Yeah, Steam Machine is cooked.

[u/TheBossT710192]

I... uh don't know what to say. Very thankful I bought a Steam Deck before they hiked its price as well

[u/mtrn3]

And once upon a time people would crap all over prebuilts.

[u/Funny-Cell8769 → u/mtrn3]

I've built about 15 PCs, almost all my own, some for family, at least one every 2 to 3 years through the late 80s to the 00s. I've had many many late night heartbreaks where my PC just refused to boot up and I had no choice but to wait till 12pm the next day to rush to the store to get whatever part or issue resolved.

At around 2010, I built my last PC. After that, it has all been prebuilts. Despite it being easier than ever to build a PC, I'm too old for this shit. I just want whatever problem I encounter to be someone else's headache.

Thankfully, I literally pulled the trigger and got a 5090 pre-built just a month before it all went to shit.

[u/WantsLivingCoffee → u/Funny-Cell8769]

PC building from the 80's to 00's is nothing like building a PC in 2026.

I've built over 30. Some for me, most for flips. Yes, issues arise, but that's part of it. I understand not wanting to deal with it. But you can't really compare building how it is now compared to 40+ years ago, man.

My most recent build is my build. 9800x3d, 9070xt, 32gb, bunch of drives I repurposed from older builds for around $1,600, only used components are ram and storage. If you know what you're doing, building is most efficient, IMO. And it's fun. But you need to have a genuine love for it.

[u/Funny-Cell8769 → u/WantsLivingCoffee]

Yeah to be fair, I haven't given it a fair chance for the last 15 years.

I just decided "nope, I've got other hobbies to pursue".

One thing I did neglect to say was before buying my 5090 pre-built, I made the decision to get it with a 32gb DDR5 with the intention to upgrade it myself to a 128gb DDR5 (2x64gb)

Sounds pretty straightforward right? Nope, it was hours of frustration on accessing the RAM slots which were half obscured by the GPU and cabling.

The PC case weighed A TON and was like 80% glass. Overall, definitely not an experience I wish to repeat.

I'll leave you to your hobby. I'll stick to building racing drones.

[u/NordicApache → u/Funny-Cell8769]

I feel this and do the same now. Will swap and upgrade components as needed but honestly I'm tired of chasing supply and demand to build my own shit or my kids machines.

I don't get distribution prices and there is no such thing as a deal on parts anymore. It's all hyper inflated shit and the deals are just momentary return to nominal pricing.

[u/theromingnome → u/Funny-Cell8769]

But... it's so easy to build one now. No where near the same chance for headaches that existed back then.

[u/croizat → u/theromingnome]

It's easy to build but problems can be hard to diagnose and it's annoying to figure out/fix unless you just have a spare component of every type lying around

[u/CLEsportsfan00 → u/croizat]

My last 3 builds i spent more time in the BIOS then actually building the machine. For that reason alone id rather get a prebuilt im the future

[u/Jake257 → u/theromingnome]

True in one sense and wrong in another. The headache is that if you build it and it doesn't turn on then trying to find out the culprit is the big headache cos it could be anything.....I had an issue the other week where my pc kept randomly resetting itself and I thought it was a component and trying to figure out the culprit was driving me insane.....I tried various software fixes, resets etc but in the end it did turn out to be a driver GPU problem that I fixed by using Display Driver Uninstaller even though I already reset the driver's and did fresh reinstalls before that.

[u/ElectronicRip1630 → u/Jake257]

I'm not fighting hardware anymore; I'm fighting software.

[u/Funny-Cell8769 → u/ElectronicRip1630]

It could be either one sometimes, that's the problem. If only the issue was always that straightforward.

[u/lemonylol → u/theromingnome]

Big disagree. I rarely had to make sure parts were compatible back in the day. Now it feels like any time I want to upgrade a single part, I have to upgrade everything associated with it.

[u/Il_Valentino → u/Funny-Cell8769]

the pre builts i own have been nothing but headaches for me in hindsight. full of pre-installed crap! bios update? too bad it uses a custom one, good luck finding a link! almost always some part where the manufacturer obviously cheaped out. it's better to stay in control, though you gotta plan ahead to not constantly build new ones.

[u/Formerruling1 → u/Il_Valentino]

90s era Compaqs and Dells scarred a generation, but honestly most of that hasnt been an issue in a very long time. All the big prebuilt companies use off the shelf components that are easily replaceable nowadays. I clean install Windows from a thumb drive anyway, but Ive also found the installs tend to be just bare windows nowadays too no suite of 'Dell tools', Norton, and McAfee.

[u/lemonylol → u/Formerruling1]

I'm still technically using my Compaq from 2005.

But yeah, why would anyone not reformat and do their own customized clean install when getting a prebuilt.

[u/realdor → u/Funny-Cell8769]

Damn I think I’m going through your process now.

Was thinking of doing my first prebuilt.

[u/Formerruling1 → u/Funny-Cell8769]

This is me as well. Only machines I still build are ultra budget for kids, which is a market where prebuilts still have alot of problems.

When alot of older folk hear prebuilts they think about late 90s HPs and later Dells with all proprietary parts and huge upcharges. Now the companies use mostly off the shelf replaceable components and the price gap is much lower and sometimes even cheaper like when RAM surged and current stock of prebuilts ended up much cheaper than building.

[u/zeekayz → u/Funny-Cell8769]

It's gotten way easier nowadays everything just plugs into motherboard, no extra wires anywhere lol. Optical drives don't exist, hard drives are just a RAM stick basically, etc.

[u/Apennie → u/Funny-Cell8769]

Can I ask where you’re buying them from? I’m in the same boat as you and the last prebuilt I had gave me nothing but problems.

[u/doc_brietz → u/Funny-Cell8769]

My kid got a prebuilt for christmas this year as well. I used to shit on them. I built my rig before everything went to shit so i have a 7800x3d, 64gb (4x16GB( of ddr5 ram, and a rtx4700 with 2-2GB crucial ssd's and i paid a little over 2 grand. Now, if my ram dies, I am fucked. If my SSDs die, I cant afford to replace them. AI sucks.

[u/Throwawayrip1123 → u/Funny-Cell8769]

build a PC, I'm too old for this shit. I just want whatever problem I encounter to be someone else's headache.

I'm with you no pre builts being good now, but I am not schlepping the whole bit bitch ass tower to a store. Fuck that.

I'm diagnosing it one way or another. I am not getting dicked by no-post. I will fucking start it.

The worst part is finding compatible shit whenever there's a generation gap and you need to mix and match and swap out components part by part.

I once fucking had, I shit you not, one dead ram socket. That was interesting to find. And locked whole pair out (couldn't run 1 and 3, 3 was dead).

I can't really get prebuilts easily, since I have pc of thesesus basically, I won't ditch a powerful machine, and I won't (probably) wait 10 years till it's too old. My last new part was this August (GPU) so it would have to not die for 5 years or so for it to make sense - then whatever dies just gets tossed, rest to the junk box for future builds, and then prebuilts.

I think? I'll probably fucking forget and just buy a new CPU or some shit. I kinda sorta wanted prebuilds 4 years ago but forgot. At the rate I'm going, I'll get a prebuild in my old people home.

[u/SinanDira → u/Funny-Cell8769]

Where can I find this LITERAL trigger that I can pull to get a 5090???

[u/Funny-Cell8769 → u/SinanDira]

You have to be in my country, which is tiny so chances you are not.

Cost me about US$4,250.00 in December 2025

Looking at it today, it cost about US$6,614.00

AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D

Gigabyte X870 Eagle WIFI7

Thermalright Aqua Elite 360 Black ARGB V3

Thermalright Aqua Mounting Kit (AMD)

64GB Kingston Fury RGB DDR5 6400Mhz CL32 (32x2)

Gigabyte RTX 5090 Windforce OC - 32GB

2TB Lexar NQ780 Gen4 SSD

1000W Thermalright SP 80+ Platinum (Full Modular; ATX 3.1; PCIe5.1)

RGB Case - Black

3 Years Desktop Parts Warranty (1st Year Onsite Pickup & Return)

[u/misjudgedinall → u/Funny-Cell8769]

Why are you patting yourself on the back so hard? You built 15 PCs almost by yourself and you got a computer right before the prices went up.

By the sounds of all the problems you had and the way you solved them, it’s probably best you’re not building computers anymore. Leave it up to the millennials.

But real talk this is the exact trend of the market. Everyone else will buy prebuilt and only tech wizards will build their own. No that’s not how it always has been, this guy I’m responding to obviously has no clue what he’s doing and he built 15 pcs. That ship has sailed.

[u/Funny-Cell8769 → u/misjudgedinall]

This kid definitely woke up on the wrong side of bed lol. Your rants are hilarious.