The quality of a computer is how its built and components used in building it. i personally think less is more. Computer all have the same cheap ass chinese components in them, dell, gateway, hp, asus. As many as I have cracked open they all have the same parts manufacturers in them. Choosing which parts is the key to a great workhorse computer. Do ya think Intel chipsets are made here in the US think again. computers are no diff than a car you can have a 4cyl monza or buy a formula one. the monza is fine for surfing web but dont expect it to run adobe illustrator
I'm not understanding something in your posts here. Your first post seems to outright think that custom builds aren't necessary and yet this paragraph especially seems to actually go in favor for custom builds. Now, I understand not wanting to go overboard, but there is nothing run with getting stuff that allows for future expansion, especially with a piece of equipment that(like cars) is outdated the moment you bring it home.
My dad does have a custom computer that requires it to be liquid cooled, it's actually design to be a server computer for several other computers. All he does is surf the web, watch streaming videos and write up contracts etc on his computer, certainly nothing to actually justify his choice in builds but for the bottomline that he wanted all of everything that he could get. Which he has already changed it to include 2 solid state drives as well. That thing takes less then 10 seconds to load and ready for you to operate(I'm not exaggerating as much as you think).
As to what's in bold. It is truly irrelevant as to where a part comes from. My iPod came from China and it has lasted a few years and still is going and going really well(use it a good bit each day), I certainly feel like I got what I paid out of it. I quickly scanned it again the thread again and I don't think anyone really brought that into question either(if you find where location of parts made was brought up, that's fine, I'll eat crow on this part). Cheap parts, inferior parts yes, but just because it comes from somewhere else doesn't in of itself make it cheap or inferior. Those chinese made iPods are usually higher priced then other MP3 players if using retail. Now do they last longer or not, I think that depends.
I agree with you on all the extra crap that isn't needed on computers that comes with them out of the box or on install of programs. However, some of that stuff is a pain to get off, expecially the newer versions of Norton that they put on "off the shelf" computers. That thing is tied up everywhere in the computer. You can also tweak the bios in order for it to run faster, however, why have to piddle with that stuff, when I can get the parts that I want(maybe not need mind you), from the different companies, tweak everything to how I want it without having to change settings that someone else put on there and make sure that it runs everything that I might throw at it.