In reply to:
I believe there is a certain price point (maybe it's your mom just looking for Internet access and nothing else) where it does make sense to just buy the $299 off-the-shelf model.
Yup. Granny doesn't need a supercomputer. DIYers could never compete with the Dells on the low end market as far as build cost. They probably take losses on the TV specials. And the TV special machines are still far more powerful than most users need. Heck the lowest-end Celeron in current release is more powerful than Granny could ever need. Plus then Granny can call Dell when there's a problem, which would be 3 times a day. Not you.
