Alienware dropped the ball on this system
Neutrino
10-26-2005, 07:13 PM
Well i'm sure most of you heard of Alienware as manufacturer of very expensive high end boxes. Of course my opinion of prebuilt systems is very bad but I've always assumed that at least manufacturers like alienware can do it right based on the specs they post.
Well not so much. i have just finished tweaking one of my friends new Alienware box and i'm fairly disapointed. True they have many things done right as in using a Pc power and cooling PSU, decent mobo and vid cards also quite decent wiring.
Now on to the "ball dropping", my friend ordered 2 gigs of ram and they built it with that much but they used four sticks and paired them with a winchester core 3500+. Of course what they forgot that winnie cores have an older mem controller which can run only at DDR333 with 4 sticks. So of course by dropping down the mem speed the CPU clock dropped to 167x11 which would make it a 1.8 GHz rather than the 200x11 2.2GHz where the 3500+ he ordered should be.
So for all that money he got an underclocked CPU with reduced speed memory.
Now we'll contact them and see how good they customer service is. If they want to make things right they will replace the 4 512 sticks with 2 1GB sticks of replace the winchester core with a newer Venice 3500+ wich do have a revised mem controller and can handle DDr400 even with 4 sticks (at 2T though).
Well not so much. i have just finished tweaking one of my friends new Alienware box and i'm fairly disapointed. True they have many things done right as in using a Pc power and cooling PSU, decent mobo and vid cards also quite decent wiring.
Now on to the "ball dropping", my friend ordered 2 gigs of ram and they built it with that much but they used four sticks and paired them with a winchester core 3500+. Of course what they forgot that winnie cores have an older mem controller which can run only at DDR333 with 4 sticks. So of course by dropping down the mem speed the CPU clock dropped to 167x11 which would make it a 1.8 GHz rather than the 200x11 2.2GHz where the 3500+ he ordered should be.
So for all that money he got an underclocked CPU with reduced speed memory.
Now we'll contact them and see how good they customer service is. If they want to make things right they will replace the 4 512 sticks with 2 1GB sticks of replace the winchester core with a newer Venice 3500+ wich do have a revised mem controller and can handle DDr400 even with 4 sticks (at 2T though).
tenguzero
11-08-2005, 11:17 AM
I've never been a huge fan of Alienware stuff, honestly. It's like the buyer is paying out the ass for the ability to say they have an Alienware and r0x0r teh 50x0r5 off everyone at the LAN party. Except, after 2 minutes, everyone's moved on -- but the buyer's bank account hasn't :p
I just finished diagnosing a problem with a friend's Alienware, as a matter of fact. And I wasn't that impressed. It turned out the thing needed a new power supply. Now, I'd expect something like a PSU failure from a $35 500watt no-name power supply, but from one used by Alienware? For a $1700 computer, I would expect better than that. Another problem I noted with the thing, was weight. That mofo weighed a TON -- I'd be willing to bet that case has more armor than the LAPD (and this complaint about weight coming from a guy who built his current rig into a 5U rackmount server case.) Which makes me wonder if a person would even want to bother dragging the thing back and forth from a LAN party or whatnot. Inside it wasn't anything impressive either. P4, A gig of RAM (4x 256mb sticks), a higher-end videocard (can't remember the exact model), SATA HD, Audigy something-or-other, etc. Basically a pretty solid build -- but nothing I couldn't compete with on a home-built rig at half the price (I just built a NEO4 PCI-Express/Athlon64-Venice/2x80GB SATA/6600GT box for a couple ticks shy of $700.)
I suppose if one has the money, they might as well spend it as they wish -- I just wouldn't spend it on Alienware stuff.
I just finished diagnosing a problem with a friend's Alienware, as a matter of fact. And I wasn't that impressed. It turned out the thing needed a new power supply. Now, I'd expect something like a PSU failure from a $35 500watt no-name power supply, but from one used by Alienware? For a $1700 computer, I would expect better than that. Another problem I noted with the thing, was weight. That mofo weighed a TON -- I'd be willing to bet that case has more armor than the LAPD (and this complaint about weight coming from a guy who built his current rig into a 5U rackmount server case.) Which makes me wonder if a person would even want to bother dragging the thing back and forth from a LAN party or whatnot. Inside it wasn't anything impressive either. P4, A gig of RAM (4x 256mb sticks), a higher-end videocard (can't remember the exact model), SATA HD, Audigy something-or-other, etc. Basically a pretty solid build -- but nothing I couldn't compete with on a home-built rig at half the price (I just built a NEO4 PCI-Express/Athlon64-Venice/2x80GB SATA/6600GT box for a couple ticks shy of $700.)
I suppose if one has the money, they might as well spend it as they wish -- I just wouldn't spend it on Alienware stuff.
travis712
11-08-2005, 01:17 PM
How you like the 6600gt? Im getting the AGP version though.
As for alienware, I hate them. My p4 2.8ghz 512kb ddr 3200sdram, 450 watt psu would cost twice as much then I paid for it from AlienWare. Plus all my temps stay under 100*F. I have 4 80mm fans and 1 120 mm fan though, and good case management. I like my case more to(Raidmax Cobra)haha..
As for alienware, I hate them. My p4 2.8ghz 512kb ddr 3200sdram, 450 watt psu would cost twice as much then I paid for it from AlienWare. Plus all my temps stay under 100*F. I have 4 80mm fans and 1 120 mm fan though, and good case management. I like my case more to(Raidmax Cobra)haha..
Oz
11-08-2005, 09:34 PM
Gee Travis, only having 512 kb RAM must be slowing that system down like hell. :icon16:
uranium235powered
11-08-2005, 10:11 PM
Hahahaha...owned!
Neutrino
11-09-2005, 03:23 AM
Yeah it seems like those alienware are really not quite what they are cranked up to be. At least the one I posted about had a excellent PSU. I have seen though another recent review about a new eurpoean market alienware and it has just what i would call at best an average PSU especailly for the system price.
Travis the 6600GT is an excellent card, and its not really at a disadvantage due to being AGP. There was plenty of bandwith in the port left despite its demise. The only disadvantage is if you plan an upgrade in the near future in which case you'll want to switch of course to a PCIX mobo and want to use this video card.
Of course the deal of the moment is the 6800GS but they are all PCIX. Also if tweaking is your thing most of X800GTO and all of the X800GTO^2 cards unlock to 16 pipes and overclock to become full X850XL which makes them an insane deal.
Travis the 6600GT is an excellent card, and its not really at a disadvantage due to being AGP. There was plenty of bandwith in the port left despite its demise. The only disadvantage is if you plan an upgrade in the near future in which case you'll want to switch of course to a PCIX mobo and want to use this video card.
Of course the deal of the moment is the 6800GS but they are all PCIX. Also if tweaking is your thing most of X800GTO and all of the X800GTO^2 cards unlock to 16 pipes and overclock to become full X850XL which makes them an insane deal.
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