Would you pay for, or think it would be a good deal to have someone build your computer for you for only parts plus $25.00 labor. Keep in mind, for all of this you get the option for a 3 year warranty, parts and labor. The warranty is available for 10% of the build price. $800 build would cost $80 for 3 year warranty. What do you think? Good deal or no?

I want to start a site like this if I can get some people interested.

I wouldn't, but that's because I'd rather build my own. But someone else might. Be advised though, anytime a build would be done for money, implied warrenties exist just in case something goes wrong. You need to check out the laws in your particular state before doing such a thing.

One other thing, by the way. A charge of $25 is rediculously cheap considering all the time and potential hastles that can be involved in building a computer. There are good reasons that shops get more money than that for assembling computers.

If you're building low-end systems, it's a difficult way to make money. Dell/HP/etc have the low-end cornered because of their bulk pricing. You just can't compete with the big guns. On the high-end, however, you stand a good chance of making some dough. You can charge a lot more for the labor/knowledge that goes into a high-end rig. Also, people are willing to pay more because the system is so powerful. They probably will have difficulty seeing the labor and parts as two separate fees. If it's low end, they expect to pay very little (hence, difficult to make a large profit). If it's high end, they expect to pay a lot (hence, opportunity to make a larger profit). Additionally, if you can find ways to cut costs without sacrificing performance (price/performance ratio), some of that savings can be passed on to you.

Careful with that warranty thing. Are you going to be the first level tech support for all of your customers? Believe me, they will have questions and problems and it's many times not related to the build itself, but something they did or are trying to do. Also, with parts, are you going to eat the cost if the part actually only has a 1 year manufacturer warranty but it dies after 2 years?

It's a good idea, but again, low-end isn't profitable and the tech support can be killer. One thing to remember, however, is to ALWAYS test parts thoroughly before handing the build over. Burn-in, Memtest, disc scan (recommend Spinrite to find and disable bad sectors before installing the OS), CPU/RAM stress test, monitor temps, etc. Keep the results of these tests in a file for each customer.

Edit: I agree, $25/build is short-changing yourself. The problem is with low-end builds because by the time you buy all the parts, you've already matched HP/Dell and you haven't yet taken a slice for your labor. With high-end builds, depending on how complicated it is, tack on like $150-200. Mid-to-High, maybe like $100. Mid: $75, Low: $50

not if the prices were MSRP retail. You'll likely spend a lot more money than the system is worth. I build systems for a living. Every part will cost you at least 10 percent, parts include price of shipping, plus i add $50 for myself. See if you can buy the parts yourself, and have it built for $25. Just buy parts that have that extended warranty.

Yes, if your prices for parts are competitive. Visit a few shops in your area (online or in person) and see what their policies and prices are. Just pretend you are a semi-clueless person and want them to build you a PC
BTW, that will also give you an idea how to treat potential customers. See who treats you best and try to behave like them.

Last time I got a computer I bought everything from the local shop and added C$35 to have them assemble and test it for 48 hours. They even installed XP and got the latest drivers from nVidia, Gigabyte, Creative, etc. $3000 PC, $35 markup to save me a day's work and minimize the risk of RMAs. Well worth it IMO. I can build a PC myself, but my time is worth more than $35 a day.

I wouldn't have paid $350. Think about capping that 10% at $100 or something, or you will only build very cheap PCs.

Be very careful about the warranties. What do you mean "parts and labor"? You can't offer warranties on parts, IMO. What if you get a bad batch of 9800GX2s or whatever other expensive thing and then end up paying for replacements yourself? I don't really know how this works, but that's OK, you're the one who needs to know this. I think the warranties on parts should be provided by the manufacturers, not you. Word your contracts carefully or you can get in big trouble.

Purchaser should pay the shipping, not you. If they don't like it, you can go to the local dealers.

I want to make systems of 4 different levels.
1. Low end compete with Dell in price but offer better quality.
2. Midrange.
3. Average gamer.
4. extreme gamer.

Profits:
1. $25
2. $50
3. $100
4. $200

Warranty is outsource at no extra cost to me. I actually get a % for selling warranty.

I got one on eBay for a trial run. Just a low end build. I know to everyone on here it look like junk but to someone on eBay looking for a deal will se it a a steal. Later today I plan to put other systems of various quality on as well.

I plan to offer 4 tiers of Intel and 4 tiers of AMD when I get it all done.

Building computers is my pasion. The main reason I want to do this is because I am a single father of a special needs child, and it would be better for me to stay home with him to make my living. I dont need to get rich by any means but if I could make $100 profit a week we can make it. For $100 I would have 2 sell 4 cheap systems or one good one every week. You think its possible?

Here is the one I got up now. http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.d [...] RK:MESE:IT Keep in mind this is to compete with the big oems. Nothing to right home to mom about, but a very reasonable computer for everyday tasks. And $39.00 for a 3 year warrany cant be beat. Most el cheapo oems only offer a 1 year warranty these days and charge way about four times as much for the 2 more years.

I was thinking of offering a service where someone could email me their Newegg cart, and I could built their dream computer, and list the auction on Ebay for them to buy. Parts + Shipping + My profit per tier. What do you think.

Thank you everyone for all of the feedback.

Could you explain the whole warranty out-source thing?

I think you'd be better off sticking to a set of standard parts. If you let them wheel and deal off of newegg, they may be picking incompatible part, parts with known issues or low quality, or parts that plain don't work.

Thanks for the input. I had those thoughts in the back of my mind. I do think that building 4 consistent model numbers of both intel and amd will provide a wide variety for customers and if I limit myself to those my problems should be minimal.

For the most part the 1 and 2 tier systems should be a walk in the park since they will be using integrated sound and video.

In the future I am going to have atleast 10 different cases for people to choose as an upgrade option so they can get one that fits there personality. I'm gonna add monitors and such as upgrade options as well. I hope and pray it all works out so I can take care of my son. $100 a week seems like it should be with in my grasps. If I make more the WOOOT! But I need that $100 a week or I will have to get a job and trust someone else to make sure my son doesnt choke to death. Babysitters havent gone well in the past.

Replace the Newegg watermarked picture from your eBay auction. Take a picture of the actual case at your house.

I own a small business and I know how it is trying to find the right price and make enough profit without trying to look greedy.

Figure out how much time it takes you to build each one and decide how much you want to make in profit per hour of work. If you can find a part supplier that will give you price breaks for buying 20 mb's at a time, then you can figure your price based on the regular price for an unseen mark up. I bargain shop. I would notice that I could buy that MB for X amount myself. So if you can get it for less than joe public that is money already made.

The best thing you can do is research suppliers. You will need to start off with maybe 2 build options, then when you have enough profit money buy more parts and offer more.

I just had a new OSC site built and had a lot of code work done by a guy in AU. He does really good work and the exchange rate helped with cost. If you sell right off your own site it will cut some overhead but will take some up front investment.

Hope this helps.

It depends on how valuable your time is to you and if you want the experience of doing it yourself. Even though I've built perhaps 300 (seriously) systems, if I were given that option today I'd probably take it (not the warranty, but the $25 part) That's ESPECIALLY true if whoever building it had decent cable management skills.

Thanks. I will use original pictures after someone buys one and I make it LoL. I stated on auction allow 3-4 days after reciving cleared payment for it to be shipped. This allows me to buy it on there money and build/test before I send it. I got $30 in my bank account.

As money rolls in there will be alot of changes that look alot more professional. Once I save enough I'm gonna pay for a custom eBay site that has drop down menus for add ons.

Get a couple of those guys that won the PC building contest. Saw a video on youtube.. They were fast !