Which One?

Which of these two is a better investment?

https://store.hp.com/us/en/pdp/hp-pavilion-desktop-tp01-0165z

https://store.hp.com/us/en/pdp/hp-envy-desktop-te01-0165t?jumpid=ma_new-desktops_product-tile_desktops_6_3uq85aa_hp-envy-desktop---te&ds_rl=1231690&jumpid=ps_con_dt_ns&utm_medium=ps&utm_source=ga&utm_campaign=Desktops-DSA_Product_OPEX_DSA_All_BASCPS&utm_term=&matchtype=b&adid=398657321510&addisttype=g&gclid=EAIaIQobChMItpmKm9n-5QIViMBkCh0PzgyjEAAYASAAEgIHWfD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds

Build your own. If never buy a pre built

What is your use case for them ?

These are office drone desktop computers, and not meant for much gaming whatsoever.

for DCS:

I wouldn't really touch either of them.

HP uses non-ATX standard components, so it's not like you could walk into any hardware peddler and get a replacement PSU, or mother board, this also means they have virtually no upgrade capability down the line, apart from maybe increasing the RAM size or maybe find a small form factor gpu.

But the HP ENVY Desktop - TE01-0165t seems slightly less hamstrung than the other.

It has the power supply to support a slightly more power ful GPU, but not too powerful, 1070 at upmost

The other with a 180watt supply would run into major issues with anything bigger than a 1050 or equivalent.

dear lord no, don't buy either!

What's so bad about them? And what else would you recommend? I don't have any computer-building experience.

None of had any build experience in the beginning. Many of us bought an office computer only to find that it was woefully inadequate for gaming and not upgrade friendly.

The first questions are "What are your expectations of your machine?" and "what's your price range?" Then you should watch a couple of beginner build videos to see just how easy it is to do. Then comes the fun part of picking out the components.

There are hundreds of thousands of people out there willing to lend you a helping hand.

Rig building has only gotten easier last few years too.

It's now on par with a Lego kit imo and far easier than self assemble furniture from ikea etc.

The secret sauce is to actually read the manuals ;)

Even a basic DCS module require far more effort to learn decently than building a gaming rig, that's the nitty gritty truth of it.

So there is no doubt in my mind you would be able to.

That said there are many hardware retailers that offer significantly more suited kit machines and doesn't charge much of an extra to build them for you.

And unlike HP these use standardised modules.

With HP you need to go to HP to get an upgrade and they will easily charge 300% for the fun of it, often making it a lot more reasonable for a customer to buy a whole new unit instead.

I'm on the other side of the planet so can't recommend any such services/retailers local to Michigan but I'm certain they are there.

What's so bad about them?

As said those office computers, if you want a PC for play flight sim games, look for game computers, like Alienware Aurora line.

https://www.dell.com/en-us/gaming/alienware

https://www.pcgamer.com/best-gaming-pc/

But you have more "bang per buck" if assemble one, ask your friends, someone may are able to assemble for you.

And, DCS want 32GB dual channel RAM.

Both are actually quite a step up from what I was using.

Besides, my original question was just which was better of the two.

Build it yourself if you can read a basic instruction sheet and use a Phillip screwdriver if not get a friend to assemble it and you order the parts you want if you want I’ll try and find a list of the parts I got last winter Jan-mar timeframe they were top of the line then so you might wish to get a newer part for better performance or keep what I bought an save some money over the newer parts but this system was built to be effective for 3-5 years or more.

Meh roughly the same honestly. One has only 8GB RAM but slightly better DGPU and the other has more RAM but slightly worse GPU, but slightly better CPU.

I'm not really interested in building my own right now. How about this guy?https://store.hp.com/us/en/pdp/hp-pavilion-590-p0085z-cto?jumpid=ma_black-friday-sale_product-tile_desktops_27_3uq68aa_hp-pavilion-590-p008

*sigh* I know you guys all think building my own PC is a better choice, and you may be right, but right now I'd just like to buy one. Makes things a bit simpler for me.

What I really want to know is, how do the graphics cards and processors compare to each other?

The newer (third) one isn't better than the previous ones. Are you planning on using these for DCS? If yes then there's not a clear winner honestly. What one is lacking is built into the other one and vice versa. If you're able to put more memory into the Intel machine so you have 16GB instead of 8GB it should suffice for DCS, but not for VR though. I'd really only expect a decent 1080p performance out of them.

I'm not doing vr.