Build Your Own Arcade Controls Forum
Main => Everything Else => Topic started by: USSEnterprise on April 17, 2006, 01:20:37 am
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A friend and I are trying to start up a small business selling computers made to run open source Linux. We want to keep the prices low, the computers powerful , and still make a profit per box. can anyone recommend a place that has truly wholesale AMD processors, mobos, RAM, monitors, etc, without the merchandise being stolen?
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i use these they are pretty cheap
http://www.geeks.com/
http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/Home.jsp
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ZipZoom and Geeks are not cheap enough. Superduper cheap is what I need. true wholesale.
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I'd recommend www.newegg.com (http://www.newegg.com)
However they sometimes have maximum purchase caps on products probably to prevent reselling of products.
But if its just a small business it might not be a problem.
I don't think you're gonna get true wholsale products at any retailer. If you want the real wholesale deal, you're simply gonna have to find a wholesaler.
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newegg is no good because they charge sales tax where I am
tigerdirect is no good because they gouge on shipping. Same goes for Geeks
I think what I need to find is a true wholesaler. Does anyone know of any?
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I always check on pricewatch.com, is that out for some reason? read the reviews carefully and it's easy to avoid scams. or maybe I have been lucky.
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ZipZoom and Geeks are not cheap enough. Superduper cheap is what I need. true wholesale.
PC part prices do not drop substantially below Newegg/ZZF levels until you buy in quantities of 2000+ at least.
You're not going to find a wholesaler that lets you order 10 or 20 pieces for lower than NewEgg prices. If there was one, it'd be all over the net.
Sorry.
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If you do find a good place, please post a link, plenty of folks here would be interested ;D
Good luck!
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If you do find a good place, please post a link, plenty of folks here would be interested ;D
Good luck!
yeah, everyone would be... but it isn't going to happen. You can probably find monitors cheap locally, and older parts of course, but if you're looking for anything somewhat recent (say anything Athlon or P4) its just not going to happen.
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zipzoom is great... ;D
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ZipZoom and Geeks are not cheap enough. Superduper cheap is what I need. true wholesale.
PC part prices do not drop substantially below Newegg/ZZF levels until you buy in quantities of 2000+ at least.
You're not going to find a wholesaler that lets you order 10 or 20 pieces for lower than NewEgg prices. If there was one, it'd be all over the net.
Sorry.
*DING!
I agree with pointdablame.. my god...
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ZipZoom and Geeks are not cheap enough. Superduper cheap is what I need. true wholesale.
PC part prices do not drop substantially below Newegg/ZZF levels until you buy in quantities of 2000+ at least.
You're not going to find a wholesaler that lets you order 10 or 20 pieces for lower than NewEgg prices. If there was one, it'd be all over the net.
Sorry.
*DING!
I agree with pointdablame.. my god...
ahhh jeez!!! :banghead:
Now I have to go delete my account and cower in the corner! ;D
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What about http://www.computergate.com/?
They have cheap shipping. 2.99 for 3-day I think.
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newegg is no good because they charge sales tax where I am
If you register with the state (collecting sales tax, which you should if you're an actual business) then you buy from NewEgg without having to pay tax yourself. You'll just have to show that you're a business entity (fax them your license) and you'll be exempt. That doesn't include stuff you're going to use for yourself, however. You'll have to pay the tax to the state yourself.
I think what I need to find is a true wholesaler. Does anyone know of any?
Sure. http://www.techdata.com is the largest. Or http://www.ingrammicro.com.
Get ready, first you'll have to fill out a bunch of application forms, along with a fee for opening an account with them. Last I knew for TD the fee was $100, I'm sure it's more now.
Then you'll find that with the volume you're going to buy from them, the prices from this "wholesaler" are actually usually far MORE than from NewEgg.
Trust me...NewEgg is the way to go for the small business owner.
There's a computer place here in town (Optima Computer) and AFAIK, with the exception of some eBay purchases, NewEgg gets 95% of their business. And they've grown in the last two years from a little office selling/repairing systems to five offices, running their own ISP, and a gaming store.
Just remember...computer sales doesn't make jack diddly for money for the small guy, the big guys (Dell, Gateway, Compaq, HP) will overtake you every time. The way you make the money is SERVICE. Fix the computer, it'll cost $45/hr in labor, one hour minimum. Plus parts.
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newegg is no good because they charge sales tax where I am
If you register with the state (collecting sales tax, which you should if you're an actual business) then you buy from NewEgg without having to pay tax yourself. You'll just have to show that you're a business entity (fax them your license) and you'll be exempt. That doesn't include stuff you're going to use for yourself, however. You'll have to pay the tax to the state yourself.
I think what I need to find is a true wholesaler. Does anyone know of any?
Sure. http://www.techdata.com is the largest. Or http://www.ingrammicro.com.
Get ready, first you'll have to fill out a bunch of application forms, along with a fee for opening an account with them. Last I knew for TD the fee was $100, I'm sure it's more now.
Then you'll find that with the volume you're going to buy from them, the prices from this "wholesaler" are actually usually far MORE than from NewEgg.
Trust me...NewEgg is the way to go for the small business owner.
There's a computer place here in town (Optima Computer) and AFAIK, with the exception of some eBay purchases, NewEgg gets 95% of their business. And they've grown in the last two years from a little office selling/repairing systems to five offices, running their own ISP, and a gaming store.
Just remember...computer sales doesn't make jack diddly for money for the small guy, the big guys (Dell, Gateway, Compaq, HP) will overtake you every time. The way you make the money is SERVICE. Fix the computer, it'll cost $45/hr in labor, one hour minimum. Plus parts.
Thats so spot on its not even funny..
You can make a fwe small coins from hardware pricing, but the money thats paying the rent is going to be labor costs..
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Sure. http://www.techdata.com is the largest. Or http://www.ingrammicro.com.
Just remember...computer sales doesn't make jack diddly for money for the small guy, the big guys (Dell, Gateway, Compaq, HP) will overtake you every time. The way you make the money is SERVICE. Fix the computer, it'll cost $45/hr in labor, one hour minimum. Plus parts.
Working at a small computer shop myself...
We also get from those two, plus http://www.asipartner.com/ and a few direct like Sceptre (http://www.sceptre.com/)for monitors or Syba (http://www.syba.com/) or raidmax (http://www.raidmax.com/main.htm). I highly sugggest looking at places like raidmax that make their own cases. Ordering a pallet or 2 of 50 cases at a time drops the most expensive shipping cost to almost nothing (we spent $2 a unit on shipping on our last order of 100 cases).
Speaking of shipping, all three distribuators above give us free shipping if we hit a min. order ($500 - $1,000) That may sound like a lot, but we are just starting out (open 6 mths) and we already do that order twice a week.
As for taxes, even if Newegg (or like we do every now and again for cheap blank media) or OfficeDepot charges you tax, keep the reciet and subtract the tax paid from the tax owed when you pay taxes. At least that's what our CPA tells us to do.
Z' Var
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If you do find a good place, please post a link, plenty of folks here would be interested ;D
Good luck!
yeah, everyone would be... but it isn't going to happen. You can probably find monitors cheap locally, and older parts of course, but if you're looking for anything somewhat recent (say anything Athlon or P4) its just not going to happen.
Optimism is not you friend is it?
But, I do understand what you're saying....it's going to be difficult/ (Almost) impossible to find anyhting better that what has been listed.
Harpal maybe? :laugh2: j/k
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If you do find a good place, please post a link, plenty of folks here would be interested ;D
Good luck!
yeah, everyone would be... but it isn't going to happen. You can probably find monitors cheap locally, and older parts of course, but if you're looking for anything somewhat recent (say anything Athlon or P4) its just not going to happen.
Optimism is not you friend is it?
But, I do understand what you're saying....it's going to be difficult/ (Almost) impossible to find anyhting better that what has been listed.
Harpal maybe? :laugh2: j/k
Nope, it has nothing to do with optimism or pessimism. It's called reality :) I've been building computers for years now for friends and family (not in any quantity I'd call a "business" mind you), and it just makes sense that if there WAS a place cheaper than the NewEggs of the world, it would spread on the net. I read a lot of computer forums as well as this one, and people would definitely tell you if there was a place for cheaper parts.
NewEgg/ZZF/et al are as close to wholesale as you are going to get, unless you are talking major quantities. Granted, I don't know what size business USSenterprise is talking about, but I doubt that he will need 500 CPUS or 1000 cases at a given time. If he does, go with sites like Raidmax as mentioned, because at that point the entry fee and pallet shipping etc etc can be rolled into your business.
To me, however, it seems like he is just getting started, and I am fairly sure he's a pretty young kid, so I doubt he's going to be buying $20k worth of inventory. But I do like the Harpal idea, maybe he's got some stuff left :laugh2:
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I think Micheal Dell started before he was old enough to sign so good luck on your enterprise. I think service and upgrades are the place to put your efforts. Way too much competion from guys like Micheal Dell now.
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here is a little dell history,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dell,_Inc.
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here is a little dell history,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dell,_Inc.
Wikipedia does not have an article with this exact name.
Not sure if it's a Firefox issue with the "," though.
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if you look at the link i posted, it is not including the period in the end, it should have the period
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if you look at the link i posted, it is not including the period in the end, it should have the period
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dell,_Inc. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dell,_Inc.)
Ah-hah! Yeah, you have to put URLs like that in the [url] tag. Sorry for the off-topic-ness.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dell,_Inc. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dell,_Inc.)
Ah-hah! Yeah, you have to put URLs like that in the [url] tag. Sorry for the off-topic-ness.
i was just going to do that, you beat me
thanx
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At this point, we are only offering one computer, but when the website goes up, there will be more of a selection. I was able to build the following computer for $300
Sempron 64 2800+
MSI Case and MB
512MB PC3200 RAM
80GB WD HDD
Lite On 16x DVD-RW
FDD
Logitech Multimedia Kb and Opt Mouse.
Ubuntu/Kubuntu
Windows XP = +$100
We charge $375 for the above. No monitor, but still a good deal.
We're trying to target people who want a good computer, but don't want to pay for the Windows XP license. There are one or two competitors, none of which are Dell, HP, Gateway, etc.
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At this point, we are only offering one computer, but when the website goes up, there will be more of a selection. I was able to build the following computer for $300
Sempron 64 2800+
MSI Case and MB
512MB PC3200 RAM
80GB WD HDD
Lite On 16x DVD-RW
FDD
Logitech Multimedia Kb and Opt Mouse.
Ubuntu/Kubuntu
Windows XP = +$100
We're trying to target people who want a good computer, but don't want to pay for the Windows XP license. There are one or two competitors, none of which are Dell, HP, Gateway, etc.
300s not a bad price.. its about that maybe a tad lower if you shop around if you did it yourself, but people buying semprons for their main machine most likely arnt the build your own type of people..
If your making a "site" you dont even need a full inventory at this point.. Toss together some low end machines like this one, some "middle class" computers and some uber high end ones.. 1 choice isnt going to sell many machines out of the gate.. need to have options to get traffic and to get people ordering..
If you look hard enough, Theres a company who sells cases for dirt cheap.. and by dirt cheap, im talking about cases newegg sells for 100 bucks, and they have them for 1/2 that and cheaper..