Advice on a PC

[mactastic]

Ok, I hate to have to do this here, but I need some advice about buying from Gateway. I just got a new job designing high-end custom homes for a builder, and we will be using Autocad. Thus I can't even bother trying to talk him into a G5;). Anyway he, like many people, is loyal to the Gateway brand that provided the rest of his office computers. He is wanting me to get a workstation for CAD design, basically what I need is a good, although not cutting edge processor, a nice video card for 3D renderings, 1024Mb RAM, and the a CD burner. Oh and the biggest monitor I can get. He would like to spend around $1500 for it. It doesn't need anything fancy at all, I have my TiBook with AutoCad running under VPC for presentation and in-the-field updating, and I'll probably use the TiBook as my primary computer for everything other than CAD work.

Sorry for forcing you all to help me with Gateway, but I hope some of you have had some experience with them, I have none. I know plenty about Apple and their products, but my knowledge of PC purchasing is very limited, particularly when it comes to Gateway machines. Thanks in advance.

[mactastic]

After looking, I don't think he's going to find one in the $1500 range. More like $2000.

[Makosuke]

Ouch. For one thing, it's plain stupid to try to put together a CAD workstation from Gateway--they're a consumer company, for heaven's sake! I don't think you can even get a workstation-class graphics card from Gateway.

Forced to buy a PC, which I in fact recently was, I'd turn to Dell. If your'e careful, you can price a somewhat stripped workstation with a QuadroFX 500 and an 18" flat panel monitor from them for about $1500. I ended up spending a little over $3K, but that's because I was trying to build a decent computer.

Sure not what I'd use at home, but it should get the job done.

[mactastic]

Yeah I wasn't too happy about it but it wasn't my decision unfortunately. Perhaps if I can present a convincing case for a Dell he will listen... I just don't know enough about PC configurations. Yet.

[ITR 81]

Get a IBM because atleast they put some work into the PC they build.

[mactastic]

What kind of IBM?

[illumin8]

Originally posted by mactastic
Yeah I wasn't too happy about it but it wasn't my decision unfortunately. Perhaps if I can present a convincing case for a Dell he will listen... I just don't know enough about PC configurations. Yet.
If you want to know how to buy Dell computers for cheap, go to this site: http://www.gotapex.com.

I got a top of the line Pentium IV 2.6 for about $600 (without a monitor).

[Powerbook G5]

I'd say go for Dell, too, if you can convince him. You can get more for less money with them and have a lot more options than with Gateway, especially with specialized items like workstation class graphics cards.

[manitoubalck]

RUN LIKE HELL FROM GATEWAY!!!

If you want a PC BUILD YOUR OWN and notice the savings, therebuy you get better parts for the same money.
Go the Atholn 64 3200+ if you can stretch his budget.

[MacBandit]

Build your own machine it's very easy and you can have a lot more machine for the dollar.

[mactastic]

If it was my own machine I would love to build it myself. However, I dont' have the expertise to get parts that won't fight with each other, and I can't guarantee that everything will work smoothly out of the box. This is mission-critical kind of stuff, I've got three lots that need designs ready to break ground in mid-January. Right now I'm doing the work on my TiBook via VPC, so I need this computer ASAP.

[edesignuk]

HP make some very nice dual xeon workstations. I have worked on the XW6000, very nice! dual 3ghz xeons, up to 8gb ram, SCSI etc. Now that would make a good CAD system.

edit: link - http://h41100.www4.hp.com/uk/eng/commercial/workstations/xw6000_series.html

[sonofslim]

if nothing else, a lot of people (myself being one of them) rank dell's customer service far above gateway's. i've bought a lot of PCs for various offices i've been in, and guided my parents through multiple PC purchases over the years. dell has always been the best as far as support goes.

of course, i don't know if they make a system that will fit your needs and your budget... but all else being equal, they get my vote.

[mactastic]

Thanks for all the advice so far...

I'm looking at a Precision 360 workstation that seems to be in the ballpark for price. It's got a P4 2.26Ghz processor, 1024Mb 333DDR RAM, 19" monitor, ATI, FIRE GL™ X1,128Mb graphics card, 80Gb HD, and a DVD-ROM/CDRW drive. Total cost = $1,777.

I know the processor isn't that great, but I don't expect it to be strained too much. The graphics card should be doing most of the heavy lifting when it comes to rendering, correct? Everything else sounds good to me (I'm afraid of NVIDIA cards) but then again I'm used to the slow clock speeds of macs. Is the P4 a reasonable choice? I don't need a Xeon do I?

[MacBandit]

Originally posted by mactastic
Thanks for all the advice so far...

I'm looking at a Precision 360 workstation that seems to be in the ballpark for price. It's got a P4 2.26Ghz processor, 1024Mb 333DDR RAM, 19" monitor, ATI, FIRE GL™ X1,128Mb graphics card, 80Gb HD, and a DVD-ROM/CDRW drive. Total cost = $1,777.

I know the processor isn't that great, but I don't expect it to be strained too much. The graphics card should be doing most of the heavy lifting when it comes to rendering, correct? Everything else sounds good to me (I'm afraid of NVIDIA cards) but then again I'm used to the slow clock speeds of macs. Is the P4 a reasonable choice? I don't need a Xeon do I?

Looks good. I went on there and went through the same process that you must have and came up with the same machine and similar specs.

[Apple //e]

Originally posted by mactastic
Thanks for all the advice so far...

I'm looking at a Precision 360 workstation that seems to be in the ballpark for price. It's got a P4 2.26Ghz processor, 1024Mb 333DDR RAM, 19" monitor, ATI, FIRE GL™ X1,128Mb graphics card, 80Gb HD, and a DVD-ROM/CDRW drive. Total cost = $1,777.

I know the processor isn't that great, but I don't expect it to be strained too much. The graphics card should be doing most of the heavy lifting when it comes to rendering, correct? Everything else sounds good to me (I'm afraid of NVIDIA cards) but then again I'm used to the slow clock speeds of macs. Is the P4 a reasonable choice? I don't need a Xeon do I?

get a faster processor and make sure its a 800mhz bus, not 533. the video card does not render. the cpu does it. get the fastest one you can afford.

[mactastic]

Oy veh... Why can't this be as easy as Apple?

[MacBandit]

Originally posted by Apple //e
get a faster processor and make sure its a 800mhz bus, not 533. the video card does not render. the cpu does it. get the fastest one you can afford.

Actually the workstation graphics cards such as the FireGL he has listed do render.

Also to keep the price down the difference between the 800MHz and 533MHz FSB is not all that significant for what he is doing and especially for the price difference.

[Apple //e]

Originally posted by MacBandit
Actually the workstation graphics cards such as the FireGL he has listed do render.

Also to keep the price down the difference between the 800MHz and 533MHz FSB is not all that significant for what he is doing and especially for the price difference.

you mean you hit render on max and the video card renders and saves the images to the hard drive?

or do you mean they implement hardware shaders to create more realistic realtime onscreen previews?

or both?

a faster processor will prolong the life of your system, but then you could always upgrade later

[MacBandit]

Originally posted by Apple //e
you mean you hit render on max and the video card renders and saves the images to the hard drive?

or do you mean they implement hardware shaders to create more realistic realtime onscreen previews?

or both?

a faster processor will prolong the life of your system, but then you could always upgrade later

I mean the video card will do a lot of the actual rendering to disk. You can read about the workstation class video cards from ATI here.

http://www.ati.com/products/workstation.html

CPU power is not all the necessary when doing CAD it's a matter of having a workstation class video card. Yes, the cpu can also always be upgraded but get real the 2.2GHz is plenty fast especially if the video card is offloading a lot of the work.

[Powerbook G5]

It's not as easy as buying an Apple since you have so many more options with the PC world. ;)

[manitoubalck]

Originally posted by Powerbook G5
It's not as easy as buying an Apple since you have so many more options with the PC world. ;)
And you ask why I use a PC?

I just don't like prebuilt machines;)

[Powerbook G5]

Pre-built machines generally aren't that great. I had a few thoughts in the back of my mind to get an Athlon 64 laptop before I got my new PowerBook, but in the end, I just couldn't bring myself to deal with Windows, another PC, or figuring out how to use Linux when I was busy with school.

[rjrufo]

Without reading the rest of this thread, I just want to warn you about Gateway. I had a very bad experience with them, and will recommend to anyone who will listen to avoid Gateway. I still say that they owe me a new computer, but I don't want it. The first computer I had was bad enough, I wouldn't want to go through that twice.

To make a long story short, they replaced just about every component in the machine at least once, and a couple as many as four times. They finally gave up, and said there was nothing else they could do for me. I had bought the extended warranty for three years. They gave up on me just under two years, so they left me with one year to go on the warranty, and wouldn't do anything else.

I could have taken them to court, but at that point, I decided that it wasn't worth my time and energy.

Stay away from Gateway if you value your sanity.

[manitoubalck]

Originally posted by Powerbook G5
Pre-built machines generally aren't that great. I had a few thoughts in the back of my mind to get an Athlon 64 laptop before I got my new PowerBook, but in the end, I just couldn't bring myself to deal with Windows, another PC.

you say "Pre-built machines generally aren't that great" yet you plug and buy apple? (laptops don't count in this regard, since you really can't build your own)

Atleast you considered other options PBG5, and that's all I ask, that you look at each option and decide which best suits your needs, for the price your willing to pay.

[iChan]

yeah, skip Gateway and get Dell... even SJ deems them Good Enough to pullute his eyes and fingertips with...

wait, scratch that, just go for apple man...

you could be starting something in this friends office.

[JeffTL]

Word of warning. I have a Dell Dimension 8250 and it's a pain in the rump. They sent me a falsely-advertised sound card that wouldn't take official drivers (Amex got me my money back, and I replaced the phony SBLive with an Audigy 2), and when I reported fan noise they told me to jam a screwdriver into a running machine -- good way to get killed.

And today, in the middle of cruising Slashdot, the keyboard and mouse started acting like they weren't connected or something, though their lights were on and they'd been working.


Dells are okay, the UltraSharp flatpanels are good especially, but caveat emptor.

[Powerbook G5]

I almost convinced my parents to get the 15" ultrasharp LCD with their Dell but my dad saw that standard 17" LCD was cheaper and wanted the bigger size. I wish he had gotten the other, though, because the screen has this grainy/meshy look to it.

[pinto32]

I have owned two Gateways and one Dell. The Gateways were both far superior in their overall build quality and reliability.

My first Gateway developed some "random-restart" issues two weeks before the end of the extended warrenty....they replaced the motherboard and power supply, but neither of these made any difference, so they just gave me a new machine, no hassels. Not only was it a new machine, but a far superior one at that....in return for a 266Mhz Pentium 2 I got a 733Mhz Pentium 3, etc. That was three years ago, and this machine has been upgraded to death and is still going strong (I'm using it to type this post).

By comparison, my parents got a Dell Demision 4100 about 3 years ago.....fans were horribly noisey out of the box (Dell said it was normal....yeah right!).....the CDRW just died a couple of weeks ago; looks like a dead laser......it has already burned out two RAM modules (one pre-installed, one bought later FROM DELL), but Dell would not replace either of them! I am not joking or embellishing this at all: when I called about the second chip (after replacing the first with Crucial RAM), the tech told me to re-install windows!!! (Appearantly you need to be running the original OS for Dell to provide tech support) The computer would not run for more than 5 minutes withut crashing with memory errors, yet he expected it to last long enough to do a two hour install of the OS.....

So, basically, if you want the advice of a very seasoned Windows user who has helped many friends and family buy and then (attempt) the keep their PCs running (soo many lost days.....agony.....), avoid anything from Dell and Compaq*. Anything from Gateway, HP, and IBM should be reasonably good (by PC standards).


*Now that Compaq has been incorperated into HP, I assume that they are just HPs with different cases, so in theory I suppose they should be better...

[Powerbook G5]

I've had serious issues with Gateway, I had a 266 MHz PII, also, and a 1 GHz Athlon from them and both had the most problems you could imagine. Compaq used to suck but my sister's 1.6 GHz Compaq has only burnt through two CD burners and a HD, which is a lot better than the Compaq AMD K6 laptop I had right before I switched to Apple. My roommate's HP laptop also seems to be below standards, too, since he's had two replace his HD, his logic board, and reinstall XP a few times since he got his computer in September. The only PCs I can really recommend with a good conscious to people are IBM, Toshiba, and if looking for a laptop, Fujitsu and perhaps Sharp.