Velocity Micro or ABS?

S

Shiymmas

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Yup, another "help me choose" thread.

After reading the reviews for ABS and Velocity Micro systems here, and after being fed up with Alienware like several others here, I've narrowed my choices down to these two companies. Budget is about $3,000 for the system, and I've configured two nearly identical systems at each website. I would list out each system's specs, but the cost is nearly irrelevant at this point since they both are so similarly configured and both cost nearly the same. I suppose the biggest concern here, after reading several reviews of each, and a few posts here, is where my money is best spent. I don't want to deal with more issues in ordering this computer, and this will be the first PC I haven't ordered from the likes of Dell or Gateway. I'm just wary at this point after hearing of one guy's credit card being charged $25,000 by ABS, and another couple guys getting busted up PCs via UPS from VM.

The only advantages I can list for each so far is that the VM system offers free shipping, currently, while the ABS will ship more quickly.

Anyway, I guess I just need more info about each company before pulling the trigger on my purchase. I just don't want to end up disappointed. If any current owners of systems from either can help me out here, or anyone who just knows more about this stuff than myself could chime in, it'd be greatly appreciated.

Just thought I'd add... the VM Gamer's Edge LXe-W black case, and the ABS X9's option for the thermaltake case both offer equally attractive boxes to me. Besides, I'm less concerned with looks than overall performance, quality, and customer service. Also, I'd all but ordered a Velocity Micro system until I read this site's review of the E2200. Between finding ABS's site through that review, and seeing the final conclusions, I'm just confused at this point.
 
I only recently rec'd my VM unit Gamer's edge. Even tho I have minor issues with the unit and still do I'm a satisfied customer based upon there companies tech support and the fact that the higher up's at VM monitor this board. If this was brand X or brand z I'd prolly have packed it up and sent it back. Just read some more posts on this forum some good some bad on VM but make your decision on who to buy from based upon some good imputs from recent customers no vendor is perfect but it's the dedication and company approach to make them all happy in the end that counts.

eAGLEi
 
As you probably saw the post, I've had a couple issues with my new Velocity Micro, because of UPS. That said, the company really has been great, especially through this forum.

When I was looking, I though the reviews favored VM, as well as comments. I didn't like ABS quite as much.

I love the fact that Velocity's support and personel are all located in Virginia, and it has been extremely easy to communicate with them. The computer is great, besides the damage, which I can't fault VM for, especially since they are really going out of their way to fix it. I can't imagine ABS doing any better.

Really, at this level, you're not buying the computer as much as the company and support behind it, as all the computers are pretty damn fast and setup really well. You're paying the premium for the extras, so go with what you like better.

Anyway, I'm not sure you can top the president of the company watching out on the forums to help people, so VM gets my vote.

Scott
 
I've been a satisfied customer and fan of VM for a while, and I hate to see all of the ranting and "my computer isn't perfect" threads about them. They have consistently been a stalward in these forums. We all probably know that only mad customers write posts to vent displeasure and inflict harm to get even with companies, and the many happy customers are never heard from except for me and a few others out there.

I'd tell anybody who asks that they are far and away the best PC company going. Are they perfect, nope, but they are the best out there and I have a general sense that they are only getting better. Also, I've never had to slam them in the forums to get any help with the minor issues I've had. They have been great to work with, especially Ellen, Pete, and Heather.

I've been talking with Trace at VM about a new rig and expect to order as soon as X1950 is available, which should be in the next week.

Clear choice: Velocity Micro!
 
So is there anyone out there who's had a successful experience with ABS? :D

All things considered, VM is becoming a very convincing choice. At this point, my only hangup is their shipping time. That said, there's no way to know that ABS's current ship date of Sept.13 is accurate compared to VM's of Sept.25, and that being the case I'm steadily leaning back to VM for my new system. Just sucks because at this point I've been waiting quite a while for a new computer that's yet to arrive, and being stuck on a laptop for the time being has become... frustrating :p

Thanks for the posts so far. I'll be making a decision by the weekend, and every little bit of info definitely helps. While I'm here, does anyone have any suggestions for a monitor? I'd like to get an LCD monitor, and the ones at both ABS and Velocity Micro fit the budget pretty well at around 19" with an 8ms response time. I don't really need a huge display, just one that will keep up with the new system, and not bust my wallet. If that means ordering one seperately from either of these sites, so be it. I just don't know much about monitors.
 
We had a good experience with them :).

Honestly though, I think you'll be happy with either one. If I personally had to choose, I'd go with VM because of their "small town" feel. Our last evaluation notwithstanding, they're still a very fine company.

ABS builds great machines and their conversion to in-house support from 2Net seems to be working out very well for them.
 
Based on what I've seen from my own experience with Velocity Micro thus far, my vote would go squarely with VM. They just seem, in all respects, to be an "above and beyond" company.

I know some folks who have had good experiences with ABS, so that may be a good bet too, but I didn't have ABS on my consideration list on my recent purchase.

-Ben
 
. At this point, my only hangup is their shipping time.
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As I think a lot of Alienware customers will tell you lately, shipping times may be hard to trust. VM shipped my system out one day after the original estimate time, which is very good I think, considering that parts were still pretty new for Core Duo 2s.

As far as monitors, I really like the Dell widescreen I have, and at the time, it was a great deal. You may want to look at those.
 
sw001 said:
As I think a lot of Alienware customers will tell you lately, shipping times may be hard to trust. VM shipped my system out one day after the original estimate time, which is very good I think, considering that parts were still pretty new for Core Duo 2s.

As far as monitors, I really like the Dell widescreen I have, and at the time, it was a great deal. You may want to look at those.
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Which widescreen did you go with, Scott? I had to, for now, ditch my dreams of the 24" 2405FPW or 2407FPW, but I did briefly consider the 2007FPW. I've seen two in action and they seem like incredible monitors for the price, I just didn't like the resolution for my day-to-day use and gaming.

And, I concur regarding the shipping times. Dell and Alienware both significantly delayed their original shipping estimates on my orders. I'm pretty understanding regarding a few days here or there, especially with proactive notification, but 4-6 weeks additional delay is ridiculous in my opinion. What made me angry about the Dell XPS 700 and Alienware PS2 Area-51 7500 orders is that I felt like both systems were put on sale much earlier than either vendor was ready to actually ship the product. I may be wrong and it may just be my frustration adding to the perception, but I saw very few reviews of either system (the Alienware reviews were all with beta PS2 cases and FX lighting systems) and no posts from customers receiving their systems. I don't mind a little pre-order action, but, if your product isn't actually available yet, be honest about possible production delays - don't sell it as a product ready to ship out the door.

-Ben
 
Which widescreen did you go with, Scott? I had to, for now, ditch my dreams of the 24" 2405FPW or 2407FPW, but I did briefly consider the 2007FPW. I've seen two in action and they seem like incredible monitors for the price, I just didn't like the resolution for my day-to-day use and gaming.
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I think I have the 2005FPW. I'm not exactly sure, as I'm not in front of it unfortunately, and my monitors at work aren't as nice. It a 20" widescreen monitor, 1680x1050 resolution. I love it, and love playing games in widescreen (though few don't support it well yet). I couldn't easily go back to a non-widescreen monitor I don't think. I do a lot of Photoshop work too (photography is a big hobby), and I really like the monitor for this too. One nice thing about the widescreen is that I can easily rotate the monitor 90 degrees, which are great for portrait type shots.

I'm pretty understanding regarding a few days here or there, especially with proactive notification,
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I thought how well VM predicted and hit the ship date was pretty impressive, certainly better then most of my experiences with custom products.
 
sw001 said:
I think I have the 2005FPW. I'm not exactly sure, as I'm not in front of it unfortunately, and my monitors at work aren't as nice. It a 20" widescreen monitor, 1680x1050 resolution. I love it, and love playing games in widescreen (though few don't support it well yet). I couldn't easily go back to a non-widescreen monitor I don't think. I do a lot of Photoshop work too (photography is a big hobby), and I really like the monitor for this too. One nice thing about the widescreen is that I can easily rotate the monitor 90 degrees, which are great for portrait type shots.
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Yeah, the 2007FPW is the new 2005FPW. Hmmm, well, even though Dell claims that my 2007FP was delivered last Monday (I ordered 2 day shipping), I haven't received the monitor or a tracking number yet. Maybe I still have time to swap out for the 2007FPW. I really wanted to see WoW, Half-Life 2, etc. in their widescreen glory.

-Ben
 
I was faced with the same decision and went VM. Though actually, I tried to go ABS at first but they weren't exactly easy to buy from.

Still though... after my experience with VM thus far (which I'll likely document in another thread), I'm happy with my decision. My PC hit the assembly process today, which I believe is would put me a bit AHEAD of schedule on my estimated ship date of 9/13.
 
Thanks for all the responses, guys.

I've made my decision, and I'm going to be ordering a Velocity Micro. Between this site's opinion on them, and everyone in this forum's support for them, and the simple fact that a PM sent to Randy was very promptly responded to, I'm all set to order.

My biggest concern at this point is what monitor to purchase to accompany the new system. I've never had any experience with LCD monitors, but from what I can tell I'll likely end up ordering one outside of VM. That said, I'm still only looking to spend between $200-300, and would LIKE to get a monitor in the 19" range. This system is going to be primarily used for gaming, and lots of it. Some of the things I've read here and there have me concerned about going with an LCD, but it's a decision I've already made. I just now need to find one within the price range, that won't have a ton of ghosting, bleeding, or whatever else makes an LCD monitor 'bad'. I've been digging through the Display forum here, but sadly it seems those guys are only giving attention to threads about really high-end LCD monitors, and I've had a hard time figuring out which direction to go on my own since info on monitors in my range is sketchy.

I've set the system up as follows:
Case: LXe-W Black - Velocity Micro Signature Case - Pure Aluminum, side window, removable front door, extended depth
Power Supply: 550 Watt Antec® TRUE POWER 2.0 Quiet Power Supply with 120mm Smart Fan (SLI Certified by NVIDIA)
Case Lights: Single Blue Cold Cathode Chassis Light Kit
Motherboard: Asus® P5N32-SLI SE Deluxe - NVIDIA® nForce™ 4 SLI MCP, PCI Express Motherboard with DDR2
Processor: Intel® Core™ 2 Duo processor E6400, dual 2.13GHz cores
CPU Cooling: Arctic Cooling® Freezer 7 Heatsink, Ultra Quiet Fan, Copper Heat Pipes, plus Arctic Silver™ 5 Thermal Compound
DDR2 Memory: 1024MB Corsair™ XMS2 DDR2-800 Low Latency CL4 Extreme Memory with Heat Spreader (2x512)
PCX Video: 1024MB eVGA™ NVIDIA® GeForce™ 7950 GX2, PCI-Express, 2 x DVI
Video Cooling: VideoCool™ Positive Pressure Airflow System - Speed adjustable, with light
Audio: Creative Labs SoundBlaster® Audigy™ 4, high performance 7.1 channel sound
Hard Drive 1: 250GB Western Digital WD2500JD 7200rpm SATA/150, 8MB Cache
Optical Drive 1: 16x Lite On® DVD+/-RW/CD-RW Dual Layer, Black Bezel
Optical Drive 2: 16x DVD/48x CD-RW Lite On® Combo Drive, Black Bezel

The main thing at this point is the choose the monitor. Once I have a price for that down, depending on its cost I'll likely upgrade to the E6600 processor, and/or 2gb of RAM vs. 1gb. That said, which will have a greater impact on performance? More memory, or a faster processor? I've mostly left those upgrades off for now to leave myself some headroom on getting a good monitor, seeing as it will have a greater effect on the overall system (IMO) than a marginal boost in processor speed.

Thanks again for all the help :)
 
-w|sh- said:
Thanks for all the responses, guys.

I've made my decision, and I'm going to be ordering a Velocity Micro. Between this site's opinion on them, and everyone in this forum's support for them, and the simple fact that a PM sent to Randy was very promptly responded to, I'm all set to order.

My biggest concern at this point is what monitor to purchase to accompany the new system. I've never had any experience with LCD monitors, but from what I can tell I'll likely end up ordering one outside of VM. That said, I'm still only looking to spend between $200-300, and would LIKE to get a monitor in the 19" range. This system is going to be primarily used for gaming, and lots of it. Some of the things I've read here and there have me concerned about going with an LCD, but it's a decision I've already made. I just now need to find one within the price range, that won't have a ton of ghosting, bleeding, or whatever else makes an LCD monitor 'bad'. I've been digging through the Display forum here, but sadly it seems those guys are only giving attention to threads about really high-end LCD monitors, and I've had a hard time figuring out which direction to go on my own since info on monitors in my range is sketchy.

I've set the system up as follows:
Case: LXe-W Black - Velocity Micro Signature Case - Pure Aluminum, side window, removable front door, extended depth
Power Supply: 550 Watt Antec® TRUE POWER 2.0 Quiet Power Supply with 120mm Smart Fan (SLI Certified by NVIDIA)
Case Lights: Single Blue Cold Cathode Chassis Light Kit
Motherboard: Asus® P5N32-SLI SE Deluxe - NVIDIA® nForce™ 4 SLI MCP, PCI Express Motherboard with DDR2
Processor: Intel® Core™ 2 Duo processor E6400, dual 2.13GHz cores
CPU Cooling: Arctic Cooling® Freezer 7 Heatsink, Ultra Quiet Fan, Copper Heat Pipes, plus Arctic Silver™ 5 Thermal Compound
DDR2 Memory: 1024MB Corsair™ XMS2 DDR2-800 Low Latency CL4 Extreme Memory with Heat Spreader (2x512)
PCX Video: 1024MB eVGA™ NVIDIA® GeForce™ 7950 GX2, PCI-Express, 2 x DVI
Video Cooling: VideoCool™ Positive Pressure Airflow System - Speed adjustable, with light
Audio: Creative Labs SoundBlaster® Audigy™ 4, high performance 7.1 channel sound
Hard Drive 1: 250GB Western Digital WD2500JD 7200rpm SATA/150, 8MB Cache
Optical Drive 1: 16x Lite On® DVD+/-RW/CD-RW Dual Layer, Black Bezel
Optical Drive 2: 16x DVD/48x CD-RW Lite On® Combo Drive, Black Bezel

The main thing at this point is the choose the monitor. Once I have a price for that down, depending on its cost I'll likely upgrade to the E6600 processor, and/or 2gb of RAM vs. 1gb. That said, which will have a greater impact on performance? More memory, or a faster processor? I've mostly left those upgrades off for now to leave myself some headroom on getting a good monitor, seeing as it will have a greater effect on the overall system (IMO) than a marginal boost in processor speed.

Thanks again for all the help :)
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W|sh,

I don't have a lot of experience with 19" LCDs. My 20" 2007FP LCD will be my first venture away from CRTs. Sorry that I can't help more there.

In regards to your second question, I'd recommend the 2GB of RAM over the E6600. Depending on what processor you're coming from, the E6400 is already likely to be a significant upgrade and the unoverclocked clock speed and cache difference between the E6400 and the E6600 won't have as much of an impact in most modern games as a jump from 1GB to 2GB of RAM will. You can't make up for the 2MB difference in cache, but you can very likely make up for the difference (if you felt you needed to) in clock speed through a little (comparatively) nudge in the FSB even with air cooling. On the other hand, you can't make up the difference between 1GB of RAM and 2GB.

Hope that helps and I'm sure others with have opinions as well. In any case, best of luck and I hope everything works out well with your VM purchase. Looks like a great system. :)

-Ben
 
Looks awesome, partner.

I, too, would recommend the 2GB of RAM. It looks like you'll be gaming with that system, so the 1GB extra of RAM is going to help you out a lot more than the extra processing speed.
 
One more vote for VM and one more vote for 2GB of RAM. ;)
 
FWIW, I've owned 4 systems from VM over the past couple years and just ordered a Vector Campus Edition today, what a deal for this machine. I wouldn't order from anyone else at this point or into the future. They've always been responsive to my requests, and any problems were addressed expediently. I spoke with Randy directly upon ordering my first system years ago, (yes he answered the sales line) and was impressed with his vision for a successful computer company. He has certainly backed it up.
 
I also agree on the RAM.

Also, I personally would add another HDD.... unless you are really great about backups. I have seen too many HDDs fail, which can be a real bummer...I know it jacks up the price, but IMO, well worth it (unless you are planning on adding another yourself, later). Best of luck with your purchase! :p
 
Ack! :D

Well I jumped into this late but I have been having a lot of fun playing games on my ABS Ultimate X9 II. I have had no problems with it, aside from slower than expected boot times :confused: , and the PC absolutely flies through games.

Honestly I was torn between ABS and Velocity Micro since Maingear fell out of the running pretty soon.

I spent way to much time wrapped up in Dell's XPS 700 fiasco and I wanted a Core 2 Duo PC now not later. ABS let me configure and order before the official release. They also got it to me a lot faster than the expected delivery of the VM system. At the time ABS was also a couple hundred cheaper than a similar VM rig.

That and my concern over some of the UPS problems VM computers seemed to have is what finally weighed the scales in ABS's favor. Honestly you guys might want to check for a disgruntled former employee who is now working for UPS and paying "special" attention to any package with a Velocity Micro label on it.

I am actually impressed with both companies and I really don't feel that either is a bad choice.

Sorry, but as they say, better late than never. ;)
 
Sir Robin said:
Ack! :D

Well I jumped into this late but I have been having a lot of fun playing games on my ABS Ultimate X9 II. I have had no problems with it, aside from slower than expected boot times :confused: , and the PC absolutely flies through games.

Honestly I was torn between ABS and Velocity Micro since Maingear fell out of the running pretty soon.

I spent way to much time wrapped up in Dell's XPS 700 fiasco and I wanted a Core 2 Duo PC now not later. ABS let me configure and order before the official release. They also got it to me a lot faster than the expected delivery of the VM system. At the time ABS was also a couple hundred cheaper than a similar VM rig.

That and my concern over some of the UPS problems VM computers seemed to have is what finally weighed the scales in ABS's favor. Honestly you guys might want to check for a disgruntled former employee who is now working for UPS and paying "special" attention to any package with a Velocity Micro label on it.

I am actually impressed with both companies and I really don't feel that either is a bad choice.

Sorry, but as they say, better late than never. ;)
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Better late than never, indeed. In fact, you weren't too late at all. I'm very glad you responded when you did.

After reading your post, and considering the fact that I'm about to spend over $2500 on a PC, and about $300 on a monitor (seperately) I decided that a few extra days to mull the decision over was worth it. After all, it's been nearly 4 months now since the death of my former PC, and while spending a few more weeks on my laptop may kill me, it probably won't.

After reading what you had to say about your ABS system, I checked them out again. I did a bit of research, and found that the reason for their slow boot times is due to the D975XBXLKR mobo. Appearantly, however, some tweaking could be done to speed the POST times up a bit. Also, there's a new revision of the BIOS for that mobo (as of 8/21, I believe) that made mention of improving POST times. In fact, to possibly help you out, the release notes specifically note that they "Fixed POST delay at POST code 5A when certain CD-ROM drives are attached to the system." I could only assume that means the problems have been resolved, or could be with a little work. The BIOS release notes can be found here and the BIOS update itself here.

Having considered my choices the past few days, and after reading countless pages of comments about both vendors, again I'm coming back to this thread to let you guys help me with this decision. Being as I plan on making my decision by the end of today and getting the ordering process in the works this evening, I hope you guys can really respond here to help me out with the choice.

I realize and completely understand the bias here in this forum towards Velocity Micro, but that aside, put yourself in my shoes, and consider each option carefully if you plan to comment. I've saved up and waited a considerable period of time for this new PC. It'll be my first new system in nearly 5 years now (sad, eh?) so yeah, I'm going nuts with this system, and the wait for whichever I place an order for. All of that said, I am strongly leaning towards one of these systems, and I may not take any of your advice, but any thoughts or comments are greatly appreciated nevertheless.

Without further ado, below are each system's specs. I've configured them each to a price range just shy of $2700 as my budget is $3000 for the system, allowing me $300 for the purchase of my new monitor.

Velocity Micro Gamer's Edge Configuration (est. ship date - 9/27)
Case: LXe-W Black - Velocity Micro Signature Case - Pure Aluminum, side window, removable front door, extended depth
Power Supply: 550 Watt Antec® TRUE POWER 2.0 Quiet Power Supply with 120mm Smart Fan (SLI Certified by NVIDIA)
Case Lights: Single Blue Cold Cathode Chassis Light Kit
Motherboard: Asus® P5N32-SLI SE Deluxe - NVIDIA® nForce™ 4 SLI MCP, PCI Express Motherboard with DDR2
Processor: Intel® Core™ 2 Duo processor E6400, dual 2.13GHz cores
CPU Cooling: Arctic Cooling® Freezer 7 Heatsink, Ultra Quiet Fan, Copper Heat Pipes, plus Arctic Silver™ 5 Thermal Compound
DDR2 Memory: 2048MB Corsair™ XMS2 DDR2-800 Low Latency CL4 Extreme Memory with Heat Spreader (2x512)
PCX Video: 1024MB eVGA™ NVIDIA® GeForce™ 7950 GX2, PCI-Express, 2 x DVI
Video Cooling: VideoCool™ Positive Pressure Airflow System - Speed adjustable, with light
Audio: Creative Labs SoundBlaster® Audigy™ 4, high performance 7.1 channel sound
Hard Drive 1: 250GB Western Digital WD2500JD 7200rpm SATA/150, 8MB Cache
Optical Drive 1: 16x Lite On® DVD+/-RW/CD-RW Dual Layer, Black Bezel
Optical Drive 2: 16x DVD/48x CD-RW Lite On® Combo Drive, Black Bezel
Total configuration cost: $2685 (Free shipping before 9/12)

ABS Ultimate X9 Configuration (est. ship date - 9/18)
Case: Thermaltake Armor Aluminum ATX Full-tower Case (Black Color)
Power Supply: Antec TruePower 2.0 550W Power Supply
Motherboard: MB INTEL BOXD975XBXLKR 975X 775
Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 2.4GHz Conroe FSB 1066MHz 4MB L2 Cache 65nm LGA 775
CPU Cooling: Thermaltake Silent 775 CPU Cooler With Heatpipe Cooling Technology for Intel LGA775 Processors
DDR2 Memory: CORSAIR XMS2 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) 4-4-4-12 Dual Channel Kit
PCX Video: eVGA nVIDIA Geforce 7950GX2 1GB/512-bit GDDR3 PCI Express x16
Audio: Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi XtremeMusic 7.1 Channels
Hard Drive 1: Western Digital Raptor 74GB 10000RPM 16MB Cache SATA
Hard Drive 1: Seagate Barracuda 320GB 7200RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s
Optical Drive 1: SONY Black 16X IDE DVD-ROM Drive
Optical Drive 2: SAMSUNG 16X SuperMulti Dual Layer DVD Burner with LightScribe Technology (Black Color)
Keyboard: Saitek Eclipse Wired Keyboard
Mouse: Logitech G5 Laser Mouse
Total configuration cost: $2702.38 (UPS Next Day shipping cost included)

There are some very important points to note about each configuration.
  • The ship date for the VM machine is over a week longer than the ABS.
  • The ABS system comes with the E6600 as opposed to the VM's E6400. The cache and faster clock speed should make a notable difference, it would seem.
  • The VM and ABS mobos are quite different, but with BIOS updates I think they both perform very similarly. The main difference is overclocking ability which, while it interests me, is something I likely wouldn't delve into for quite some time.
  • On the ABS system I was able to upgrade to the X-Fi ExtremeMusic sound card over the VM's Audigy 4. While I'm not sure how large an impact this will have on performance, it seems to have more features than the Audigy, and I'm quite particular about my sounds.
  • I believe one of the more notable differences, is the storage. The ABS price allows me to toss in a 74gig WD Raptor, as well as a secondary 320gig seagate hard drive where the VM only comes with a single 250gig drive, which may end up as the JD or the JS (seems random luck for the time being which I'd get).
  • A possibly overlooked point would be the shipping. VM's free shipping is simply UPS ground. Meanwhile, with the ABS system's price, just for kicks I chose UPS Next Day shipping and alas, it fits the budget even still.
  • Finally, there's the keyboard and mouse. VM offered neither of these, while ABS offered both at prices as low as I could find to order the components at any other online store. These would both be purchased seperately from VM should I choose to order my PC from them. I would also end up waiting to get these, as they add an additional hidden $100 to the VM's price tag at current prices online.

So there they are. I don't really know that I can go wrong either way at this point. With the VM I'm getting a quality system with what I know will be kickass support, which as you can all see here you pay quite the hefty price for. On the other hand I take a minor gamble with ABS and end up with a system that will perform notably better than the VM. Also, recent reviews of ABS's in-house support seems to be going fairly well, and like the VM the ABS systems are covered by a 1 years parts/labor/tech support warranty. At any rate, as previously mentioned all comments are greatly appreciated at this point and will be time-sensitive now. I fully intend to order one system or the other by the end of the day . :cool:
 
For reference, and to not add anything more to my HUGE reply :eek: I figured I'd put up links to configure both systems.

ABS Ultimate X9
Velocity Micro Gamer's Edge

Both are very easy to setup through the menus, and each should arrive at the above costs when configured as such. The only thing I left off each system was the OS, which will be Windows XP Pro SP2. Replies now please. :D

Edit: bah, just edited other post and hyperlinked system titles to accomplish same things :cool:
 
-w|sh-

First off, I'd like to thank you for considering Velocity Micro. It's always a good feeling to know that people know of the high quality and service that we strive to deliver.

Secondly, I know it's hard making a decision like yours. Personally, from a pure numbers perspective, I'd have a hard time making a case for going with Velocity Micro vs. ABS in your particular position.

However, I can only tell you that our systems are proudly built, hand tested, and thoroughly inspected to ensure the highest build quality. Our chassis, while not the flashiest looking when compared via pictures on a website, are considerably higher in build quality than anything Thermaltake manufactures. Instead of focusing on "bling," our Lian Li custom-made LX chassis have been specifically engineered and made for us to ensure proper thermal performance and a reduced acoustic signature. It's a tough to beat combination that many one-off manufacturers cannot match.

Also, all of our support is handled in-house, including our 24/7 tech support. Our in-house technicians are on rotation where they are "on call" 24 hours a day. This allows you the same quality support at 3AM as it does at 3PM. Our techs can are authorized to send a technician out to your house, and we work closely with on-site support to ensure that they take care of you the way we would.

When I wrote Fear and Loathing in Lost Business, Velocity Micro was one of the companies that I believed was doing it right.

But it all boils down to what you feel comfortable with. I'm not going to sit here and tell you to buy Velocity Micro if your wallet is dictating another decision. It's your hard earned money and you should buy whatever is going to make you happy at the end of the day. For some, it may be with us, and we'd love to have your business.
 
Another thing to consider (and please correct me if I am wrong....).

I believe that ABS charges extra to overclock your system, while there is no up-charge with VM. This is something that also adds value to your system. I think that if you OC your ABS system, it may affect your warrantee. Just something else to consider.
 
By default we do not offer overclocking as an option for our CPUs. We are developing our overclocking procedures for Core 2 processors and will be seeing how we can add that value to our products.
 
ChrisMorley said:
By default we do not offer overclocking as an option for our CPUs. We are developing our overclocking procedures for Core 2 processors and will be seeing how we can add that value to our products.
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Sorry, I stand corrected :eek: . Perhaps I was thinking about VM's AMD systems. I thought I once saw OCing as an option...
 
-w|sh- said:
and another couple guys getting busted up PCs via UPS from VM.
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I don't think it's really fair to blame the MFG for some sloppy preloader at ups for the machine being damaged. That could just as easily happen to an ABS computer or any other computer.

I vote VM hands down, and I'll be ordering my new PC from them come tax time.
To me it just feels like they care more about the consumer than ABS would.
 
stragi said:
I don't think it's really fair to blame the MFG for some sloppy preloader at ups for the machine being damaged. That could just as easily happen to an ABS computer or any other computer.

I vote VM hands down, and I'll be ordering my new PC from them come tax time.
To me it just feels like they care more about the consumer than ABS would.
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I absolutely agree that it isn't fair to blame VM for bad handling by UPS. The only reason I mentioned it at all was due to the fact that their offer of free shipping via UPS is what made their system fit my budget at all. On the other hand, all options included I managed to fit FedEx overnight shipping into the ABS configuration, which while they could still fumble the handling on the system, their track record is much shinier.

That said, I (almost regretfully) have successfully ordered my ABS system configuration. At the point I made the decision, and having very carefully considered both options, I don't think I'd have been satisfied with my final choice either way. The simple fact is, while taking no gamble on support and service with the VM system, or its build quality, I'd have had a sub-standard system (compared to the ABS setup) for a nearly equal price. On the other hand, having ordered the ABS system, I feel a bit concerned that everything will arrive in working order, and should it not, I'd worry over getting things functional. However, just comparing the staggering differences in each build, I had to choose ABS based on the amount of bang I'd get for my buck. To put it to another perspective, to configure both systems identically, the VM rig shot up to almost $3300 compared to the ABS system at $2700 after shipping. That's a hell of a price to pay for their service which while I'm sure it brings great peace of mind to some, just couldn't fit my budget. :(

So, at this point my system will arrive on Sept. 19th. Nearly two weeks sooner than the VM would've (speculation here - I'm sure their systems ship early sometimes). At least I won't be waiting very long for my new rig, and with a little luck, it'll arrive in pristine working order and hopefully give me no problems in its use. I'll certainly be posting a follow-up review either in this thread, or a new one. The decision to go ABS was made far more difficult by the simple fact that there's little reference to go on, so hopefully when I get mine I can paint a better picture for other potential future customers.
 
-w|sh- said:
That said, I (almost regretfully) have successfully ordered my ABS system configuration.
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LOL! I felt almost sad to order a PC through ABS instead of VM too!

Damn, I need to check forums more often. I have just been wrapped up in Beta's lately and now Relic's CoH.

Thanks for the BIOS link. I better check into that further but it just really hasn't caused any problems for me. Its just seems kind of, well, odd.

While I try I am not the most technically savvy consumer but at the time ABS did me give me a little more bang for the buck and seemed to have just as good a track record as VM.

I should have mentioned this earlier. ABS is very picky when it comes to credit card info. If everything doesn't match up exactly with the credit card company's info they will put your order on hold till it gets straightened out. Double check with them, they have online chat, that there is no billing issue with your order. Sorry, I thought you had already gone with VM or I would have brought this up sooner.

Yeah the whole, "Am I going to be lucky or really really unlucky with this order?" haunts me everytime.

Good luck and happy gaming!
 
Before purchasing from ABS I'd look thru their forums, particularly any threads related to their G3's. You may not be interested in a G3 but the sheer number of complaints and the forum moderator's own admission of not being able to help will give you an indication of how good their tech support is.
 
juror#555 said:
Before purchasing from ABS I'd look thru their forums, particularly any threads related to their G3's. You may not be interested in a G3 but the sheer number of complaints and the forum moderator's own admission of not being able to help will give you an indication of how good their tech support is.
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Only certain models of their G3's are having issues.

My G3 Mayhem Eclipse XT runs fine (truth be told, I have only had it since August 21st), The only complaints I have are: there's a dead pixel at the top left of the screen (I couldn't care less though, just 1 pixel) and I didn't receive my copy of Farcry (apparently it was "while supplies last" even though they still advertise it as include [I think]).

Other then that, it's uber peachy.
 
Atilac said:
Only certain models of their G3's are having issues.

My G3 Mayhem Eclipse XT runs fine (truth be told, I have only had it since August 21st), The only complaints I have are: there's a dead pixel at the top left of the screen (I couldn't care less though, just 1 pixel) and I didn't receive my copy of Farcry (apparently it was "while supplies last" even though they still advertise it as include [I think]).

Other then that, it's uber peachy.
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Actually only one model is having a consistent problem, and that's not even ABS's fault since its manufactured by Uniwill.

However, if one takes the time to read thru the hundreds of posts in their own forums you likely will see a clear pattern regarding the quality of their technical support.
 
Yeah, I was pretty surprised when I couldn't find a forum on Velocity Micro's site.

ABS's forum is pretty dead most of the time and I was going the Ultimate X9 desktop route so the G3 wasn't a source of worry for me.

ABS definately has some quirks but whenever I've called, emailed, chatted, or posted with them they have treated me descently.

It all boils down to the great question whenever any of us order anything, "Am I going to be lucky or really really unlucky this time?"
 
call me crazy for bumbing a topic roughly 4 months old but i want to find out how this turned out with my being almost in the SAME exact situation (except it's a whole new XPS 700 scandal now that they're available, and i have also just about edged out Maingear, but i would love to order one if they were just more reasonably priced, or their very vanilla ordering process did a little more to convince me of their quality rather than making it all feel generic).

And i am also vaugely, but regretfully leaning towards ABS, i like their stealth case though, and what used to be the X9 is now kind of the X8, and they are now using nforce mobos (aside from the door the VM case doesnt seem all specially designed for them, it looks almost exactly like my old lian-li)

even still, how did it work out, and if there were any problems how did was the support?

--and why did the VM guy get banned?
 
spincut said:
i have also just about edged out Maingear, but i would love to order one if they were just more reasonably priced, or their very vanilla ordering process did a little more to convince me of their quality rather than making it all feel generic).

And i am also vaugely, but regretfully leaning towards ABS, i like their stealth case though, and what used to be the X9 is now kind of the X8, and they are now using nforce mobos (aside from the door the VM case doesnt seem all specially designed for them, it looks almost exactly like my old lian-li)

--and why did the VM guy get banned?
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If you call and talk to the salespeople at Maingear, it will be hard to not buy from them. Same goes for VM.

That said, we've had generally good experiences with ABS, some of which have been really good. I don't believe you'll be disappointed in your purchase if you decide to go with them.

Another company in that price range is AVADirect - they're worth a look. They've got a great sales staff, as well.

The ban was due to an internal matter - we'll leave it at that.
 
nah i dont like the AVAdirect look, a bit too budgety for my tastes (even if the support is as good as you said it was).

I have no doubt a phonecall to maingear would sway me, but that wasnt my point, i actually already really want one, but the price just isnt in the sweet spot for me unless i make some compromises i dont want to make (plus i sometimes put a little too much exageration in the idea that i may even ever have to talk to tech support, computer may work fine until after the warranty expires anyway).

if i got some sort of discount (which i'm asking about now in relation to business or educational) then it would probably sway me back into maingear (although i wish their ordering and part info had some more meat to its look) but in the meantime i too am just trying to decide which build i'd like most between VM and ABS, i am liking ABS because all in all they give a bit more trimmings with a similar config, and i like their stealth case a little more (it is a tad overextreme looking even still but my personal PC that died was that same Lian-li case and as good as it was i just dont want to look at it anymore).

in my desperation to find something else i kind of went over the head of your reviews and gave a serioius look to vigor and those "twister" systems, but i just couldnt get into them after reading certain aspects of their noise levels and support, even with their rather "ballsy" default support of 2+ or so years standard.
 
Not quite sure what "budgety" means,they offer the same components(actually a larger selection than most)at a significant savings.And their ratings and reviews have been very favorable.Where is it written that a company has to charge hundreds more to be considered good?
 
For what it's worth, after watching how VMS handles customer issues on this board, I would have no second thoughts going with them, if I was going to buy a custom manufactured rig.

Good luck either way!
 
budgety, meaning a place with too much of a budget feel, it's pretty self expanatory.

and i dont want to build my own, i've already graduated from that experience and the frustrations that come with it. I never said botiques couldnt offer what i wanted either, i just got to find the right one, and consdiering the size of the purchase, i do not want to be stuck with a purchase that i'm not happy with considering i'm coming from a pretty sensitive area in that regard or one that doesnt have some of the premiums i would like to get from having someone else build it (aside from tech support).
 
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