Is there anything coming up in the near future that's going to make me feel stupid about buying a new CPU/mobo/RAM later this month?
No moreso than usual.
Next week is the perfect time to buy new. The week after Christmas is the perfect time to buy used. And if you find some deals right now, you're not likely to see TOO many better deals next week that will make you wish you hadn't. Particularly if you're like me and don't leave the house on Black Friday.
Talking of used, remember I mentioned wanting to replace the graphics card in my HTPC, in addition to getting a new primary machine? Did that last week. Went to Bookman's, which is primarily a used bookstore but which also has some electronics. I found a used eVGA GTX560 Ti with sticker price $90; with my wife's teacher discount it came out to less than $80 with tax. (And about $15 more than that when I got home, put it in my computer, and realized at the last minute that my motherboard only had one power connector and I needed to run to Fry's to buy an adapter. And then they didn't have a molex-to-6-pin adapter so instead I had to buy a molex-to-8-pin adapter and then a 6-pin-female-to-6-pin-male that I stuck on 6 of the 8 pins on the 8-pin adapter. Which I in turn about broke even for on finding that Fry's stocked the case I wanted for $20 less than Amazon but only had a beat-up display model so I had to drive a 50-mile round-trip to the other Fry's, which probably used up about $6 worth of gas.)
tl;dr I don't know how many states Bookman's is in but they're worth checking out if you're scrounging for used computer parts. There are probably other general-purpose used-item stores that stock that kind of stuff too. You probably won't get a much better deal in a brick-and-mortar store than on eBay (or vice-versa -- the blessing and curse of Internet commerce is that it's pretty well leveled the playing field and you're much less likely to get ripped off OR to get a screamin' deal than you used to be), but it's nice being able to actually look at things.
You wanna talk about feeling old, though? I figured my rig out using
pcpartpicker.com. It is a site with a list of hundreds of different computer parts that will, for example, only display motherboards and coolers that are compatible with the processor you've selected, and throw an error if you pick a video card that doesn't have enough wattage for your build. AND it lists the prices on multiple sites, including deals like rebates, free shipping, etc.
(On the subject of rebates: they're nice if you can get them but I would advise always assuming that you're going to end up paying full price for anything you get. Companies do not offer rebates because they intend to give them out, and it's easy to miss out on one on a stupid technicality which may or may not have actually happened, and be unable to reach a human being to discuss it. I consider them under "This would be a nice bonus if the card came in the mail, but I'm just going to assume it won't.")
I certainly still wound up doing my due diligence and plenty of research, but it's nothing like the old days -- hell, I built a computer as recently as 4 years ago and, while I remember there being sites sort of like this back then, they were a lot more primitive.
(Our big end-of-semester project for the computer class I took as a high school senior was to research deals on computer parts and come up with a pitch for a reasonably-priced system to build. The teacher picked the best ones, and when we came back for the next semester we built the computers. A few months later I bought a new computer for college, and it was basically just a slightly-upgraded version of the system we'd built in class. This was back in the days before NewEgg, when Amazon just sold books, and when Fry's didn't even have a damn website and the website that became frys.com was called outpost.com.)
EDIT TO ADD: I think I've already mentioned most of this already, but in case it helps anybody, here's my build:
Processor: Intel i7 4770K. It's latest-generation (Haswell) and is overclocking-friendly.
Mobo: ASRock Z87 Extreme6. One step down from the board that got an award from Anandtech (doesn't have a wireless card); one step up from the board that got an award from Tom's Hardware (does have the mini-PCIE slot that the wireless card goes in).
Case: Thermaltake New Soprano. A bit bulkier and heavier than I expected but still nice, and I really do love the built-in HD mount slot. Looks like really nice snap-in drive mounts, and good cable management. (More stuff we didn't have Back in My Day.)
Power supply: Corsair HX850M. Modular (yet another one of those new things that's just so damn nice to have that I wish we'd had in the old days). More juice than I need right now, but most reviews say it runs pretty quiet so I think it's worth it to get something with more power than I need since I figure for my next video upgrade I'll probably do the SLI thing.
Which brings us to video card: Keeping my PNY GeForce GTX 570. Good card; uses too much juice for my Mac Pro. Sincerely hope it doesn't turn out to be a problem with the card instead of the Mac, but will let you know if it does.
Drives: Bought a cheap ASUS DVD burner; other than that I'm reusing hard drives I've already got sitting around the house. But you can't visit a tech site without tripping over a dozen good deals on drives. You can get a 256MB SSD for around $150, a 1TB spinning drive for around $60, whatever. But for my part, I've got plenty of drives lying around already and, with prices already dropping all the time, I'm content to stick with what I've got for now and watch them keep falling.
RAM: Got an 8GB stick of Crucial 1600 for $60. NewEgg is running deals like that pretty much constantly right now; if you don't see one today, look again tomorrow.
Monitor: Got the 27" one they sell on Monoprice (the model that has an HDMI port, in case I ever need it, though note that HDMI doesn't actually support 1560x1440 or whatever the resolution is; you'll want dual-link DVI). It was under $500; IIRC there was some kind of sale on. Extra bonus: if you spend big money at Monoprice, they'll give you long-term discounts; since I bought the monitor I automatically get the bulk (10+) price on everything they sell.
Keyboard: The same Microsoft Natural 4000 I've been using since 2006. I bought two and use my other one at work.
Mouse: Evoluent VerticalMouse 3. Spendy but I think it really helped with my wrist pain; haven't had a cramp in years. (It might also help that I switch things up with a trackball at work -- that's one of the Logitech ones with the thumb ball that they don't make anymore.) Also, my first one broke after a couple of years of use but their customer service was excellent and I got a replacement quickly and completely covered under warranty. I don't think they make the 3 anymore but I'm willing to bet the current model is solid.
Guess that's everything, including stuff I already had before I bought the computer. Again, I'll let you know how it all goes once I actually get the new machine put together.
