Low Prices? Yes! We did it!

Right on!  I'd been slowly and silently watching while feeling some dismay at the pricings creep I'd been seeing; these prices now bring DS back to the kick-ass bargains (combined with superb customer service & genuine build quality) that first attracted me here!

Edited by Jingping - 14 May 2010 at 2:12am

Hey. I just put my order in yesterday, and it included stage 6 for dual gpu + cpu, no chipset. I see now it has some deal on liquid cooling, will I be able to take any advantage of this ?

Hey Alex, thanks for getting back to me, but I just did a bit of testing on your config page.

I built the exact same system with the only difference being you only now offer an i7 930 and on my build I ordered yesterday, i selected the 920.

Everything else being the same, after taxes the difference was $229.38

You think I can get this applied to my order or can I like cancel/ reorder? :) I could use that for upgrading ram or something. :D
Thanks.

We can offer it as a credit which you can make upgrades to your system if that works?

nice

We'll basically, your getting a lower priced system because the warranty isn't for 3 years on the parts.

Sweet!

Alex, what are your thoughts on giving the option to select better warranty options, for a higher price than the basic 3 year limited, in the Special Deals section? I mean I love to see the option to cut prices down that much more for a tight budget computer, but seeing as I can configure two identical computers between Special Deals and Black OPS and have a $600 price difference I'm sure there could be some room for a middle ground.

Digital Storm's great full warranties have been one of your best selling points, I've always thought.

And how come the big price difference in Windows 7 Professional? Did the price of Home Premium go down, the price of Professional go up, or a little of both? We used to always recommend Professional for access to XP Mode since it was only a few dollars more than Home Premium, but now that it is $42 more it doesn't look as worth it anymore.

Great feedback!

Nice stuff going to buy soon and these prices look good ^_^!!

Originally posted by Damon That would be great!   DS has an awesome reputation for Customer Service and the BEST Warranty in the business, so you should definately continue to offer that option at a low price to ALL your customers (never lose site of what put you on the map and built your rep).   By lowering your prices and providing greater flexiblility in your configurator you will definately expand your customer base (quite honestly you would probably do EVEN better if you just had one configurator with the best price and ultimate options - people feel cheated and ripped off by the "Black Ops" one and only use it as a last resort (I would eliminate that one all together)). Simplify to maximize!!!   Never underestimate word of mouth, repeat buyers, and simplicity (KISS)!!!!

I'm torn on this issue. On one hand I do like the idea behind the two different configuration methods, the current system was implemented pretty well to me. Special Deals section gives up on a bigger parts selection, better cooling options, better overclocks, and more customization options for a lower base price, versus the Black OPS section has more parts, better cooling, better overclocks, and more specialized customization options but at a premium.

However then on the other hand I know that this leads to a lot of the parts and options available only in the Black OPS section to more or less get blacklisted and not selected by many people because to get them they'd have to move up to the Black OPS section and then the base price would rise quite a bit. I'm certainly not against merging them into a single configuration area, if implemented well it would lead to a number of their higher end options being purchased more often while allowing customers access to select higher end options without raising the base price of the computer so much. I just think they would have to be careful how they go about setting it up and pricing, too much one way and DS kills their profit margins, too much the other way and some customers get overcharged (probably customers trying to configure low budget PCs).

On the subject of warranties again, even though I suggest the option of selecting full coverage warranties on Special Deal PCs for a higher price, I definitely still want to see the option to select the cheaper limited warranties stay. If there is one and only one area that Digital Storm does not absolutely crush its "competition" is in prices. It isn't that Digital Storm doesn't offer amazing value for their PCs/warranty/support, it's just the other guys will skimp on everything possible, limited warranties, refurbished parts, no quality control, off-brand parts, foreign tech support, and morals, to make sure the total price for their PCs are lower. You will always inevitably lose customers to this because there are plenty of people who think they see what looks like a good PC on paper but don't know any better and even people who do know better but decide to roll the dice and take their chances with the other company anyway because they just absolutely have to try and save that extra couple hundred dollars.

I've personally lost two friends to Cyberpower PCs. One did it on an impulse without doing any research because he saw the lower prices, and unfortunately he has been having nothing but problems with it so far. The other was shopping around and was even looking for suggestions from me, but I just could not convince him to go with a DS over CP, I couldn't make him understand how much better of a deal he could get for an extra $200-300, all he could see was CP's lower price. It was very depressing.

So I would like to see the cheaper warranty option stay, because some people just don't care about warranties and can't see past the price, and end up being put off by DS's higher base prices.

thanks for the clarification! So let me see if I have this right, the special deal comps come with a 1 year warranty on parts. After that year, if something breaks, it comes out of our pocket to replace. There is also 3 years of labor, which I'm assuming means tech support? After that, if our comp has an issue, do we pay extra for support?

The Black OPS brand has 3, 4, 5 years of full coverage?

As someone who is thinking of purchasing from you guys, I appreciate all of the communication and clarifications.

Originally posted by Alex Unfortunately, we cannot offer a warranty upgrade option to our 'Special Deal's from a limited to a full 3 year parts and labor warranty only because then the price of the warranty upgrade would put the system at the same price point as our 'Black|OPS' systems.

That is really a shame. With now such a large price difference between the Black OPS and Special Deals sections I figured there would be room for a middle ground. I mentioned before I configured a few identical PCs in both sections and the price difference was around $600, but looking again I just now noticed that the Black OPS "in the cart" discount of up to $300 is no longer being applied, is this an oversight that happened with the recent price updates? This would bring the base price difference between the two sections closer to $400-450, but is still most definitely significant.

When configuring systems for people I will make a note that if they want full 3+ year warranties they will have to move up to the Black OPS section, but I honestly don't think many will find $450 for a warranty upgrade to be appealing. I know I don't. I'm actually glad I ordered my Special Deals PC while they still had the higher prices. It was $250 more than if I was ordering right now, but that sounds about right for a full Platinum warranty upgrade. That full warranty was one of the big reasons I went with Digital Storm in the first place after all.

@Dragoonseal,

Edited by Alex - 16 May 2010 at 12:27am

Alex, would you be able to add the extended warranty to the special deals as an added choice? Even raising the price of their system i'm sure it would give a lot of people peace of mind knowing they can still get it if they're willing to pay. I for one would pay the extra, customer service and warranties are after all two of Digital Storm's best selling points.

Edited by mwilke - 16 May 2010 at 3:17pm

My mistake I didn't factor in the $300 discount applied after you hit "buy now" in the black ops section, so it would factor out correctly to be the same price. Thanks Alex.

Originally posted by Dragoonseal This picture shows the discount breakdown, most people are only going to get a $100-150 discount

Is it just me or is there $1000 that is unaccounted for on that picture. ($4,500 - $5,499). I guess that slot figures in with the $250 discount?