Darkscribes Blog for Tom

The Gateway P-7811FX Notebook, BIG FAIL!

October 9, 2008 | No Comments Posted

I thought that the Gateway P-7811FX notebook at the price of $1,249 was a bargain; at least at first I did.  But let me first tell you about what's good.

• 2.26 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
• 4 GBs of DDR3
• nVidia 9800GTS with 512 MB of GDDR3 memory dedicated to the video card
• 200 GB 7200 RPM hard drive
• Absolutely beautiful LCD screen

But that's about where all the good things about this beast ended. Now onto my tail of woe.

The first notebook had a bad AC Adapter. It would get very hot and it would make a very high-pitched whine, almost like a buzzing sound. Strike One!

I was able to exchange this out at my local Best Buy to get a new AC Adapter, but much to my dismay it too had this issue. A week later I get a stuck pixel, which you all know that if you get one you're bound to get another one... or three. Strike Two!

So I get another one, this time the screen has this white, ghost-like shadow to the screen and to add insult to injury... when I put my HDD into it the machine BSODed. So I was thinking that maybe it just shut down wrong. Swap the HDD back into the old one and see if it boots. It didn't, it BSODed again. So, this time... the thing corrupted my operating system. STRIKE THREE! YOU'RE OUT!

I walked into this deal knowing that Gateway had quality control issues but I thought that since this was their FX series, their so-called "gaming series", they'd put some effort into making a good, quality notebook.

I mean, think about it... you're trying to break into a new market, a market full of people who are very hard on their machines. The kind of people who push their machines to the edge of the proverbial cliff and one step further. The kind of people who demand a lot from their machines.

And now, you do this kind of screw-up. What was Gateway thinking!?!?

As far as I'm concerned... they have forever tarnished their name when it comes to my opinion. I will not ever buy another Gateway again and I will not recommend them to my friends and family.

As for those gamers who are thinking about buying a Gateway FX-series, notebook or desktop, stay clear... unless you want to be burned like me.

I've converted to the religion of Intel.

September 24, 2008 | No Comments Posted

I used to support AMD awhile back and they used to make the only chip that I'd suggest to people to buy, but that has changed; I will only suggest an Intel.

For one, AMD has had their collective asses kicked all over the place with the introduction of the Intel Core 2 Duo.  Take the Penryn family of Core 2 Duo chips, the performance is astounding.

Plus, it's pretty damn bad when an AMD Quad Core gets its head handed to it by an Intel Core 2 Duo.

I took the plunge and went 64-bit, Part 2

June 3, 2008 | No Comments Posted

As you probably read here, I upgraded my notebook to Windows Vista Ultimate 64-bit.  As of right now, I'm still with 64-bit and won't switch back!  It's like a breath of fresh air; it's stable, fast, and very reliable.  I mainly think that it's far more stable because the system isn't dragging behind a semi-truck full of legacy 16-bit shit from the stoneage of computing.

I've put my notebook to sleep multiple times over a period of nineteen days and I haven't had to reboot the machine once!  Loading program after program, it's just stable... rock stable.

I took the plunge and went 64-bit

May 7, 2008 | No Comments Posted

I put 4 GB of RAM into my HP Pavilion DV9235NR notebook and installed Windows Vista Ultimate 64-bit. At first I thought nothing would work but much to my disbelief, everything worked.

All of my favorite applications work wonderfully on 64-bit Vista. Surprisingly, it runs faster than 32-bit Vista and has far less problems than 32-bit Vista had.

Why didn't I go 64-bit earlier?!?!

26 years old and what do I have? Gray/White Hair!

March 12, 2008 | 1 Comment

My hair is naturally a dark brown.  Here I am, 26 years old and I already have gray/white hair in some spots on my head!  Seriously, WTF!