My $2000 dollar brand new computer SUCKS

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

It’s a Gateway with a 2.4Ghz Pentium 4
256MB
with an NVIDIA GeForce Ti4600 video card
I wasn’t really “in the know” when I bought it a few months ago, but I recently ran it through the 3dMark diagnosis, and I got a score of 1685, which on comparison with other systems appears to be pathetic.

Now, what I wanted (and got) was an average priced up-to-date gaming PC, I’m not looking to break 10,000 or anything like that. I just would have liked to get somewhere around 5000 at least…

I suspect that it’s the video card that did me in, am I wrong? Hardware geeks help me out.

2

Hmm… I’m running an AMD Athlon 2200+ (Which runs at 1800 MHz) with an nVidia Ge Force 4 Ti 4600 and I score about 9800 on 3D Mark 2001 SE… I DO have more RAM than you, but that shouldn’t make that substantial an impact… Make sure you disable any other running applications while you run your 3D Mark test… That includes as many of the icons by your clock on the task bar at the bottom of the screen… You should indeed be scoring better than you are…

3

Thats part of it, the card is ok but not at the very high end. With PC’s from vendors like Dell and Compaq they very often come loaded with a ton of complete crap that for some god-forsaken reason all start with your machine and sit in your system tray (icons on the bottom right part of your screen). Start, Run, type MSCONFIG and look at your Startup tab. Just about everything here with a check next to it can go aside from the system tray and some like to leave the registry scan. Its probably XP, you you’ll want to check the services tab too. Many of these services can be disabled, check this site for details:

http://www.blackviper.com/WinXP/servicecfg.htm

4

Anytime you get a dell or gateway format the harddrive and start from scratch so you can pick and choose what programs you install.

Next time get an alienware they balance price with quality very well and don’t load your comp with crap.

Then again it’s very easy to build your own computer. Just slide tab a into slot b and there you go. That way you know exactly what you have and have some confidense to fix problems yourself.

5

No the video card is pretty decent, what you need is RAM! 512 minium and 1gig for the best performance. I built an AMD 2500 XP box with a ti4200 and a 1gig ram and did way better than that, but I don’t remember the exact numbers. Did that computer come with a monitor?

6

Oh and I forgot to add building your own comp is usually cheaper and since you now know what you’re doing you can upgrade a couple of parts at a time instead of having to buy a whole new system every couple years.

7

I suspect that you’re running 3dmark 2k3, not 2k1. 2k3 produces much lower scores overall and demonstrates much different scaling than 2k1. 2k3 is almost strictly a video card benchmark (very insensitive to cpu speed) and is widely regarded to be a useless benchmark (not unanimously, but widely).

Also note that different resolutions and options (AA, AF, etc…) will make dramatic differences in 3dmark scores and that the top scores belong to systems cooled by liquid nitrogen (not usable in that state).

3dmark 2k1 can be useful as a gauge for how well system tuning is working, but you’d do better to benchmark the specific games you play and decide on which options to use based on that.

8

Thanks for the advice, everyone.

Clearing my start-up didn’t help my score at all, but it did show me how apallingly infested with spyware and pop-up generators I was. Yikes, Spybot isn’t getting it all, apparently.

I was originally going to buy an Alienware, but I was seeing a $1000 dollar price difference for similar specs, might have been worth it, might not have been, oh well, too late now.

I have been planning to upgrading my memory ASAP.

np_complete may have given the key, though, as I was, for a matter of fact, running 2k3. I’ll experiment some more, thanks again!

9

capt,

Really? I just did a quick configure on a 2.6 p4 on alienware and it came out to 1635.00 (with a monitor) Generally I find the difference between say dell and alienware to be about 10-20% worth it in my opinion…but I dont’ want to sound like I’m pimping that site so I’ll shut up now.

10

here is the first benchmark I could find with results from both 2k1 and 2k3. Your score on 2k3 isn’t abnormal (the test doesn’t include a 4600, but it would fall between a 4200 8xAGP and a 4800.

The numbers are not perfectly representative (they use a dual channel ram, different cpu speed and architecture, etc…) but you can see the differences in scaling between the 4800 and 5800U in 2k1 and 2k3.

11

:eek: :eek: :eek: :eek: :eek: :eek:

2k1 results: 10621

I feel more confident now! Get some more memory in the near future, and maybe a new video card in the more distant future, and my comp should hold out for many more years…

12

cool, now to figure out your upgrades. Download and run cpuz (this app identifies your cpu, memory, and mainboard) and post the value of Chipset in the mainboard tab. Also post what it says for FSB in the CPU tab and Frequency in the Memory tab.

If Chipset says i865 or i875, then you’re in luck, these are dual-channel motherboards. If it says something else, then don’t despair, there may still be very effective and inexpensive upgrades for your system (but I personally don’t know much about intel chipsets).

[Different chipsets and CPUs prefer different types of memory, in general, any memory of the correct type will work, but some will work better than others. As long as you’re spending money on it, you may as well spend it effectively]

13

Chipset: i845G
FSB: 133.3mHz
Frequency: 133.3mHz

14

I just wanted to brag a little. :smiley:

My new box completed last week.

P4 2.8 Ghz 800 fsb
Gigabyte 8knxp motherboard 875 chipset 800 fsb
512 MEG PC3200 ram
Lian Li aluminum case
Antec 430 watt PSU
Radeon 9200 (just a temp till I get a manly card)

$1200

Runs faster then sonic on speed.

15

ok, if I’m reading over my info correctly, the i845G can support DDR333 (aka PC2700) DDR memory.

However it also supports PC133, DDR200 (aka PC1600), and DDR266 (aka PC2100) memory (these are the officially supported modules).

In CPUZ, under the Memory tab, you’ll see a group labelled Modules Information, this will contain a combo-box with text like DIMM #0, DIMM #1, or somesuch, the text to the right of that will give you a brand, memory technology, speed, and size. If your computer is using single data rate memory (as opposed to DDR (Double Data Rate)) then you’ll absolutely find it worthwhile to upgrade to DDR.

Your board may not support DDR333, but it might. If it does not support DDR333, it will run those modules at DDR266 speeds, so you can still use the hardware. If you want to upgrade, I’d recommend that you get DDR333 (aka PC2700), but make your own descision based on price differences.

Since you have a single channel motherboard, I don’t think you’ll see a clear advantage to using 2 sticks instead of 1.

Note that if your current memory is PC133, then you can’t add a stick of DDR and expect it to work, in this case donate your memory to a friend, family member, or charity.

You won’t see a big advantage in using either 1 or 2 sticks of memory after you upgrade (as long as the prices are comparable) but if you plan on getting 2 sticks at one time, then buy the same brand, same speed, etc…

I’m sure I’m missing something in here, so feel free to ask me to clarify (I don’t want to feed you too much information either).:slight_smile:

16

World Eater
You have 2 sticks of 256MB PC3200, right?

If not, then look into getting a second stick of RAM, i875 is dual channel so you’ll get better bandwidth with 2 sticks.

In any case, that’s a ton better than any of my systems right now.

17

Wow, np_complete, you’re either an exorbitantly helpful person, or an exorbitantly bored person…

Either way, I greatly appreciate it!

18

:smiley: Given a head full of near-useless computer trivia, it’s rare to have the chance to spout it at a not-unwilling audience. Though they do not know it, my usual victims owe you a debt of gratitude.

19

You sure you just didn’t miss a digit the first time?

20

Thank you very, very much for that link Bongmaster. :smiley: Its been extremely helpful.

Here’s a list of startups in case anyone’s stumbled across one that has no explanation.