I have had nothing but trouble with the Gateway 710X I bought not yet 3 years ago, failure after failure of one sort. The last problem about two months ago was the sudden and abrupt total crash of my main C drive (Maxtor DiamondPlus9). I replaced it with a Western Digital (on advice of this forum). Additionally, shortly after buying this turkey, I bought ANOTHER Maxtor DiamondPlus drive and have been using it as a backup drive.

A couple of weeks ago, I have been experiencing random noises out of the PC, the kind of noise where you look up and think to yourself, "That CAN'T be good..." It sounds like a metalic clunk sound, sometimes only one, sometimes a series of clacks and clunks. It is totally random in nature and I haven't been able to replicate it...until today. Last week I had two whole days when I did not hear the noise at all.

I figure there are only a couple of places a sound like that can come from: fans, CD/DVD drives, and hard drives, right? There has been no CD/DVD in the drive when hearing the noise. The fans I have checked and rechecked, and it isn't the sort of noise you would hear from a fan anyway. That leaves the drives.

It can't possibly be that the new drive is going out?... When I save files to either drive, I do not hear the noise. Sometimes I hear it when I'm typing, sometimes I am sitting at the PC reading off a screen when it happens. It doesn't seem to be triggered by anything in particular.

I have checked Event Viewer faithfully each day, and there are no disk-related errors of any kind.

Yesterday when it happened, it was so prolonged and so noisy that I looked at the screen and expected and waited for it to go dark.

Today I decided to try and find out for sure if I could somehow replicate the noise. I ran chkdsk on the new Western Digital drive: whisper silent and the process finished quickly.

I ran it on the second Maxtor drive: the process took a long time and appeared to hang at one point, and the noise I have been hearing DID occur a couple times during the process.

I'm thinking that in fact my second drive is going out on this machine. Correct me if you think I'm wrong.

I guess what I'm asking is, IS there anyplace else a noise could be coming from inside the computer? It sounds like its toward the front quadrant of the machine, which is where the drives are, not toward the back where the fans are. Since there have never been a CD/DVD or floppy in a drive, that eliminates those.

More importantly, is it going to hurt anything leaving this drive in the machine? Can it hurt anything else in the computer, or am I safe to allow it to operate until I get a new one?

People, don't buy Gateway. They are not what they used to be. They obviously use the cheapest parts they can find trying to save money in exactly the place where you don't WANT to save money.

Frustrated,

Jenna

It probably is the Maxtor drive going bad. If you haven't already done so, BACKUP ANYTHING IMPORTANT ON THAT DRIVE. The clunking sound usually means that the drive is trying to re-align the heads because it can't read a track. Failure is imminent, prepare to lose that drive.

There are only two types of hard drives...
- Those that have failed.
- Those that will fail.

Behind every good computer... is a jumble of wires 'n stuff.

Oh, that's not what I wanted to hear. Nevertheless, it's what I expected to hear.

Fortunately, the drive IS my backup drive, and I have ghosted the PC as well as done DVD Nero backups of personal data, so I'm in pretty good shape.

Guess I'll start shopping for a drive...

One day soon, I will post here on recommendations for a new system. I've pretty much had it with this Gateway piece of S*^%!

You can't really blame Gateway for the failure of the Maxtor drives.

Behind every good computer... is a jumble of wires 'n stuff.

I blame them for putting the cheapest drives they can find into an otherwise very expensive computer. They also use cheap CD and DVD drives.

Their "support" also has gone from very good in 1998 to ridiculous in 2005.

I bet YOU aren't on a Gateway! <wink> In fact, what ARE you on? I'm definitely shopping for a new computer.

Did you get the full 3 yr gateway warranty to replace defective hardware?

In retrospect, I should have; I only got the 1-year because I spent a fortune on the machine. Never assume because it's expensive it's good; lesson learned!

I think nearly every company's support has gone to pot. Support is a black hole for manufacturers where their profit margins get sucked in and vanish. You could blame that on inferior products, but in reality most support costs are due to inept, or even down right stupid customers. That said, Gateway has fallen on tough times and their quality is a shadow of what it used to be.

I could not recommend any mass market prebuilt machine to you with a clear conscience. As far as I'm concerned there are only two ways to get a quality computer. Build it yourself from top quality components, or have a local shop with a good reputation and long time in business, build it for you with the parts you have chosen. If you follow the latter plan, you will pay for the shops labor, and the cost of warrantying and supporting the machine.

Shelly

>I think nearly every company's support has gone to pot.
>Support is a black hole for manufacturers where their profit
>margins get sucked in and vanish. You could blame that on
>inferior products, but in reality most support costs are due
>to inept, or even down right stupid customers. That said,
>Gateway has fallen on tough times and their quality is a
>shadow of what it used to be.
>
>I could not recommend any mass market prebuilt machine to you
>with a clear conscience. As far as I'm concerned there are
>only two ways to get a quality computer. Build it yourself
>from top quality components, or have a local shop with a good
>reputation and long time in business, build it for you with
>the parts you have chosen. If you follow the latter plan, you
>will pay for the shops labor, and the cost of warrantying and
>supporting the machine.

I've heard that Dell Customer Service has also gone to pot. All Customer Service calls are routed off shore. Is this correct?

Yep.

Shelly

Does this mean Dell's PRODUCT also is going the way of Gateway's insofar as the machine's quality is concerned?

I have had DELL a 333 (Gave this one to a relative still running) and a Dell 4100 800MHZ never had problem with them.

I know have the old 4100 and custom built AMD 64 3200 on a ABIT AN8 board PCI express video card 1 gig of memory board is capable of 4 gig of memory. I had it done a local shop to what I wanted. This shop is General Nano Systems out of Minneapolis/St. Paul Minnesota. I really like it. I have had it since May I have networked with my OLD DELL 4100 and my Toshiba Laptop

I build my own PCs. The only name brand machine I own is an aging IBM Thinkpad.

Behind every good computer... is a jumble of wires 'n stuff.

I agree wholeheartedly with you, Shelly. I was recently impressed, though, with Hewlett Packard. I bought one of their cheap printers, and the plastic thingy broke off the paper tray. I called their support number expecting the worst, and I about fell over when on the second ring I got a real human being on the phone. Not only that, but he was pleasant (in spite of the fact I know he's probably not making dick and has way too much pressure to take calls), and he cheerfully placed an order for a replacement part at no charge.

But, even so, I do have to wonder about HP's PCs; I only have one machine by HP and it has performed for several years without any problems. Trouble is, it's outdated at this point or I'd move back into it.

I know all you guys build your own PCs. However, all you guys are light years ahead of ME in the 'smarts' department where this sort of thing is concerned. That said, how much trouble could I get into trying to build my own computer?... Would I have compatibility problems, for instance, with different hardware I may choose? Would that sort of thing end up costing me more in the long run?

What would be ideal, of course, would be if some of you guys could make out a shopping list of materials for your PCs and we less-than-smart guys could use your lists. Eh?

You would find no shortage of help here if you decide to build.

Shelly

Thankyou so much! I'll definitely go this route first.

I think if a new drive solves my immediate problem, the first project will be getting my husband off his old Gateway 400 and onto something with Windows XP. This will be good experience for me. When I can convince him to do this, I'll post here and get recommendations from you!

J

Download & run the Maxtor diagnostic & see what it says about the drive.

Sometimes with a physical problem with a drive, like an actuator arm, the problem may not be apparent all the time, & even though it is on its' way out, it may not always be picked up as bad.


You can also check SMART values to see if they show anything.

Aida32/Everest or similar will show you those.

HD Tune website
http://www.hdtune.com/main.html

I'm almost positive now that the problem is a physical one. Chkdsk finds nothing wrong, and I can access all the data on the drive. When I write to the drive, no noise is heard and everything runs smoothly.

It must be at random times when that head/arm is moving for some reason that I hear the noise. I also heard it when chkdsk was checking it, and the arm would have been moving then, I suppose.

I'm not even going to bother with diagnostics because I don't trust this drive at all. With I'd seen THIS before I bought that second drive: http://www.dealtime.com/xPR-Maxtor_DiamondMax_Plus_9_120_GB_6Y120L0~RD-140491656836

Jenna,
to quote Shelly:

As far as I'm concerned there are only two ways to get a quality computer. Build it yourself from top quality components, or have a local shop with a good reputation and long time in business, build it for you with the parts you have chosen. If you follow the latter plan, you will pay for the shops labor, and the cost of warrantying and supporting the machine.

very true.

remember, if you build it your self, all your hardware is under mfg. warranty anyway so don't worry about that.
If you aren't comfortable doing the assembly and configuration yourself,
(that's all your doing when you build your own computer, you aren't designing anything and it's not difficult at all) then have it built by someone like Shelly mentioned.

best thing would be to post here with what you want to use your computer for and these geeks will be happy to give you a nice list of compatible components that you can take to your shop for assembly..

Ooo, Michael, that is most excellent! When I get my ducks in a row and can start buying components, I will indeed post here. All you people rock. Can you imagine the store you could put together if you weren't scattered all over the country and world?...

Hi Jenna:

I don't know what your budget is like but may I suggest that you come up with a configuration that the gang here can review and then you can start purchasing your P.C. one bit at a time if funds are tight. I know from experience that it's better going this route than trying to purchase all the components on limited funds. You'll end up having what YOU want.

Yeah, I'm going to talk to my husband tonight about this. Now that I think I'll be more or less stable for awhile, we need to get him into something solid first. That'll give me a little practice before we get to mine. HIS needs are definitely not as complicated as mine because he doesn't do much on his computer except Excel, email and internet. I do extensive graphic work, web development, etc., and need something with more guts to run Painter IX and Dreamweaver, etc.

I'll definitely give you guys a crack at it. You can make up a shopping list for me and I'll get going!

If you don't feel comfortable physically assembling your components I can highly recommend Monarch computer systems

http://www.monarchcomputer.com/Merchant2/merchant.mv?Screen=CTGY&Store_Code=M&Category_Code=easyas123

Although their hardware might be somewhat limited they do thorough tests and burn in period on the built machines.

Thanks! It's bookmarked.

Years ago I researched and bought all the components for a machine. It was a blast and I learned tons. I found a reputable pc repairman and he put it together for me.
It took the fear out of opening up a machine so I can go in there and clean, replace and add components without breaking into a sweat.

As soon as we decide on what to do, I'm going to definitely post here for help with the components. You're right, if there's not an immediate need to get a PC going NOW, it could be fun putting it together. I've put PCs together before, but it's been enough years ago that I don't consider myself "current" by any means. Still, I should be able to figure out where everything goes if I get good advice from you all going in.

It's still kind of sad to see how companies like Gateway and Dell have gone down. I have enough smarts to do some of the basic stuff myself, like replace the drive. But there are a lot of end-users out there who NEED real support. They obviously aren't going to get it anymore.

Well, as the final PS to this story: the drive FAILED! Suddenly, I heard more griding noises, and Event Viewer had a list of errors, most of which read similarly:

dmio: Disk Harddisk0 block 6160455 (mountpoint : Uncorrectable write error

dmio: Harddisk0 write error at block 6160455 due to disk removal

The system failed to flush data to the transaction log. Corruption may occur.

dmio: Disk Harddisk0 block 6160455 (mountpoint : Uncorrectable write error

The device 'Maxtor 6Y200M0' (IDE\DiskMaxtor_6Y200M0__________________________YAR511W0\365933394a30454d202020202020202020202020) disappeared from the system without first being prepared for removal.

I ran out and bought another drive, sitting here on my desk. Soon as I get done working for the day, I'll slap that puppy in and hopefully that'll be the end of this story.

Thanks again for the help.

J

"Another one bites the dust"
Queen

May it rest in peace!

From our old haunts at PC911..
How To Clean Your Hard Drive THOROUGHLY.
http://www.pcnineoneone.com/howto/cleandrive1.html

Make sure you read the Author's notes at the end.

Oh believe me, I'll have FUN "cleaning" this drive. Like the last one, I will completely disassemble it and bang the platters into oblivion... It's good therapy.

Go Girl!!

That will void the warranty.

Shelly

Shelly, to be honest with you, if it means going through Gateway's "support" to get a replacement, it wouldn't be worth it to me.

I do have ANOTHER problem, though: I just installed the new drive and it is formatting. However, the drive cage has one of these lever things, and both these drives fit loosely into the bay. There are no rails between the bottom and top bay, so one drive is resting directly on the other one. WILL THIS CAUSE ANY PROBLEMS?? There are screw holes in the sides of the drives, but thanks to Gateway's brilliant engineering, no corresponding holes to screw them to.

Can't you make new holes to match? Remove the rails and drill. My son and I had to hacksaw a Dell Dimension 8200 case wall to fit an Enermax PSU in.

There's nothing to drill any holes INTO, and I'm really not a hole-driller. I'd be afraid I'd royally screw up the cage and then be SOL totally.

Depending on how loosely the drives fit, you might try putting the normal dirve attachment screws in one side of the drive to take up the slack space. Even if you have to "coax" it a little to get it in, it's better than having it loose. As far as having one drive sitting on top of the other, the only problem would be that the bottom drive would run a little hootter. But it's always better to have them secured in place. with space for air to circulate.

Eric

That was a good suggestion about the screw, but honestly, because of the design (or lack thereof) of this cage, it didn't make a difference at all, the drive simply doesn't fit nicely into the cage.

I did find a workaround, though: I put a seashell underneath the back end of the drive!! It's resting on the metal of the top of the drive on the bottom, and it's resting against the plastic back-end of the drive on top. I'm attaching a photo.

Unless anyone tells me that a seashell is a bad idea, I'm going to leave it there as it does make a nice 1/2" to 3/4" space between the two drives. I figure the shell won't mind the heat, it won't melt, it's not a conductor of any electricity...it should be okay, yes?? Granted, a weird workaround, but then Gateway's engineering makes us need to come up with innovative ways around the problems, LOL!!

Attachment #1, (txt file)

It's a good idea to have the frame of the drives grounded to the case. The pnoto doesn't show the side of the drive cage, so I can't see if there is any way to better attach the drive. If these are spaces for 5 1/4 inch wide drives (like CD drives) there are adapters available to use with 3 1/2 inch hard drives.

http://www.compusa.com/products/product_info.asp?product_code=50891745&pfp=BROWSE

Shelly

The seashell sounds like a good idea if the drive is stable enough perched there. Since we are talking about a desktop which doesn't get moved around unless you are tearing into it for some reason, the drive can just sit there. For years, I had a drive just sitting on the bottom panel of the case. No problem.

.
Onward & Upward !
Sid

WINDOWS 10
ASUS P8Z77-V Pro MB
Intel i5 3750K CPU
8g Corsair Vengeance DDR3 RAM
Corsair Neutron 250g SSD

From your photo it looks like your case has slots in the drive cages to accomodate special screws that have heads designed to slide in these slots. Typically the manufacturer provides extra screws, either loose or screwed into spare holes somewhere on the case. You may find some behind the front bezel, on the back of the case, or inside somewhere.

In your photo, there is a screw head showing at the back of the optical drive. It appears to ride in a slot, and is retained by a black plastic latch.

Your drives may not be held rigidly in place, but they are probably retained by the latches that hold these screw heads.

Behind every good computer... is a jumble of wires 'n stuff.

Exactly the way you describe is how my Compaq is.
They did provide spare screws, as you say, though none of them were correct for mounting a HD.

shelly is right on this > in reality most support costs are due to inept, or even down right stupid customers.

My mate got one, the first thing I told him was "Never, Ever, delete,cut or move anything"

He called me one day, "IE won't work". I went out, he had zipped the IE icon in the taskbar. Of course, it wasn't him that did it.

On another, he moaned that he couldn't send or receive emails. Out I went. Eventually I discovered that deep in OE he had changed his email address. Naturally he didn't "go into" the program change them.

On other occassions he messed up Mailwasher, then Copernic Pro.

Another day I went out, I can't remember his problem, but anyway, I noticed that AOL was installed in the computer. I told him all about AOL and that he should not install programs that he won't use. He insisted that he never installed it, and that I installed it the last time I was there.
Telling him that it wasn't me, that I thought AOL was rubbish and I didn't have an AOL CD didn't wash, it was me who installed it. I haven't went near the 'puter since.

In cases like that last one, if a person helped to get a 'puter up and running and sommat later went wrong, the person might be in trouble, could even be told to have the 'puter properly repaired and pay all costs.

We have to be very carefull nowadays.

Thank you
Ian

I am attaching a better photo of the drive cage.

Shelly, it doesn't look as though the brackets you found would work with this. The side-to-side wouldn't allow the width of the metal, I don't think. It slides in easily, but there are scratches on the sides when you pull it out, so it's snugish, just not snug enough because the weight of the drive on the top allows it to fall down on top of the one below.

I searched the internet until I'm blue and can't locate a cage with levers that look like this. I have gone around with Gateway's email "support" until I'm furious; they keep sending me a pdf on how to install a hard drive, which has pictures, BTW, that are NOT of this cage!

If anyone knows where I can get hardware that would work with this rascal, I'd appreciate it. The shell is working, but I don't like the thought of trying to move this computer at all with that method in place...

Attachment #1, (jpg file)

Well.....since the warranty is expired on this thing, the solution is pretty simple. Time to take the BIG plunge. Yes....go out and buy a new case!!!!

The seashell was just the first step ( mind you....a pretty tiny baby step ) in building it yourself. You've already replaced two HD's by yourself. So dump that Gateway POS case and lets get going baby!!!

Case's are relatively inexpensive. Considering the frustration level that you're having.....incredibly cheap. Give us your Gateway model number and I'm sure we can make some suggestions for you. ( Want to find out size of MB. Probably a mini ATX).

Also the Power Supply is probably marginal, knowing how cheap OEM mfg's are. You can get cases with a Power supply that is usually much better than the OEM unit. Can you read the information on the Power supply?

I think that if you slide both hard drives out of that cage, you will see that one of them has the screws I was talking about. Gateway probably supplied you with some spare screws of that type, you just have to find them. They may be behind the front bezel of the PC. I don't have any info on how to remove the bezel on your particular model, Some are held on with plastic latches, metal clips or screws. If you look inside the case, you may be able to determine how to get the bezel off.

Behind every good computer... is a jumble of wires 'n stuff.

Actually, I had some spare HDD screws. I did wiggle the drive out far enough and managed to get one of them in. This did help somewhat to fasten one end down, however, there is absolutely NO way to fasten down the back half of the drive as there is no other "latch", just open rail. I ended up shoring the back end of the drive up with a rubber block. What a joke!

You need 4 of the screws, 2 on each side. You will have to totally remove the drive to install all the screws.

Behind every good computer... is a jumble of wires 'n stuff.

There's no lever on the other side; it's flush with the case. I'm attaching a better picture so you can see. I don't know how you'd get the entire cage off, but I have the feeling it's not pretty and is way more excitement than I'm up for!

Attachment #1, (jpg file)

You don't need to get the cage off. Just remove both drives from the cage, then you should see that the original drive has some screws on the sides that ride in the slots in the cage. Put similar screws in the new drive, then slide both of them back into the cage.

Behind every good computer... is a jumble of wires 'n stuff.

Some older cases needed mounting rails that screwed to the sides of the drive and then snapped into place when the drive was inserted into the drive bay. I can't see very well from the photograph you took but you may have that type of case. You can tell by looking at how the original drives were attached. The rails had spring tabs that locked the drive in place, and were released by pressing a release on each side of the drive. These rails were popular on cases made by Enlight.

Shelly

I have the original Maxtor drive in my hand. On the right side of the drive is nothing whatsoever except three screwholes without screws. On the left side (where the lever is) there is a screw in the center of the matching three screwholes. There were no rails in that cage at all, nothing. It shipped with one drive, which apparently was mounted with the Gateway Patented Gravity System; the top bay was empty and I added the second Maxtor drive later.

The Maxtor drive is a little wider than the Western Digital I bought subsequently, and it was necessary to kind of force it into the cage; this is what held it up off the other drive.

I might just figure out something I can glue to the sides of the drive to make it wider, like some of that rubber foam stuff, so that I can wedge it in and it will stay up that way.

But honest to god, there's no rails in this thing, only that damn lever that doesn't do much.

I am going to build a computer, hopefully soon. I suppose the case would be a good place to start.

Here's a question: is there a case that does NOT have this sort of problem?? For instance, these cages should unlatch and slide out; you shouldn't have to take the blasted machine apart to change a drive or get at the motherboard to add RAM. I want a case that is accessible like that. Any recommendations??

Hi Jenna -

I too suffered with a Gateway case years ago. I have built 9 PC's using the Enlight 7250 mid tower case. You can find it for $41. incl. shipping ( no power supply) via a Shopzilla search. It is the best case for the money that I've found. No screws to open the case, the 3.5" drive cage (3 bays) slides completely out for easy access, the 5.25" bays don't require screws or rails to securely mount drives. You can see several views of it at Newegg, http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16811116165 but you can find it cheaper elsewhere. I haven't found any reason to look for a better case.

Eric

That does look nice. Are the drives hard to maneuver in and out since the bay doesn't swing out?? It looks like getting the top two in would be kind of hard...

Also, are there only two USB ports on this case?? I just see two in front. (I have 8 currently; you know how it is to "trade down"...)

The 5.25" drives just slide into place and are locked wia "pish-in" tabs. Very easy to install and remove. The rear USB ports aren't a function of the case, as they are are built into the rear panel of the motherboard - usually at least 6 on current mb's.

Eric

Okie dokie, I'm bookmarking this one and watching for it on sale!

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16811112212#DetailSpecs

This case already has 2 USB ports at the front. Lian Li also provides a USB header to connect to the back of your PC for an extra 2 USB ports. Depending on the choice of your motherboard it will also have USB ports available at the back. The Lian Li cases are awesome so work with. You can remove the Hard Drive cage to install your drives without having to use any tools. Lian Li cases mostly use thumbscrews. I know that the price may be a bit hefty but you won't regret it.

Wow, some hard choices to make, I can see already.

So, overall, does it end up being MORE expensive to build your own or LESS??

For instance, price out the Gateway I bought costing $3033.40 in December of 2003. The specs are:

Operating System Microsoft Windows XP Professional
OS Service Pack Service Pack 2
Internet Explorer 6.0.2900.2180
Motherboard:
CPU Type Intel Pentium 4HT, 3000 MHz (3.75 x 800)
Motherboard Name Intel Bonanza D875PBZ (5 PCI, 1 AGP, 4 DIMM, LAN)
Motherboard Chipset Intel Canterwood i875P
System Memory 1024 MB (DDR SDRAM)
BIOS Type AMI (08/29/03)
Display:
Video Adapter RADEON 9600 PRO SEC (128 MB)
Video Adapter RADEON 9600 PRO (128 MB)
3D Accelerator ATI Radeon 9600 (RV350)
Monitor Plug and Play Monitor (134940431)
Monitor Plug and Play Monitor (134940431)

Multimedia:
Audio Adapter Creative EMU10K2 Audigy Audio Processor
Storage:
Floppy Drive Floppy disk drive
Disk Drive Maxtor 6Y200M0 (200 GB, 7200 RPM, Serial-ATA/150)
Optical Drive HL-DT-ST DVDRAM GSA-4040B (DVD+RW:4x/2.4x, DVD-RW:4x/2x, DVD-RAM:3x DVD-ROM:12x, CD:24x/16x/32x DVD+RW/DVD-RW/DVD-RAM/CD-RW)
Optical Drive JLMS XJ-HD166S (16x/48x DVD-ROM)
Network Adapter Intel(R) PRO/1000 CT Network Connection (192.168.1.104)
Modem Intel(R) 537EP Data Fax Modem

Motherboard Properties:
Manufacturer Intel Corporation
Product D875PBZ
Version AAC27087-208

< Memory Controller >

Memory Controller Properties:
Error Detection Method 64-bit ECC
Error Correction None
Supported Memory Interleave 1-Way
Current Memory Interleave 1-Way
Supported Memory Speeds 70ns, 60ns
Supported Memory Types SPM, FPM, EDO, Parity, ECC, SIMM, DIMM, BEDO, SDRAM
Supported Memory Voltages 3.3V
Maximum Memory Module Size 1024 MB
Memory Slots 4

< RADEON 9600 PRO SEC >

Video Adapter Properties:
Device Description RADEON 9600 PRO SEC
Adapter String RADEON 9600 PRO
BIOS String BK-ATI VER008.011.001.013
Chip Type RADEON 9600 Series AGP (0x4150)
DAC Type Internal DAC(500MHz)
Installed Drivers ati2dvag (6.14.10.6378 - ATI Catalyst 3.7)
Memory Size 128 MB

Video Adapter Manufacturer:
Company Name ATI Technologies Inc.
Product Information http://www.ati.com/products/home-office.html
Driver Download http://www.ati.com/support/driver.html

< RADEON 9600 PRO >

Video Adapter Properties:
Device Description RADEON 9600 PRO
Adapter String RADEON 9600 PRO
BIOS String BK-ATI VER008.011.001.013
Chip Type RADEON 9600 Series AGP (0x4150)
DAC Type Internal DAC(500MHz)
Installed Drivers ati2dvag (6.14.10.6378 - ATI Catalyst 3.7)
Memory Size 128 MB

Video Adapter Manufacturer:
Company Name ATI Technologies Inc.
Product Information http://www.ati.com/products/home-office.html
Driver Download http://www.ati.com/support/driver.html


--------< PCI / AGP Video >---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

ATI Radeon 9600 (RV350) Video Adapter
ATI Radeon 9600 (RV350) 3D Accelerator


--------< GPU >---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Graphics Processor Properties:
Video Adapter ATI Radeon 9600 (RV350)
GPU Code Name RV350
PCI Device 1002 / 4150
Transistors 76 million
Process Technology 0.13u
Bus Type AGP
Memory Size 128 MB
GPU Clock 324 MHz
RAMDAC Clock 400 MHz
Pixel Pipelines 4
TMU Per Pipeline 1
Vertex Shaders 4 (v2.0)
Pixel Shaders 1 (v2.0)
DirectX Hardware Support DirectX v9.0
Pixel Fillrate 1296 MPixel/s
Texel Fillrate 1296 MTexel/s

Memory Bus Properties:
Bus Type DDR
Bus Width 128-bit
Real Clock 202 MHz (DDR)
Effective Clock 404 MHz
Bandwidth 6464 MB/s

Graphics Processor Manufacturer:
Company Name ATI Technologies Inc.

"So, overall, does it end up being MORE expensive to build your own or LESS?? "

Good question. At the low end, there is no question that Dell can build a PC cheaper than you can, given the same specs. The OS alone - Windows XP Home sells for $90+ at Newegg. When you get into higher powered systems, I think that you can break even or come out ahead a few bucks. I built an Athlon XP 3200+ for a friend recently and spent a little over $900.That was for the Enlight mid tower case, Asus A7V880 mb, 2 GB RAM, 120GB WD HD, DVD/CD burner, floppy, video card, PS, etc., and Windows XP Home - no monitor,KB, or mouse as he already had them. I went to Dell's web site and spec'd out an equivalent box that came to over $1400. And it's hard to put a price on the satisfaction of building it yourself.

Eric

Hmmm...this is interesting. My husband, for instance, has very minimal needs. He's on an old Gateway 400 right now on Win98. I'd like to get him onto XP, but that machine won't handle it, of course.

So we'd need to buy XP, and then whatever bare-bones nothing fancy would serve him fine because he doesn't do much on his computer other than listen to a CD once in awhile and use Word and Excel. I would like to see a flat-screen monitor, but he's not a gamer, doesn't need fancy sound, etc.

I have an IDE HDD I can use, so I wouldn't need a drive. He wouldn't need a gig of RAM or a super-fast processor. I'd just like to see him with an OS that doesn't crash every 5 minutes like 98, a decent monitor, and a CD/DVD burner.

How cheaply do you think that could be done, yet using quality parts that you wouldn't get with a Gateway or a Dell??

Hi Jenna –

Several options - build one from these or similar parts

19” LCD monitor Viewsonic $249.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16824116366

Enlight Mid Tower Case $67.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16811116165

Antec 400W PS $85.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16817103908
.
MB & CPU combo AMD Sempron 2800, ECS (Fry;s) $89.

512MB Crucial PC3200 $50.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820146541

Sapphire ATI Radeon 128mb AGP video card $54.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814102458

Lite-on DVD/CD burner $38.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16827106990

Windows XP Home SP2 $95.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16837102059

Total $727.

OR

Puck up a barebones system from Fty’s for $300 - $400. I can’t speak to their quality, though. What it comes down to, as always, is that you get what you pay for.

Eric

CompUSA has the Antec 430 watt power supply on sale for $39.99 this week.

Shelly

I don't know about the other components in your system, but the Intel motherboard is a very good unit. I was looking at the specs on the D875PBZ the other day. It's not the latest and greatest any more, but it's nicer that anything I currently have.

Behind every good computer... is a jumble of wires 'n stuff.

Thanks for the info! I'm going to see if I can talk my husband into building a system.

As for the motherboard in my computer, I'm glad to know it is a good one. However, I have been very VERY disappointed in the processing speed of this computer. When I open Windows Explorer, for instance, I get a white box that takes seconds to open. I have always been disappointed by this because my old computer that was a 700mhz machine was actually faster on processes such as this. This Gateway has got a gig of RAM in it, and still it's slower than a 700mhz HP Pavilion with half the RAM???? Whassup with that??

still it's slower than a 700mhz HP Pavilion with half the RAM???? Whassup with that??

I bet the HP had an AMD cpu in it

LilJoe

AMD CPU's are consistantly as fast or faster than Intel in most benchmarks. Most manufacturers do not care how fast your computer runs, they care how often you will call for support. The incentive for them is to run components well within their operational limits. Personally, I have not built an Intel based computer in over 8 years.

Shelly

Argh... Definitely I'll be posting back here when I get ready to nail down components. This is too important to leave up to chance again.

>Thanks for the info! I'm going to see if I can talk my
>husband into building a system.
>
>As for the motherboard in my computer, I'm glad to know it is
>a good one. However, I have been very VERY disappointed in
>the processing speed of this computer. When I open Windows
>Explorer, for instance, I get a white box that takes seconds
>to open. I have always been disappointed by this because my
>old computer that was a 700mhz machine was actually faster on
>processes such as this. This Gateway has got a gig of RAM in
>it, and still it's slower than a 700mhz HP Pavilion with half
>the RAM???? Whassup with that??

Probably a ton of useless crappola programs running in the background.....put in there by Gateway.

How often do you defrag and perform other maintanence? Do you run something like Ad-Aware to get rid of Spyware? Got a good firewall and is it enabled?

Certain settings in XP can really slow things down. One of the Tweaking sites is probably your best bet. Pay particular attention to all of the graphics animations and features. XP has a ton of these but they can all be turned of. That makes a huge difference in program opening speeds.

Go to Control Panel\System. A "Sytem Properties" dialog box will open with various tabbedcmenus. Open the " Advanced " tab and click on the "Performance Settings" button. This will open a Performance Options box. Choose "Visual settings".....

By default Gateway probably has every single visual effect turned on. Select the setting that says: " Adjust for best performance". Everything should then be unchecked. Then tick off any styles that yoy like....I only have four things checked ( Show contents while dragging. Smooth Font edges. Use visual styles on Windows and Buttons and Use Common Tasks in Folders ). Avoid ALL animations and Shadow\Translucent crappola....only slows things down. Click Apply\OK

While still in the Performance options Box, select the Advanced Tab. Processor Scheduling and Memory usage should both be set to: " Adjust for best Performance of Programs ".

While you're there...go down to the Satrup and Recovery section and select settings. Under " System Failure" make sure that " Automatically restart" is unchecked. Won't boost performance...but you'll thank us if you ever have a system failure9 having this checked often creates an infinaite re-boot loop ).

BTW....do you have Broadband? If so send me an e-mail.

Actually, Chickenman, this Gateway was slow out of the box. I checked ALL the settings, they were already set correctly. Under specialized settings, I only had four checked.

I am using Spyware Blaster, Adaware and Spybot. I don't defrag anymore, to be honest, but like I said, I just had two brand new drives in this machine, one of them with a new OS install, and it was the same thing from the get-go.

I'm on DSL.

It's a mystery why this machine has such slow performance, but like I said, it was a Gateway from the minute it came out of the box.

Enlight always has made excellent well designed cases withg nosharp edges to nick you. Unfortunately they don't make full height tower cas that I prefer to use.

Other good cases are available from Antec, if you like a larger case.

Shelly

Enlight does have a line of full tower cases:

http://us.enlightcorp.com/Product/Product_PC_case.aspx

Eric

Eric, I could not find any full towers in that link. They were all 17 or 18 inches tall. That's a mid tower, unless I missed the one you were talking about. A full size tower is about 24 inches.

Shelly

My mistake, Shelly. Why Enlight calls it a tower escapes me.

Eric

Think I didn't get all the info on the earlier. More stuff is:

Computer: Gateway 710X Performance
Operating System: Microsoft® Windows® XP Professional
AntiVirus Software: Norton AntiVirus
Processor: Intel® Pentium® 4 Processor 3.00GHz with Hyper-Threading Technology and 800MHz FSB
Chipset: Intel® 875P chipset
Memory: 1024MB 400MHz DDR SDRAM (2-512MB modules)
Hard Drive: Western Digital 160GB Sata serial ATA hard driveSecond Drive: Western Digital 250GB Sata serial ATA hard driveFloppy Drive: 3.5" 1.44MB diskette drive
Additional Media Drive: Digital media card reader 3.5" drive
Optical Drive: DVD±RW/±R/CD-RW Recorder and 48x/24x/48x CD-RW with Pinnacle Expressions 2.0
Controller: Integrated Ultra ATA Controller
Expansion Slots: 5 PCI and 1 AGP
External Ports: (8) USB 2.0 (2 in front and 6 in back) Parallel, Serial and (2) PS/2
Certification: Energy Star Compliant
Monitors: 17" LCD Flat Panel Display Analog (17" viewable)
Video: 128MB ATI Radeon 9600G with TV out and DVI
Sound System: SoundBlaster Audigy 2 Audio w/ IEEE 1394 (FireWire)
Speaker System: 2.1 Speaker Solution with Subwoofer
Modem: 56K PCI data/fax modem
Network Adapter: Integrated Intel® 10/100/1000 Ethernet (Gigabit) adapter with communication streaming architecture (CSA)

For the price you can't beat this case with a stick.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16811129163&ATT=Cases+Computer+Cases&CMP=OTC-pr1c3grabb3r

That IS nice! I guess most of you prefer Antec cases. Duly noted. I'm going with them.

Not me, I think they're fugly. Of course, looks isn't everything. They are sturdy, though.

>That IS nice! I guess most of you prefer Antec cases. Duly
>noted. I'm going with them.

If they don't have flashing lights and an alien's face i guess they're ugly...... heh heh.

Flashing lights and an alien's face are even fuglier.