The other day I wrote about my lovely new computer I had just ordered, and I mentioned I had messed up on the optical drives. Well…it ate at me and I had to change it. Sadly, changing an order is no easy task. I basically discovered that the order would need to be canceled and started over. The more I thought about this, the more I saw it as a possible advantage.

My original system was a brand new model, and hence would have a delay in production. At that time, it was going to be after November 1st before I got it. So, back to Dell’s website I went where I found the 5150. I could duplicate the system almost exactly and have it ship within 1 week AND actually lower the cost some! The only difference is the video card, and it’s not that big of a difference. So, the NEW new system is:

Processor: Pentium® D Processor 805 with Dual Core Technology (2.66GHz, 533FSB)
Memory: 2GB Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM at 533MHz (2×1GB)
Hard Drive: 250GB Serial ATA 3Gb/s Hard Drive (7200RPM) w/ 8MB cache (one is a backup shadow of the first)
Optical Drives: 16x DVD-ROM Drive + 16x DVD+/-RW w/dbl layer write capability
Video: 256MB PCI Expressâ„¢ x16 (DVI/VGA/TV-out) ATI Radeon X600 SE HyperMemory
Sound: Integrated Sound Blaster®Audigyâ„¢ HD Software Edition

No huge, radical changes to it, but it’ll be here a lot faster, and this system, with 3 year service plan ended up running me $1189.40 compared to the other one running me $1215.48. The old one would have ended up at $1125.48 after a mail-in rebate, but I get this one a couple weeks faster and no hassle of mailing in a rebate, which I almost always forget to do.

Expect a post next week about the fun times of doing a 3-way computer swap! WOO!