Fighting Irish Forums

yeah, anybody here using a Dell machine for normal home use, surfing, gaming?

reason i ask of course is that my own trusty HP was taken out be a stray lightning bolt....even unplugged at the time... and in the hunt for a new rigg, Dell sent me a line of credit for one of their machines. (since my cabbage is low, that line of credit is VERY appealing to me, naturally.)

i've never personally had a Dell...though i've used them and like them as business machines at a couple of my jobs...in fact, the machine in my office at work now is a Dell and a very good one to boot---though how it would fare in the gaming aspect is unknown.

also, i know they have been (up and down) number one in service and support for several years...which is a good sign. another plus.

now sure, before anybody starts the---"your best bet is to build your own rigg" deal, hey, i know that...and i could do it too...except that to do something like that, you have to have a little commodity called TIME. of which i usually have ZERO. yeah, the needed spare time for me to order, assemble, put together, test, configure, etc, etc...a home built rigg is JUST NOT THERE. nada, zip. and using the local computer stores to do the same again is NOT a good idea...the bozos around here are not competent enough for the big moola they charge to do such a job. which leaves me having to buy one already assembled and ready to go.

anyway, back to the original question... can anybody here give me some pros and cons to owning a Dell? checking their web site, they've got some good looking, powerful riggs for sale. and their prices are as good or in some cases better than the other big computer companies. and then there's that line of credit that they nicely extended to me...

my use for a computer is this. some light normal computer tasks....a lot of writing jobs, some photo work on occasion (light) some light graphic applications on occasion, some web surfing, occasional watching a DVD on it, some music on it, pretty standard stuff really. except of course i also DO game on it...so it needs some punch. games run are not that intensive anymore EXCEPT IL2/FB/ACES/Pacific...which demands a straightup, pretty good machine to run well.

so can anybody here tell me anything?

thanks in advance.

Beowolff

My wife had one... Service was great, as I recall... And a good friend of mine has an XPS laptop (one of the new gaming laptops) and has had a few heat problems, but is overall fairly happy with his purchase, I think.

I know that's probably not the level of information you want, but as I've never had one personally I don't know the pros and cons as such, but I know that the people I've known that have had them have been reasonably happy with their purchases...

Good luck, and my advice to you would be to invest in a Surge protector/Uninterrupted power supply to help deal with those stray lightning bolts...

Beo,

Dell is getting serious about gaming machines. I checked into the top gaming machine and was surprisingly impressed. Forget all about those mundane tasks, the most important thing is IL2 and beyond and the new DELL is not a bad box.

http://www1.us.dell.com/content/topics/ ... l=en&s=dhs" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

There are some stories about spotty customer service and screwy BIOS set-ups, but it's an up-an'-comer in gaming.


F

I have been enjoying our Dell Dimension 8250 for the last several years. Service has been great, though you need to have some patience in understanding their Indian accents (help based from India).

My machine has worked perfectly for everything including gaming. As with any PC, you need to make sure you know what you need and that the particular model will service that need. As Falcon said Dell is getting really serious about gaming rigs.

Back when I purchased the 8250 they were using RDRAM - expensive! I'm pretty sure they have gotten completely away from this great but costly form of RAM. Also, when I upgraded the CPU, PSU and video card it involved doing some searching around to get specific parts. Again I think they are moving away from this and going with more common components.

Overall they are very good to deal with. Best prices? You need to shop around for that answer. Good luck!

TS!

took you guys advice.... and many thanks for it.

ordered a refurbished one...actually a scratched one already built but not shipped. 3.2 gh P-4 640 processor with hyper threading... 160 gig hard drive, 1 gig of onboard ram, 256 Nivida 6800 vid card and usual etc, etc, DVD read/write...etc...

its one of their middle of the road gaming models... got it for 499.00 plus tax and shipping... i hope that with that 3.2 gigahertz P4 its a real screamer...but won't know for a few days. ships in three to five business days. total cost about 600.00 US... and that scratch on the case won't bother me one bit.

Beowolff

I always thought owning a DELL was kind of like driving a MACK..

It wasn't all that bad, but you didn't want your friends or kinfolk to see ya doin it..

Also, the issues that Tac related have always come to mind. Once you got one, it seemed that you had to saty married to the factory parts/support. JUST like Mack Trucks were for SO many years. That is, until they got smart and started adding NON-Mack components to their stuff like DELL seems to be doing.

The price for what you bought sounds good.

Hope it gives years of trouble free service and I STRONGLY recommend buying a good UPS rather than a "surge" protector.

I have a Dell machine - a three year old 4500.

I have upgraded the hard disk, video card and put some extra RAM in it but it never gave me a much trouble, very sold and reliable piece of kit.

Just upgraded to a new Fujitsu Siemens machine but have given the Dell machine to my two boys to use so still in service.

I also used the Dell Outlet - returned or refurbished machines - and as I said the machine was great.

we have dells at work - so i don't like them.

:FI:Cider

Same here....

Great comouters... but I hates 'em too....

Aw no mates!

The new Dells are great,

as long as you don't get the lame P-4 640 proces ...

uh ...

nevermind.


Falc ... I mean Helo.

jk

ha ha---Fal, er I mean Helo, surely you didn't fall for the old, "i got a reconditioned Dell 3.2 gig P-4 640 processor" did you?

ha ha---heck, that old trick is as old as the book!



my, my, you're slipping in your old age, bucko. no, no lame 640 processor here. no sir-ree.



Beowolff

okay, i confess.... i got the Dell in yesterday...of course i had to try it right away. NICE. really. i did like my trusty old HP but this baby hums so much better than the HP did...even after all of the huge amount of work i did on the HP to speed and power it up.

yeah, i mean right out of the box this thing is fast. i'm really impressed. of course the TRUE trial will be tonight after i install the benchmark software----you guessed it---IL2/FB/ACES/PF and all the needed patches. if this puppy still hums fast with THAT installed and running...

i'll be VERY happy (and surprised.)



Beowolff

Should be great for ya mate!

I have a Dell Dimension 8250 with 3.06 GHz, 1 GB RDRAM, 6800 BFG 256 MB with tweaked XP Home edition. I fly/host using Perfect Mode, Water=1, Trees=3, 1024x768, 4xAA, and achieve average 60+ fps for most missions (and some are intense).

You should have a grand time with the new machine. Just disable some of the OS services and you should see very good performance.

TS!

yes, pal... she runs great. so far so good. i've gotten FB and the Aces addon installed, now searching about for Pacific Fighters disk...????

but so far she's screaming.

and yeah, all of those OS services...my God. they loaded her up with everything but the kitchen sink. i've disabled a few of em from memory, but it looks like i'm going to have to re-find that guys' site... Black something or other... where he tells you how and what to turn off for best performance. what WAS the name of that guy??? graaaa.... my memory's slipping.

Beowolff

BlackViper's site is no longer active (at least the last time I checked). But just Google for it as someone else is hosting it.

TS!