Folks in North America, where do you like to get PC parts online these days?
It’s been awhile since I looked into building a PC, so I’m not sure what some of the better stores may be, or which may have swapped hands/changed approaches and aren’t as reliable as they once were.
If one wants an occasional old gizmo that’s no longer made, eBay can be helpful.
Specifically for cables – which aren’t that pricy relative to other items people buy, and are often marked up a lot by retailers – I’ve gone to Monoprice for quite some years. Useful if getting a bunch of cables.
I got an old gaming laptop on eBay for like $300 that I take with me on work trips. The person just upgraded or something and wanted to get rid of it.
I know people sometimes have bad experiences on ebay, but I feel like if you message the seller and feel out the situation in advance, you can avoid a lot of the problems. I always try to buy from individuals vs. from someone whose entire business is selling on ebay, and I’ve never been burned.
I’m from the UK and ordered a GPU from B&H as they had a sale on and as a result it was a bunch cheaper - there was a some confusion on the billing address (mine doesn’t fit nicely in a US format & so got messed up when they tried to store it or something along those lines) but they were great to deal with about it so I’d definitely recommend them also
For cheaper items, I unfortunately use Amazon. I try to do my research and avoid scams. For more expensive items, I’ve used a variety of methods such as eBay, my friend, and a stranger posting on (also unfortunately) Facebook Marketplace.
Usually Newegg and Amazon, sometimes NextWarehouse for things I’m not in a rush for (they do a lot of drop shipping from the distributors/manufactures themselves so it’s sometimes cheaper but also slower). B&H is also worth a look, sometimes they do price drops on things & end up being cheaper than the other places.
There’s a local Best Buy near me that’s in a special tax district (lower sales tax) so I could try checking them out but usually the prices there are marked up so much that it’s not worth it IMO.
There aren’t any Micro Centers near me, it’d take a fair amount of travel to get to one.
Most of the parts for my last 2 builds have been from Micro Center, but if I’m just buying one or two components I hit up my local Best Buy first, and then Newegg if Best Buy doesn’t have what I want.
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