Hardware Utopia Ballista Limited Edition Review

That's one way of looking at it. But sometimes the little things can make a big difference to customer satisfaction. For instance, I like coleslaw, especially cheese coleslaw. Many of the big supermarkets like Tescos, Asda, Sainsbury's and Morrison's sell a pathetic attempt at coleslaw. They're just really bad, the mayo can be watery, the cabbage chopped too coarsely and Tescos and Asda simply make their unpalatable (in my opinion) by seemingly filling it with vinegar. Waitrose does a nice coleslaw, it's pretty finely shredded, a good mayo and has a good balance. M&S have by far my favourite, however, it's just exactly what I look for. I could save, definitely, by going to Asda etc. but I end up going to Waitrose and M&S much more often because they have a knack for getting the details right. The little things that people don't think you care much about, but can vastly up the experience.

Packaging and delivery are just like coleslaw in that regard. You can live without it, but when it's done right it can really tie the experience together.

 

Ease up on the snobbery a bit, mate. I'd consider buying a chassis with a custom paint job, mainly because I don't have the time (or the talent for the fancier paint jobs).

I wouldn't buy a prebuilt PC because, as an enthusiast, speccing and building a rig is half the fun.

So people who do don't know how to build a PC shouldn't be allowed to own a nice looking rig? I've often taken apart someone's PC in front of them (when fixing or upgrading) and the look on their face suggests they think it's some kind of witchcraft. To you and me they're no more complicated than lego, but someone people have no understanding, and a geniune fear, of the goings on inside that whirring box on the desk. It doesn't mean they can't have a pretty one and, for some, it's worth paying the premium for someone to do it for them and provide a warranty.

 

I would get a grasp of what you are talking about before needlessly slagging people off.

I specced up the parts on Scan last night and it worked out around the same. That's with the custom paint job included. As for doing it myself? I'm perfectly capable of that thanks. I just feel that when I spend £2000 on my dream PC that I would rather have the experience of getting it built. That means letting some one else who is up to the task do it. It doesn't mean that -

A. I can't
B. I'm not capable.

It just means that I would rather sit back in my chair, link my fingers and place my hands behind my head whilst putting my feet up and getting a good service.

It's just a wooden shipping crate.

Sure. And I bet it will spend about an hour in my time before I put it in the loft/garage etc. It doesn't matter. A company that goes to those lengths does so to please their customers.

I've built and painted two custom cars. Sure it was fun, but, I would love to take a car in and let some one else do all the grind whilst I just sat back getting excited.

Even the plastic binder Utopia offer (with all the manuals in) has me excited.

Good service is something that is dying out now. I mean FFS they even have a landline number and they're not trying to earn 15p a minute out of me to help out if anything goes wrong (which would be their fault of course).

Fair play to them I will definitely be ordering from them.

Here we go. Pretty much same spec though the board in this is better. Not that it matters to me, I'm crap at overclocking any way.



So basically £50 for a custom paint job, wooden shipping crate, labour, 10 year labour warranty, binder.. ETC.. Like fook would I even bother getting my hands painty.

 

Apols for the DP but I wanted to post this..

I phoned Utopia a little while ago to ask a few questions about the PC I will likely be ordering. First off they are very polite. Any technical questions I had were immediately asked of the technicians. The 3820 is overclocked to 4.4ghz in the Ballista X79.

I was interested in the orange colour they provide.. So I asked about it and they immediately took me some photos of the finish and colour that came in today (a first).







I mean seriously

This is going to be one hell of an experience the tension and excitement is already building.

 

I've already got a PC I built. It's all I've done since 2008. NOTE I am nearly 40 years old and built my ZX80 at the age of 7 with my uncle. I've built PCs ever since but was out of the loop for a few years leading up to 2008.

I just spoke to Mark at Utopia and he said those laptop photos are a customer's and were sent during the build. See, THAT is what I want. I want an email every other day showing me what's happening. Sort of a "Look but don't touch". Then I want to get my tracking number and spend the day pacing up and down by the window..

I don't want to spend two grand, end up with a duff part and not know which and then endure the stress of sending it all back and paying postage and losing money because of restocking/testing fees.

 

..but how is it custom?

To me, custom means unique., if X number of people can get the exact same 'custom' paint job, it's not really custom, it's just another case.

 

It is custom. If you read their prologue you will find this -

For custom paintwork or any additional colour options, please get in touch with our team and we'll help you out.

So I did. I'm currently talking over getting some sort of House of Kolor flip. And of course I will make sure the inside is painted to suit, making it completely unique to me.

I just received this reply mere minutes after asking about it. I'm sure Utopia won't mind me putting this here, as I think their customers would be happy to hear it.

Hi Andrew,



No problem at all. I’ll need to get back to you on this. I’ll have to speak to our painters regarding this. Just so you know: our painters also do custom paintwork for the Vauxhall Rally team, so you can be sure the quality is second to none.



Once they get back to me I’ll be in touch.

Let's face it though it's not just that. Here in the UK we have nobody like Falcon Northwest, the now defunct Voodoo (HP and their reverse midas touch, everything they touch turns to chit) and Origin.

Let me put a list of all of the things I would ever want when buying a built PC.

1. To talk it over first and make sure what I am getting is what suits my needs - check. I've already phoned Utopia with a question and then they actually phoned me straight back to clarify a situation (their tech guy phoned me as I originally spoke to a guy in sales).

2. To offer a custom finish without ripping my asshole out for it. Go to originpc.com and add a a paint finish to a case. $450+ - check.

3. To show me photos step by step as my PC is being built - check. Utopia do that for all of their customers.

4. To dare to change the config from the stock cart without getting my asshole ripped out on overpriced upgrades. See, this is something that's always made me really angry about PC builders. Why I can go to say, Scan, and buy an SSD for £120 yet if I add it to your builder it's £250? IMO that has always been a way for them to get around retail pricing and take the piss.

So given Utopia want £82 to add a 250gb Samsung SSD to my rig and £25 for a set of Bitfenix Alchemy cables I would say..... - check.

5. To box up and ship my system in a unique way. The wooden crate is bloody awesome. First you have to cut the plastic bands off, then pry open the crate. - check.

6. Get it to me on time and with a decent courier - check.

All of the above are things that are offered in the USA (at a price of course, Utopia doesn't charge for most of the above) and all of them are what has made companies like Alienware (the real one not the Dell rape case) successful.

TBH? I'm actually pissing my pants with anticipation. I've already tested their customer service and unbeknown to them they have passed with flying colours.

I really, truly, can't wait to order my dream PC from them.

 

It's always been my dream (well, was) to go on Alienware's site and drop a bollock and order the sickest rig I could get my hands on.

Sure, I could do better than the £2000 PC I've got my eyes on but most of the upgrades from the £2000 base are a waste of time (like the 3930k and so on, given that Utopia have said I can have 4.4-4.7ghz out of the 3820). Other uprades are equally as pointless (16gb ram for example). Even with two grand to spend I still need to use some common sense if this rig was £400 over the odds I would likely avoid it and just upgrade my Alienware.

I still love Alienware but as the days pass Dell are slowly grinding the brand into the ground so yes, a name change may be needed

I'll still have the rig in my signature but I would probably sell at least one of the GPUs. I'll be taking out the Killer NIC and putting it into the Utopia

 

I'm torn on this, I think the colour looks awesome, the idea of a such a small and powerful PC is great, money wise I don't tend to spend that much on a PC, more of a gradual thing, upgrading bits here and there when needed, have to agree about the odd choice of cooling though :/

The company in general sounds awesome though, making me want to get some pretty stuff from them

 

Yeah the cooling choice is pretty strange. I think the idea was obviously some sort of 'show car' finish throughout without thinking about the consequences of long term use. In their defence though it is a limited edition thing so I'm sure they would tell you about the coolant.

Yeah spending two grand on a rig is crazy by any means. For pretty much all of my life I've built my own and upgraded over the course of months/years, bought second hand parts to reduce costs etc. I've never ordered a fully built rig from any one because I couldn't afford to. In a way I still can't afford to, this has been offered to me by some one I love dearly as a way of giving me one of my dreams

Titan is overkill however, I can at least offer some explanation to my outright stupidity... As of the end of the year there will be consoles with 8GB of video memory available to them.

It's long been known that Nvidia are incredibly shrewd and stingy with VRAM. They always offer just the right amount for the current games. Yet, every year or two we get an engine tweak or new engine that ends up using too much vram.

I used to have a pair of 295 single PCB that cost me £200 new the pair. They were really powerful, each putting out about the same power as a 480.

Then Battlefield 3 came along and no matter how much I reduced the settings the standard 896mb memory each core had to use wasn't enough and it ended up in a completely unplayable mess.

Now imagine you'd spent a grand on those two cards at launch only to find that not even two years later they are rendered pretty paper weights because you can't upgrade the vram on them?

Even the 670 and 680 came with 2gb which was about 400mb 'too much' per se. Next thing we know games will be sucking down vram like it's going out of fashion (because the devs are lazy and throw brute force at the problem) and then Nvidia will ration out vram AGAIN.

Sod that I'm going Titan. 6gb should keep me sorted for at least a few years.

I'm also humming and harring as to whether I want the ITX Pandora. It sports a 4770K and mini FT03. You can see it here in all of its yellow loveliness.

http://www.vortez.net/articles_pages/utopia_computers_pandora_review,1.html

I mean seriously? it should be made illegal to pack that sort of hardware into such a tiny system.

 

I would game on a console full time if it were not for the fact that titles such as Crysis 3 to me are completely unplayable with a pad. I know they have assisted aiming but seriously I just want to smash my head on the wall when there's loads going on and I can't turn around quickly enough.

Pandora would be ideal as I can just set up one small desk and a 20" monitor or so and be done

 

Well even after a year I have not got used to it and have simply stopped playing all FPS with any element of difficulty in them whatsoever.

 

Depends what you want.

Hassle free gaming at 1080p this is overkill anyway. Question then becomes if its enough for multi monitor which it might be.

CPU temp is a touch worrying. Other than that looks like a good build.

Also don't like the coolant used the person likely to buy this will not understand they need to replace it in 3 months.

 

Your attitude is disgusting.

 

Yea, man, but dude, listen, OK... anyone who doesn't build there own PC is stupid, get it?!

 

I'm no FanXpert (sorry, had to) but on the basis the draft in front of a fan feels stronger than the pull from the back, won't having a static fan pulling through the rad from the outside be much less optimal than pushing through from the interior? And thus, why bother with this tightly-packed loop at all?

Why the disbelief? That's a good 1% discount ;-)

I'm the same (an idiot). My scratch build is doing my head in because the box I'm using is dented so none of the standard measurements apply like ATX holes etc.. So I'm not rubbishing the Utopia build - and I'm sure no-one else with any build experience is doing so either - it's just constructive criticism that any public company should invite, so they can improve.

 

haha what's funny is that I actually quite heavily modded a PC (which involved some pretty serious painting) aswell as chopping ETC. You can view that here

http://forums.bit-tech.net/showthread.php?t=211969&highlight=nfenix

Is that good enough to qualify me as a non-idiot? I know it didn't have thousands of pounds worth of hardware in it nor did it have uber complexed water cooling but my point is any one can do a mod like that and end up with something unique.

I have also gotten Alienware chassis running without running their DMI which is quite a task.

So now I have put that to bed let me explain why I find Utopia appealing.

I want some one else to do the dirty work. I want to click a few buttons and let some one else take care of it. Lately I've had nothing but dead parts. I don't know if it's because quality control has dropped due to the recession, or, whether manus are cutting corners but I've had an SSD die, two sets of fans die (due to bad quality) and so on.

I just want to pay my two grand and let some one else do all the dirty work.

 

would i spend 2k on a pc that has been supplied for review with a kink in the tubing.

no.

 

Has anyone noticed how poor a quality the powder coating is?? Its chipped along the top edges and they have completely ignored the insides. I would be greatly dissapointed as a customer if I got this.

Sort the paint and your on to a winner!!

PS, also sort that tubing and fluid, it hurts my eyes.