 'fixed' without much hassle, but for such issues, you can google and find the solution in 1-2 min yourself. After all, this type of basic troubleshooting is part of your responsibility as a user too.

For complicated matters, they may just replace random parts in hopes that the problem gets fixed, and that is why some customers find that nothing has changed when getting it back. Most tech-savvy people are in real IT industries, not PC marketing/reselling companies. With low-effort business models, these companies can't afford to have real tech-savvy people in there. Some of the people repairing/building your PC are those with little to no experience type, if you don't believe this just go and see their hiring page, and there is no difference between them and the typical person on street.

Next, most prebuilt are going to have a couple of poor-quality parts, esp Aftershock PC. The rest are more or less the same, and the only difference depends on whoever put out the bigger bait to lure customers in, that's the only thing that drives their sales. It's not the quality, service, or product (they have non), it's all manipulation.

I have to say you're more or less bang on for Aftershock, one of my friends has been getting WHEA uncorrectable error BSOD for the last few months hasn't been able to get aftershock to fix it...

So far they changed his CPU and SSD but they still can't fix the issue. I noticed he have 4 sticks of RAM and suggested that he remove 2 sticks but he seem reluctant to do it himself or make aftershock do it... w/e not my pc

So yeah, they just throw **** on the wall and see what sticks... Most of the time it sticks on the first few attempts but in edge cases like that one I'm mentioning above, any overclocking enthusiast will tell you it's probably the 4 sticks of RAM causing the WHEA BSOD but those support personel still don't have a damn clue.

 

[transparos]

Even Sim Lim Square shops like dynacore and PCKaki? Software issues ain't a problem, what I'm scared of is hardware problems. If I can't even turn on my pc, how am I going to diagnose it? It's not like I have working spare parts to swap around and test like a pc shop will.

If let say your GPU dies, returning it to manufacturer for warranty is gonna take awhile... I am willing to pay a premium if they can straight up replace my part onsite (with an equal part ofc not some random crap) or loan me a placeholder.

If their aftersales support is **** though, I might as well just send dynacore @NightRaven49's build and call it a day

if u ask them to build for u, i am pretty sure they will assemble and test everything is ok before u pick it up or being deliver to you.

for me, since starting to build pc in 2003, hardware rarely fails within the warranty period unless u get a bad product. unfortunately i don't think either of the shops will replace ur part onsite or loan you a placeholder. for me if the product is out of warranty i will just buy a new one.

 

[Yongkit]

Even Sim Lim Square shops like dynacore and PCKaki? Software issues ain't a problem, what I'm scared of is hardware problems. If I can't even turn on my pc, how am I going to diagnose it? It's not like I have working spare parts to swap around and test like a pc shop will.

If let say your GPU dies, returning it to manufacturer for warranty is gonna take awhile... I am willing to pay a premium if they can straight up replace my part onsite (with an equal part ofc not some random crap) or loan me a placeholder.

If their aftersales support is **** though, I might as well just send dynacore @NightRaven49's build and call it a day

It seems you do have very common customer expectations for the after sales service from the pre-built system, nevertheless I would suggest to verify and check with the builder so it is align with your objective to go with pre-built system

1. Expected response time
2. Onsite support arrangements
3. Parts replacement arrangements

 

[Yongkit]

To be honest I don't like either option that much also...

I would rather go with 5600 for budget (drop the X, no need for integrated) or splurge on 5800x3d for the fps

I heard FPS wise 5700x and 5600x bottleneck is pretty much the same, not sure if I wanna spend an extra 150 for it. This pc is gonna be purely for gaming, I'll be connecting to my work laptop for productivity.

Looking at the components parts I would say it is fair pricing for a pre-built system + warranty service from the builder unless you go for DIY route with similar pricing but possible to get slightly better performance components.

Yes fps wise with GPU bound game the bottleneck is about the same.

But if you play game like cyberpunk or spiderman which also can cause cpu bound then 5700x definitely have better advantage compare to 5600x/5600.

 

[KYZT2021]

I have to say you're more or less bang on for Aftershock, one of my friends has been getting WHEA uncorrectable error BSOD for the last few months hasn't been able to get aftershock to fix it...

So far they changed his CPU and SSD but they still can't fix the issue. I noticed he have 4 sticks of RAM and suggested that he remove 2 sticks but he seem reluctant to do it himself or make aftershock do it... w/e not my pc

So yeah, they just throw **** on the wall and see what sticks... Most of the time it sticks on the first few attempts but in edge cases like that one I'm mentioning above, any overclocking enthusiast will tell you it's probably the 4 sticks of RAM causing the WHEA BSOD but those support personel still don't have a damn clue.

Thought got so call stability test and then builder sign off

 

[royfrosty]

As long as the parts are mostly aftermarket parts. It is unlikely you will get good support or their support line and expect them to deal the issue for you. If the issue is not easy to solve, they also likely not to know. You might ended up having a longer down time than you yourself fix the issues.

You truly want

Even Sim Lim Square shops like dynacore and PCKaki? Software issues ain't a problem, what I'm scared of is hardware problems. If I can't even turn on my pc, how am I going to diagnose it? It's not like I have working spare parts to swap around and test like a pc shop will.

If let say your GPU dies, returning it to manufacturer for warranty is gonna take awhile... I am willing to pay a premium if they can straight up replace my part onsite (with an equal part ofc not some random crap) or loan me a placeholder.

If their aftersales support is **** though, I might as well just send dynacore @NightRaven49's build and call it a day

Wait a min. "If let say your GPU dies, returning it to manufacturer for warranty is gonna take awhile... I am willing to pay a premium if they can straight up replace my part onsite (with an equal part ofc not some random crap) or loan me a placeholder."

I think you can just buy alienware or hp omen or lenovo legion desktop already. Since you wanna pay them that much money, then i suggest look at them instead. Lol

 

[cytosin]

It seems you do have very common customer expectations for the after sales service from the pre-built system, nevertheless I would suggest to verify and check with the builder so it is align with your objective to go with pre-built system

1. Expected response time
2. Onsite support arrangements
3. Parts replacement arrangements

I will, but you will always get biased answers... look at all the carousell builders claiming lifetime warranty LOL

So far everyone says aftersales are **** in general for mainstream brands, and for SIM Lim brands, I think everyone just buys the parts directly so no one knows how their customer support is like.

Maybe I should just buy used desktops on carousell, screw the warranty

 

[cytosin]

As long as the parts are mostly aftermarket parts. It is unlikely you will get good support or their support line and expect them to deal the issue for you. If the issue is not easy to solve, they also likely not to know. You might ended up having a longer down time than you yourself fix the issues.

You truly want


Wait a min. "If let say your GPU dies, returning it to manufacturer for warranty is gonna take awhile... I am willing to pay a premium if they can straight up replace my part onsite (with an equal part ofc not some random crap) or loan me a placeholder."

I think you can just buy alienware or hp omen or lenovo legion desktop already. Since you wanna pay them that much money, then i suggest look at them instead. Lol

Alienware? I would rather buy 2 sets of the same specs from sim lim at the same price, if one spoil I just switch to the other

 

[cytosin]

if u ask them to build for u, i am pretty sure they will assemble and test everything is ok before u pick it up or being deliver to you.

for me, since starting to build pc in 2003, hardware rarely fails within the warranty period unless u get a bad product. unfortunately i don't think either of the shops will replace ur part onsite or loan you a placeholder. for me if the product is out of warranty i will just buy a new one.

Just to check, if my part dies right I just need to send it back to the store, they will settle the warranty for me?

Just that I need to know which part is dead only...

 

[transparos]

Just to check, if my part dies right I just need to send it back to the store, they will settle the warranty for me?

Just that I need to know which part is dead only...

dun think is so simple... for example. after 2 to 3 years, your pc unable to boot up anymore, it could be due to PSU or motherboard. how do u determine? they can help you diagnose the problem if you bring down the pc.

i don't think they help u to settle the warranty, u need to send to the distributor yourself. meanwhile u will be without part for your pc lor. so usually like i mention above i have not encounter any parts which is within the warranty period, i will buy a new one as warranty have lapse and don't like to waste time waiting.