All you need if you have PC, DC, PSX2 etc (Ukcomputing)

Member Name: phypher

Product:	Ukcomputing
Date:	24/05/01 (55 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Good Choice, Good Sites Layouts, Good Prices

Disadvantages: No Scottish Shops, Sometimes lack of product info

I could have picked any one of the many UKxxx.com sites, but picked the UKComputing.com site, since this seemed to affect most people who have access to dooyou.co.uk.

This site is part of the Special Reserve group. Anybody who has read computer magazines in the last 10 years will have seen their adverts for their club. Basically, you pay a membership every year, get a free gift, and then order to your hearts content. Shipping is free.

I have been a member of the club for about 5 years I think, and ordered from the bi-monthly catalogue you get sent as a member, but with the Internet it has got much easier to spend all my money. I'll talk more about the club in useful things to know at the bototm of my review.

The site is a de-facto shopping site, which has a huge emphasis on games, but with a fair sprinkling of hardware as well. Most of the hardware is again geared to the game player from RAM to joysticks. They even sell their own PC's which are, you've guessed it, geared for games.

The site is also a huge portal to the other areas they cover. they seemed to have bought every domain name that begins with UK. I could review each of them, and get loads of review points, but I will give you the gist of it here, I think.

The site is laid out nicely, and there are links to all the other areas as i said, such as UKDVD.com, (which sells DVD, kind of obvious I know), UKXBox, which deals with XBox stuff, and even UKDemos.com which has demos.

Each of the sites that are linked to, use the same interface, which is very easy to use. The site operates with the normal shopping cart system, and if you are a member, you get to enter your membership number, and choose a free gift if you renew your membership (about £6) when you order. The free gifts can range from a DC game, to a PSX joypad, to a Pokeman Trading card game.

I have never found the system difficult to use, when it comes to actually making
a purchase because it is such a familiar way to buy things now. But I do find that sometimes there is not enough information about the products. I like to see full specs, pictures, and a lot of blurb, and you don't always get that, so you can't always tell if a product will meet your need. they do review some of the products themselves though, which can help, but they are highly unlikely to tell you that a product is crap, are they?

Delivery is included as part of your membership, and since most of the products are also discounted, you can usually pick up a great bargain. I normally find that you have a three to four day wait for the items to arrive by Royal Mail, and they are usually wrapped well in large Jiffy envelope type things (if you're buying a game, and not a PC that is).

Useful things to know.

You get a catalogue every 2 months.

Prices are usually good, and every month products are selected for larger discounts, and are available for a browse, so you can pick up a bargain you weren't looking for if you use that facility

There are a huge amount of links to their other sites, which are usually unique to a product such as PS1 and PS2, and even the new GameBoy Advance.

Membership fee is about £7 a year. You can choose a free gift if you order something when you renew each year.

You get a voucher thing for every order you make. You collect 5 and can claim one of the free gifts. A bit like a loyalty card at Tesco, or more like the old Green Stamp things or Co-Op stamps.

They also have shops, but disappointingly, they have none up here in Scotland, so I can't really comment on the shops.

They also offer domain name registering, and have purchased a huge list of domain names that you can choose an e-mail address form. they even had dunfermlinefans.co.uk as an available address for me. They even have their own ISP you can sign up to.

I have had to
use the technical support once. Unfortunately, I cannot remember what it was for, I can only remember that the problem was sorted to my satisfaction. Also their telephone setup seems to be acceptable as well, because I have always got through quickly if I have had a query.

In Conclusion.

The structured way in which the sites have been created seperately for each area of gaming and computing makes finding what you want much easier than some other sites. But you don't always get a lot of information about the products, so unless you know the product you may not be able to make up your mind if it is a worthwhile purchase.
I have renewed my membership every year so far, and i fancied a few of the free gifts recently so I am actually renewed about 3 years in advance now, which says a lot about the whole thing.

Summary: