how much of an upgrade is this from a

-Dell dimension 3000 with an intel celeron 2.4 ghz. and 504 mb of ram ?

mmiteshm wrote:2703 sold

2+7+0+3=12

12th sept is woot off.

Better not be... I have a birthday party to go to at noon and a baby shower to go to at 2!!!

rickisrad wrote:how much of an upgrade is this from a

-Dell dimension 3000 with an intel celeron 2.4 ghz. and 504 mb of ram ?

It's a significant upgrade.

kenbuzz wrote:
I would want to take one (or both) of the internal HDs, and possibly the CD-RW drive from the 2350 and slap them in this system. The HDs have several years' worth of data and apps, and there's an empty front bay so there's no reason not to populate it with an optical drive.

All of these puppies are IDE, and I have ZERO experience integrating IDE appliances into a SATA system. Someone please tell me it's straightforward and school me on what I'll need to do.

Many SATA systems include IDE connectors on the motherboard. My 3 y/o HP Media Center, for example, has both IDE and SATA drives.

An easier solution is to simply put you IDE drives into an external enclosure, which then can be plugged into the USB or Firewire port. This is quite a bit slower than a direct IDE connection and you'll need an additional electrical outlet. But you do get the advantage of portability, and the external drive generally runs cooler, theoretically extending its life. You can also turn the drive off when it's not needed, saving electricity and again, extending its life. And being portable allows you to take the data with you. You can edit your files on a laptop or someone else's computer. And you can keep it locked for security.

External enclosures can be bought for $10-$40.

kenbuzz wrote:
I would want to take one (or both) of the internal HDs, and possibly the CD-RW drive from the 2350 and slap them in this system. The HDs have several years' worth of data and apps, and there's an empty front bay so there's no reason not to populate it with an optical drive.

All of these puppies are IDE, and I have ZERO experience integrating IDE appliances into a SATA system. Someone please tell me it's straightforward and school me on what I'll need to do.

Many SATA systems include IDE connectors on the motherboard. My 3 y/o HP Media Center, for example, has both IDE and SATA drives.

An easier solution is to simply put you IDE drives into an external enclosure, which then can be plugged into the USB or Firewire port. This is quite a bit slower than a direct IDE connection and you'll need an additional electrical outlet. But you do get the advantage of portability, and the external drive generally runs cooler, theoretically extending its life. You can also turn the drive off when it's not needed, saving electricity and again, extending its life. And being portable allows you to take the data with you. You can edit your files on a laptop or someone else's computer. And you can keep it locked for security.

External enclosures can be bought for $10-$40. USB enclosure are much more common than ones using Firewire. USB 2.0 has a faster burst speed but Firewire 400 is faster when data transfer is sustained, i.e. moving lots of files. Plus If you choose Firewire, make sure the computer has such a port.

BillThePoet wrote:The last PC I bought -- wait, I've never bought a PC. The last PC I voluntarily worked on was either an 8088XT or a 286AT. I forget.

6 wonderful macs later, it's worth $300 to find out if my long-held views are now wobbly, or more true than ever. I can't wait to spend a three day weekend installing a "patch" or "service pack." Whatever they are.

Current numbers (updated each minute)
First sucker: zionpsyfer
Speed to first woot: 1m 26.830s
Last wooter to woot: BillThePoet

*AHEM*

A 'patch' or 'service pack' is just an update, same as OSX has.

The Macs I work with suffer breakages from updates far more often than the PCs. And no, this is not due to user error.

See you at the next cult meeting.

mmiteshm wrote:2703 sold

2+7+0+3=12

12th sept is woot off.

Yes that makes perfect sense.... :\

SecretWootMember wrote:ACER OWNS GATEWAY

THIS IS A GREAT COMPUTER AND CAN BE UPGRADED WITH A NICE MID LEVEL GRAPHICS CARD WITH THE POWER SUPPLY THAT IT HAS IN IT !

DO YOUR OWN RESEARCH MOST OF WHATS BEING SAID OUT HERE IS BS

THOUGH SOME KNOW WHAT THEY ARE TALKING ABOUT

BTW YOU CAN TAKE OUT THE MODEM AND SAVE 5 WATTS
UNLESS YOU STILL USE DIAL UP

IT WILL FREE UP A PCI SPOT OR YOU CAN PUT A FAN IN IT'S PLACE FOR ADDED COOLING FOR THE GRAPHICS CARD

ONE MORE THING
BUY THE EXTENDED WARANTY FROM SQUARE TRADE IT WILL EXTEND IT TO A FULL YEAR OR YOU CAN OPT FOR THE TWO YEAR ONE
DO IT SOON YOUR 90 DAY WARANTY WILL BE UP IN NOVEMBER !

Thank you for the good advice and reply; I appreciate it. It should be okay to keep, then.

kenbuzz wrote:
I would want to take one (or both) of the internal HDs, and possibly the CD-RW drive from the 2350 and slap them in this system. The HDs have several years' worth of data and apps, and there's an empty front bay so there's no reason not to populate it with an optical drive.

All of these puppies are IDE, and I have ZERO experience integrating IDE appliances into a SATA system. Someone please tell me it's straightforward and school me on what I'll need to do.

Many SATA systems include IDE connectors on the motherboard. My 3 y/o HP Media Center, for example, has both IDE and SATA drives.

An easier solution is to simply put you IDE drives into an external enclosure, which then can be plugged into the USB or Firewire port. This is quite a bit slower than a direct IDE connection and you'll need an additional electrical outlet. But you do get the advantage of portability, and the external drive generally runs cooler, theoretically extending its life. You can also turn the drive off when it's not needed, saving electricity and again, extending its life. And being portable allows you to take the data with you. You can edit your files on a laptop or someone else's computer. And you can keep it locked for security.

External enclosures can be bought for $10-$40. USB enclosure are much more common than ones using Firewire. USB 2.0 has a faster burst speed but Firewire 400 is faster when data transfer is sustained, i.e. moving lots of files. Plus If you choose Firewire, make sure the computer has such a port.

kenbuzz wrote:
I would want to take one (or both) of the internal HDs, and possibly the CD-RW drive from the 2350 and slap them in this system. The HDs have several years' worth of data and apps, and there's an empty front bay so there's no reason not to populate it with an optical drive.

All of these puppies are IDE, and I have ZERO experience integrating IDE appliances into a SATA system. Someone please tell me it's straightforward and school me on what I'll need to do.

Many SATA systems include IDE connectors on the motherboard. My 3 y/o HP Media Center, for example, has both IDE and SATA drives.

An easier solution is to simply put you IDE drives into an external enclosure, which then can be plugged into the USB or Firewire port. This is quite a bit slower than a direct IDE connection and you'll need an additional electrical outlet. But you do get the advantage of portability, and the external drive generally runs cooler, theoretically extending its life. You can also turn the drive off when it's not needed, saving electricity and again, extending its life. And being portable allows you to take the data with you. You can edit your files on a laptop or someone else's computer. And you can keep it locked for security.

External enclosures can be bought for $10-$40. USB enclosure are much more common than ones using Firewire. USB 2.0 has a faster burst speed but Firewire 400 is faster when data transfer is sustained, i.e. moving lots of files. Plus If you choose Firewire, make sure the computer has such a port.

kogaku wrote:Oh good grief. I swear, this thread is like the bastard spawn of the world's biggest drunken brawl (that'd be the mother) and the out-takes from The King of Comedy (that'd be the other mother).

Some day they'll have a framed image of this thread in the dictionary next to the phrase "more heat than light."

Anyway, I can't take it anymore -- your lunatic assertion gave me the DTs, and I don't even drink!

AWESOME POST!! Thank you! I posted earlier that I had purchased the Acer in August on Woot - and they sent me this Gateway instead. At firt I thought - what the!- but then thought, 'okay...' Got worried reading the posts here, but you seem to be the voice of reason in the wilderness. Another thing - I also purchased the Acer 23" monitor on sellout.woot, for $144, and it never came. After checking into it, it was determined it was delivered elsewhere, and 'elsewhere' decided not to return it to Fedex. Kudos to Woot - they refunded my $144 immediately! I would have preferred having the monitor, but I impressed with the no-hassle refund. Thank you, Woot.

Windows THRIVES on multiple cores! You don't think that Windows "supports multicore threading"??? Are you SERIOUS?

Have you EVER taken a look at the Task Manager in your Windows setup? Have you ever seen how many processes are running, EVEN IF YOU'RE NOT RUNNING A SINGLE APPLICATION?

Have you looked how many threads EACH process uses?

Did you right-click on a process and notice an "Affinity" menu item?

Do you know what "task" and "process" and "thread" and "affinity" even MEAN????

(Right now, on MY machine, I have 91 processes going, which are running between one and SIXTY ONE threads PER PROCESS.)

Do you have the FAINTEST CLUE as to what Windows DOES with all those threads?

Here's a free hint: Windows ASSIGNS THEM TO THE PROCESSORS!

Imagine that! An Operating System, assigning processes to processors. Who could have guessed?

Here's another free hint: If you are running a program that can NOT use more than ONE thread, ONE processor, do you think it will HURT your performance if Windows assigns the REST of the currently running tasks to OTHER processors?

Folks, this is a good machine. It has MANY times the power of a typical MULTI-OFFICE FILE SERVER of not too many years ago. It has the power of a MAINFRAME from within the lifetime of many of us alive today.

I think back to the amount of tax money that went into paying for the IBM S/36 my largest governmental client ran an ENTIRE COUNTY on, back when I had a life -- which, combined with its peripherals, resembled a small laundromat (and sounded like one!) -- and I reflect on the fact that THIS "piece of junk" is more than the equivalent of SEVERAL of those MASSIVELY expensive "high-power computers" from not THAT long ago.

I am running a machine that's got maybe HALF the power of this one -- and I do lots of video and audio processing daily, lots of graphics (I do landscape photography, and enjoy archived "classic" radio and TV from "the golden age" of broadcasting).

My "slow" machine is PLENTY fast for what I do. It has power to spare.

There are an awful lot of self-appointed "experts" who seem to get their rocks off ruining a good time for others. I smell sour grapes. THEY can't afford this -- or, they paid a lot more for it (or, for a LESSER machine), so, they're gonna ruin it for as many OTHERS as they can.

I swear, I have NEVER seen such a brutal pile-on like I've seen in this thread. Seriously!

Bye now (and, buy now, if you need a decent machine at a decent price).

Stablenut wrote:

Well, that last post got screwed up - I accidentally inserted my reply within the quoted post. In response to Kogatu:

AWESOME POST!! Thank you! I posted earlier that I had purchased the Acer in August on Woot - and they sent me this Gateway instead. At firt I thought - what the!- but then thought, 'okay...' Got worried reading the posts here, but you seem to be the voice of reason in the wilderness. Another thing - I also purchased the Acer 23" monitor on sellout.woot, for $144, and it never came. After checking into it, it was determined it was delivered elsewhere, and 'elsewhere' decided not to return it to Fedex. Kudos to Woot - they refunded my $144 immediately! I would have preferred having the monitor, but I impressed with the no-hassle refund. Thank you, Woot.

It smells like a woot-off tonight...

mmiteshm wrote:2703 sold

2+7+0+3=12

12th sept is woot off.

just 2+7 by itself resembles a "september"... right?

Time for a Woot Off!!!!!

jdame95 wrote:Would anyone know the noise level on this? I would consider it to replace my aging media center, but have no idea how loud gateways run and need it to be below xbox360 sound levels.

i have this model i bought it about 3 months ago at best buy and after tax and the exteneded warrenty it came to just under 600 bucks it you can expand the ram to g gigs but i think it will read a max of 6 and this this is whipser quiet you cant hear it make a sound even running mulitpul apps at the same time a great buy when i bought it at the price i got it for and an even greater deal at the price listed here shame it is sold out or i might have picked up another one

Pommy wrote:If you have a Core 2 Duo a Phenom X4 (not Phenom II X4) at 1.8Ghz would be much slower in almost everything and not an upgrade but a downgrade.

Correct. Dual Cores SUCK because you don't get the power maxed for single programs... It's just good for running multiple apps simultaneously. Dual Procs however is a whole different story.

BillThePoet wrote:The last PC I bought -- wait, I've never bought a PC. The last PC I voluntarily worked on was either an 8088XT or a 286AT. I forget.

6 wonderful macs later, it's worth $300 to find out if my long-held views are now wobbly, or more true than ever. I can't wait to spend a three day weekend installing a "patch" or "service pack." Whatever they are.

Current numbers (updated each minute)
First sucker: zionpsyfer
Speed to first woot: 1m 26.830s
Last wooter to woot: BillThePoet

If you want to install service packs, I don't think you need to spring for PC hardware. Windows will be just as buggy on a Mac, I assure you.

DoorStopz wrote:Correct. Dual Cores SUCK because you don't get the power maxed for single programs... It's just good for running multiple apps simultaneously. Dual Procs however is a whole different story.

I don't know of anyone who just runs a single app all by itself. As "kogaku" points out (yes, credit where credit is due), Windows alone runs like 60 processes. If dual- and quad-cores are only good for multitasking, then they're only good for just about everyone.

n2imagination wrote:Quad cores are only better with apps that use the multi-core like studio max or video editing apps. You would only see a benefit if running these types of apps or multiple apps at one time. Each would get a dedicated core. You would sacrifice speed though with each app but could benefit if the app can use all 4 cores. My duo core laptop just barely lags behind my quad workstation for studio max because the laptop speed is much higher.

Or if you run a unix-based operating system. Since multiple CPU support has been built into the various unix-based kernels since ... forever, most applications also support multiple CPU cores. Windows is just a little (read: a lot) dumber.

slamslam102 wrote:Woot describes the mouse as usb but not the keyboard.

• Premium Multimedia Keyboard
  
• 2-Button USB Optical Wheel Mouse
  

To be honest, I might *prefer* to use the PS/2 connections for the keyboard and mouse, freeing up 2 of the 4 rear-mounted USB ports for other items.

Look at it this way, the two front-mounted slots are kinda oddly-placed for items you may want to permanently connect, leaving you really only with the 4 on the back. If the mouse and keyboard occupy two of those, well, you can do the math as easily as I can.

Instead, if those devices are moved to the dedicated green and purple PS/2 ports, winner winner chicken dinner! All one would need (supposedly) would be a $1.00 USB(female)-to-PS/2(male) adapter for each one.

Unless I miss my guess, that's $2 to double the # of available rear USB slots. +1

will this handle the game crisis?

Does anyone have a recommendation for a good video capture card to put into here?

I'm liking these ones that come with a media center remote. Link

GregoryLikesCheapStu wrote:Does anyone have a recommendation for a good video capture card to put into here?

I'm liking these ones that come with a media center remote. Link

I feel most will perform about the same I like the look of the ASUS remotes and there is one with a large rebate on it from the link you gave me for it to be around 50 bucks with good reviews so i would go with that one

baffles wrote: Woot Info Post
e pluribus wooters.us

Gateway 1.8GHz QuadCore Media Center with HDMI [Refurbished] - $289.99 + $5 shipping

1 * Gateway DX4200-09 1.8GHz Quad-Core 4GB DDR2 640GB SATA HDMI Vista Home Premium

This post is brought to you by Wooters.us, to help make sure pricing information on the product is available in the future. We are not run by nor affiliated with Woot.

I think the price that I payed was a total of $416.72, did I get overcharged or is the 289.99 +5 shipping in error?

So is this eligible for the Windows 7 upgrade?

Wntrgarnet wrote:Dont fear the 1.8Ghz as listed.. Remember, it's a quad core. :]

My refurb has never given me a problem.They are a really reliable company.

The lower the Ghz the higher the clock speed.

dontamboong wrote:will this handle the game crisis?

It will do fine for casual gamming with the minimal required video card upgrade. But for best gamming it will need a quality video card and a better power supply I say a least 350w

There are a lot of questions here that most can be found with a little research! A great site for a lot of basic pc and hardware information is pcityourself.com it's easy to read and should answer a lot of questions.

Have they not shipped yet....

Hairlikegoats wrote:I think the price that I payed was a total of $416.72, did I get overcharged or is the 289.99 +5 shipping in error?

To address any confusion, a quick FYI:
-He is posting a gateway computer w/ 4GB ram.
-You ordered a HP pavilion w/ 6GB ram, Intel Pentium E5300 Dual Core 2.6 GHz processor with 800 MHz front side bus, etc. (different specs, manufacturer, price).

Anyone have theirs shipped yet?

Nope, the slow shipping is a killer.

not yet...how can we track the shippiing process?

ttcao wrote:not yet...how can we track the shippiing process?

When it leaves the warehouse we get tracking numbers. We're always left in the dark waiting until then, though :p. They say typically 5 business days until it ships, which would be Friday 18th.

I live really close to woot...Wonder if they would just let me pick it up?

Regarding the question of does this qualify for the windows 7 upgrade, the answer is yes. See the following site:

http://www.gateway.com/windows7upgrade/models.php

thefrancs wrote:Regarding the question of does this qualify for the windows 7 upgrade, the answer is yes. See the following site:

http://www.gateway.com/windows7upgrade/models.php

I saw that site before my main concern was in the FAQ:
"Which Microsoft operating systems will qualify for the Upgrade Program?
To be eligible for the Program, you must purchase a new PC between June 26, 2009 and January 31, 2010. The PC must come with a valid Windows Vista® Home Premium, Windows Vista® Business or Windows Vista® Ultimate Certificate of Authenticity (COA) attached. In addition, the PC must also have Microsoft Windows Vista® SP1 or SP2 OR a Windows® XP Downgrade with Service Pack 3 installed. "

Keyword on the "new" PC

You will receive a tracking email when your order ships out. Orders will typically ship within 5 business days. The day you order does not count as day one considering we won't know the result until midnight. To check your order status, go to the Your Account tab at woot.com, log in and check your order history.

If you have any further questions, please contact us at service@woot.com and we will be glad to assist you.

Sincerely,
Woot Member Services

gumpmaster wrote:Nope, the slow shipping is a killer.

jeffk11 wrote:Anyone have theirs shipped yet?

Maaaaybe...okay not really. If we let you do it, we will have to let everyone else do it that wouldn't be fair. Perhaps one day we will have a drive thru, how cool would that be?!?!

Lateralus86 wrote:I live really close to woot...Wonder if they would just let me pick it up?