Its really not that difficult. Snapping the heatsink on is probably the hardest part and it's not that hard. I also use Crucial brand memory, although I have used Kingston as well. Don't buy generic.
It's only worth it if you are building a very high-end workstation. Otherwise you're working for minimum wage. This is if you are purely looking at it from a financial viewpoint. If you enjoy tinkering with computers then you should DIY regardless of the cost savings.
Yes, I wanted to build my own PC after years of owning Compaq and Dell. I finally did it just recently, I wanted a PC for trading, games and Home media. I bought the following: CoolerMaster Mystique Aluminium case Asus P5W DH deluxe MoBo Pentium E6400 Dual core Zalman cooler 2Gb OCZ memory 400GB Seagate SATA drive ATI Radeon X1950Pro CoolerMaster 550watt SLI PS 16x DVD Burner Hauppauge TV receiver Windows XP Media Centre Edition This set up will do all I need for now and I can still upgrade it if I need to. The only problem I had was Partitioning the drive, I fiddled about using Partition Magic, which was a lot easier than reformatting the whole drive again. It was my first computer build project.
If you know someone that has a certain set of components with the same OS you plan to run, and runs the same specialized software you plan to run, then physical assembly is an hour or two, and another couple hours to get software loaded. If you are just choosing parts and expecting them to work together, that is a much higher risk scenario because you don't know what might go wrong. The amount of time required will depend on how many things go wrong. That's why its better to buy something already put together, because someone else has debugged the combination of components and software.
Here are some recommended diy systems froma respected source http://arstechnica.com/guides/buyer/guide-200703.ars
I'm partial to marked-down HP refurbs at the HP store. They are comparable in price to a DIY and you don't have to do anything. They also come with a warranty so there is not worrying about the refurb job.
I have had all my machines built from local guys because I felt like if something went wrong they would fix it. I like the idea of using local business when I can. You don't really save that much money if any but you do stand to make a good friend who can come over to your house and help you out if something weird goes wrong. I would like to learn how to built them too just for fun so I can ugrade all the time. John
Thats right it is an OCer set up although I have not squeezed the max out of it yet. The Zalman is the CNPS9700. All parts shipped to Panama from Directron.com