My PC experience :(

I don't enjoy mac's simplicity I think I find the user interface boring and the navigation slow. I spend a lot of time on my computer, I want to spend it checking out stuff. I am just not a fan of fixing problem after problem so it will work. This is also why I have a hard to deciding over Android or iPhone. Android has a trashy app store and misses out on some amazing exclusive iPhone apps. But it's so much more open, so many thing you can tweak and things such as hosting hotspot's sounds really cool.

Did you flash bios to latest?
I use Gigabytes X58 UD3R and EP45 UD3R. The X58 has been flawless and a dream to work with. The EP45 was finicky and a little more trouble to get stable.

nope! I think I am going to do that now, thanks for the suggestion. I kinda woke up sick so I bailed on Uni so I have some time.

I went to the Gigabyte website downloaded Rev 1.0 and tried to install it via Q-Flash and after installing it booted up and automatically started recovering the bios. So I think it has reverted back.

The name of the file I downloaded was motherboard_bios_ga-ep43-us3l_f8

I was going to try an older version but as all the warnings about bios screwing up I haven't done it yet.

My EP45 came with F5 ver.
New install so I intended to flash bios first thing, grabbed up latest F12. Ran it twice, flash stated it passed, both times at reboot F5 was still listed.
So I got F6, flashed, passed, it took.
Got F7, flashed, passed, it took.
F8 flashed, passed, it took.
I stepped the mobo through each and every update till F12 was in.
Made a difference in mobo stability.

Download bios update file to desktop.
Extract update to A:\
Enter bios and choose flash key (F8???) or set bios to boot with floppy.

In bios disable Gigabyte boot screen, will allow you more time to see boot info, which will include mobo bios ver that its currently using.

Chooseyant said:

Keiichi25 said:

Now this isn't to say the OP is a stupid basic user. My point is that from what it sounds like, he wants to have a good system.

Yes I want to have a good system. I do have time, I've been fiddling with my computer for hell knows how long. What I don't have time for is things such as faulty components so that it literally will not boot up until replaced.

I like working around software issues, and launching various applications only windows has. Experimenting with virtual machines, and even installing OS X.

My point is, I don't think I should have anything but a 'good system' if I pay for it, brand new and install everything fine. But I have been pretty unlucky.

I think a big position apple has on Windows now is that they can run windows. So if you really wanted to play that windows only game or specific software, you could. You are definitely limited though as it is only an emulation but it's quite impressive. I've installed mac on windows but in no way is that something for the 'general idiot'. It also relies on specific hardware for which it has drivers and stability in the long term is questionable.

Well, part of building a Custom PC is that you have to not only 'pay for it', you have to research it a bit to make sure you have the right combination of parts. As for Apple being able to run Windows, of course it can. So can Linux with emulation. However virtualizing it or Emulating it can have odd effects too for some hardware expectations and how virtual boxes talk to hardware or how emulators deal with it.

Also, please note, I am well aware that OS X relies on specific hardware. Apple monopolizes their own class of PC for a reason, they don't want clones and don't want other people to use anything but their computer hardware for that OS. They keep a tight rein on it for a reason. They are also not going to bother trying to make it work too hard on other hardware because they aren't going to task themselves to really hit every possible hardware permutation.

Windows is more generic because they are trying to support every possible PC hardware out there, and that is their target market, try and get every nook and cranny and saturate the market. And they do it well by also throwing out coding tools to make even joe schmoe make programs.

Linux is roughly the red headed step child mostly due to so many different flavors of Linux (Red Hat, Denebian, Solaris, HP-UX, Ubuntu and so forth) which are sometimes picky about the hardware it runs for some, others seem to be fine, but lacking also some methodologies to access the hardware for some versions of Linux over others. Linux is a good OS, just difficult for people to get into and work with as well at times.

Anyways, getting back to the point with regards to hardware, unfortunately, it still be a labor of love when you do a custom build. As much as you should have parts that work, the problem is that you are just a user as well. There is no 100% guarantee that every part you buy will be 100%. Sure, there is suppose to be QA to make sure that they won't break down, but even QA doesn't necessarily guarantee 100% functionality. Pre-Built systems will have a slightly better chance of not having as many failures, HOWEVER, knowing from past experience, it is still not a guarantee, and it is about the same for Macs as well, as pointed out by some posters here.

It wouldn't be the same as Macs, as you stated they are pre-built only use hardware specific from Apple. No way in hell do they screw up as much as 1000 different types of motherboards, ram, cpus, gpus etc.

I still like my PC and don't regret building it. I just think other company's have hurt the PC market by creating problems. It's easy to brand and keep it up to scratch. Not so easy for 1000's.

If I had all the time in the world and no dead lines PC's would be pretty good. But when you can't use a computer because one of the parts is broken or Windows decides to **** up then you gotta fork out a lot on a quick fix. And end up getting back the same part refurbished 1 month later due to the fact it was faulty.

I want a stable system. And mac just seems so much more stable as there are less things to go wrong.