To order online or not to order online?

[TankyTev]

I'm a little new to this ordering online business. I love PCPartPicker because it picks the retailer with the best price for me automatically and can save me a boatload of money. I'm just afraid of ordering online because I can't physically inspect the item I'm buying. I've read reviews and done my research for almost every component I am going to buy, so my build is pretty much set. It's just very deterring to me when I read those reviews that say they got an item that was dead on arrival. Then I'll have to send the item back, pay for shipping and handling, wait for a replacement or refund, and repeat the whole process if something else crapped out while being shipped. It's all very deterring. I can save money but the potential is there for a significant component, like the CPU or GPU, to be dead on arrival and can delay me. Now I'm a very patient man, waiting does not bother me at all. Being stagnant? That's what bothers me. I'm making a big move to another state in about a week here and I would like my parts to arrive at my new destination so I can build it and start going to school.

 

Your thoughts?

[Jobobee]

Buy it online. Though if you can go to a micro centre they often have good deals on...

But buying everything online is fine most of the time. You won't be able to try the stuff in the shop anyway.

[brownninja97]

btw if you are in the Uk then check ariapc, for some odd reason the pcpartpicker seems to ignore aria's sales

 

also online is waaay better then retail.

[Izaya Orihara]

Order them fromt the internet the possiblity of hardware being doa is 2%. An average sytem has 9 parts so it will be about a 20% chance that something is DOA: 

[antoainb]

Buy online. DOA also happens with physical store items and if you need to RMA something they will generally pay for shipping. 

[Totalschaden1997]

If you get for example a dead PSU you normally write a review, because you as a customer want to warn other people.

If you get a working PSU you dont write reviews most of the time. So thats, why you shouldn`t always just look at how many bad ratings something has.

[squirrl]

Order them fromt the internet the possiblity of hardware being doa is 2%. An average sytem has 9 parts so it will be about a 20% chance that something is DOA:

It doesn't work like that 20% is very high. If everything has a 2% chance of failing then the overall chance is still 2%.

Imagine if everything had a 20% chance of failing rather than a 2% chance. According to your maths then the total chance that something would be DOA is 200% which is silly

[Izaya Orihara]

It doesn't work like that 20% is very high. If everything has a 2% chance of failing then the overall chance is still 2%.

Imagine if everything had a 20% chance of failing rather than a 2% chance. According to your maths then the total chance that something would be DOA is 200% which is silly

1,02⁹= 1.1950925686223109 -1 = 0,195 =19,5 % or roughly 20%. That's how it works. When i say something i mean one part out of all the parts in an average build containg 9 pieces. 

[Mooshi]

Depends on if you have a decent tech store near by and if there are sales or not. When I built my PC, Best Buy is a massive lolno. Another advantage to online is the superior selection. For those that live near a store like NCIX, it'd be easier to go local, but not everyone has good stores near.

[Kyuubixchidori]

I get most of my parts from micocenter, but i also order online. in store simply doesnt have everything that the internet does

[Yoinkerman]

Actually we're determining the probability of every part being fine, which is  1 - (0.98^9) or 16.6% because we want the sum of the probabilities of any combination of parts failing.

 

 

1,02⁹= 1.1950925686223109 -1 = 0,195 =19,5 % or roughly 20%. That's how it works. When i say something i mean one part out of all the parts in an average build containg 9 pieces. 

[Izaya Orihara]

Actually we're determining the probability of every part being fine, which is  1 - (0.98^9) or 16.6% because we want the sum of the probabilities of any combination of parts failing.

No if we would want to know the probablility of every part being fine we caculate 0.98⁹ and that's like 0.83 or 83%. I still remember some of the pointless stuff we made in school. 

[Yoinkerman]

Yes, so the probability of one or all of the parts not being fine is 1 - 83% or 17%.ish.

 

No if we would want to know the probablility of every part being fine we caculate 0.98⁹ and that's like 0.83 or 83%. I still remember some of the pointless stuff we made in school. 

[Izaya Orihara]

Yes, so the probability of one or all of the parts not being fine is 1 - 83% or 17%.ish.

The probablity that one of the parts is broken/DOA is 17%. 

[Yoinkerman]

The probability of every part being fine is a subset of every probability.  We both agree that to calculate that outcome it's 0.98^9.  or about 83%.  The subset that includes one or more parts not being fine is simply 1 - (every part being fine) or the sum of every combination of parts failing.   We could figure it out if you really wanted by calculating 0.98^8(0.02) + 0.98^7(0.02^2) + 0.98^6(0.02^3) ... 0.02^9 but that's the really long way to do it.

 

17% is the subset that includes one or two or three or ... all parts failing.

 

The probablity that one of the parts is broken/DOA is 17%. 

[Izaya Orihara]

The probability of every part being fine is a subset of every probability.  We both agree that to calculate that outcome it's 0.98^9.  or about 83%.  The subset that includes one or more parts not being fine is simply 1 - (every part being fine) or the sum of every combination of parts failing.   We could figure it out if you really wanted by calculating 0.98^8(0.02) + 0.98^7(0.02^2) + 0.98^6(0.02^3) ... 0.02^9 but that's the really long way to do it.

 

17% is the subset that includes one or two or three or ... all parts failing.

I'm tired haven't sleept in two days i may be wrong so yeah... I my mind two parts failling would be 10000 to 289. Cause 0.17x0.17 I'll go to bed now. Good nigth.

[TankyTev]

Buy online. DOA also happens with physical store items and if you need to RMA something they will generally pay for shipping. 

 

That's not always the case. I loved, and still love, Corsair because if I had a faulty product, I would be able to send the product to them and have it replaced at no charge to me. Now I have to pay shipping and handling because their policy has changed or something. That still hasn't changed my view on their customer service and the quality of their products though. RMA'ing with Corsair does not make me cringe at all because of my past experiences with them but for other companies, I don't know and that's what makes me cringe at ordering.

 

If you get for example a dead PSU you normally write a review, because you as a customer want to warn other people.

If you get a working PSU you dont write reviews most of the time. So thats, why you shouldn`t always just look at how many bad ratings something has.

 

Some people just don't write reviews at all even if they get a good or bad component but I see what you're saying. It is something to put into consideration.

[Yoinkerman]

One part failing is a ^ b ^ c ^ d ^ e ^ f ^ g ^ h ^ i

where

a = fine = 98%

b = fine = 98%

c = fine = 98%

d = fine = 98%

e = fine = 98%

f = fine = 98%

g = fine = 98%

h = fine = 98%

i = broken = 2%

 

two parts failing is a ^ b ^ c ^ ... ^ i

where

a,b,c,d,e,f,g = 98%

h,i= 2%

 

and so on, and you add them up.

 

But I think actual rates of DOA stuff is much lower than 2% so ordering online is probably fine.  Though I usually opt for DOA insurance with free return shipping if it's available because DOA stuff does happen, and a couple of bucks on an order potentially saves a 30$ shipping fee.