computer novice needs advice on PC

[cbx1170]

I have 2 Alienware Aurora 101-B AMD Phenom X4 9550 Quad Core computers. Yes the Best Buy ones. Best Buy SKU 9058342. Worth playing with? One works fine, one does not. By deduction and swapping good parts I have found 1 ASUS Motherboard M3A32-MVP Deluxe is faulty (non WIFI). And at least one of the remaining 2 GPU Visiontek ATI Radeon HD 4850 GPU cards is bad. I have just purchased and awaiting receipt of one good Visiontek matching card. My Questions. I get a couple windows with promp and Alien head upon boot up and it looks for a couple things including 2 hard drives and then says it can't find them but will still boot under Vista- it takes 1 minute. Any good ideas of how to get these two computers running at their best? How to ck? Either as they came from Alienware OR? Anyone have any boot up / Respawn discs? I have tried to ck Alienware website for drivers and download but I am not sure of results. Are there better (GPU) cards available/suggestions? I'm also looking for a MoBo card now and would appreciate any suggestions-comments on anything. Windows Task Manager performance shows all is good ? ! . 52 year old learning computers ready to try games. cbx1170, thnx for any help.
Phenom X4 Quad 2.2GHz
ASUS M3A32-MVP Deluxe SLI CrossFire AM2
2 x ATI Radeon Visiontek HD 4850
4 x 1GB PC2-6400 DDR2 SDRAM (upgradeable to 16GB (~800Hz? OR))
500 Seagate OEM OR 640 WD Green HDs
512KB x 4 L2 mem, video mem 1GB
Sys Bus 3600MHz ?
Vista Ult.

 

[Jamin43]

I have

* 2 Alienware Aurora 101-B AMD Phenom X4 9550 Quad Core computers. SKU 9058342. Worth playing with?

Absolutely - the Phenom II's are faster - but since ya got the Phenom quad core - use it - unless you want to spend money for a new one.

One works fine, one does not. By deduction and swapping good parts I have found 1 ASUS Motherboard M3A32-MVP Deluxe is faulty (non WIFI).

And at least one of the remaining 2 GPU Visiontek ATI Radeon HD 4850 GPU cards is bad.

I have just purchased and awaiting receipt of one good Visiontek matching card.

My Questions. I get a couple windows with promp and Alien head upon boot up and it looks for a couple things including 2 hard drives and then says it can't find them but will still boot under Vista- it takes 1 minute.

If the PC is booting Vista - it's recognizing the drive with Vista on it. Do you have the O/S disks. If so, you can do a fresh install of vista and update service packs on Microsoft. and re-install any apps you want. I don't much like all the stuff Dell's and HP throw on their PC's - Don't konw too much about Alienware. You might have to download some drivers like monitor - chipset - etc from Alienware before re-installing your O/S.

Any good ideas of how to get these two computers running at their best?

How to ck?

What is ck?

Either as they came from Alienware OR? Anyone have any boot up / Respawn discs? I have tried to ck Alienware website for drivers and download but I am not sure of results.

Are there better (GPU) cards available/suggestions? I'm also looking for a MoBo card now and would appreciate any suggestions-comments on anything.

4850 is a Plenty good for an entry level gamer. If you're running 2 cards in SLI - all the better. Is there faster - absolutely - but if you already have those cards - use em - and see how well you like gaming.

I recently built my first PC - and am gaming - with a similar technology When you feel limited - you can look at a 5850 - in a year or so price should be about what the 4850's; are sellin for today.

Windows Task Manager performance shows all is good ? ! . 52 year old learning computers ready to try games. cbx1170, thnx for any help.
Phenom X4 Quad 2.2GHz
ASUS M3A32-MVP Deluxe SLI CrossFire AM2
2 x ATI Radeon Visiontek HD 4850
4 x 1GB PC2-6400 DDR2 SDRAM (upgradeable to 16GB (~800Hz? OR))
500 Seagate OEM OR 640 WD Green HDs
512KB x 4 L2 mem, video mem 1GB
Sys Bus 3600MHz ?
Vista Ult.

One foot in front of another. All is good.

 

[cbx1170]

Thanks for reply. Will keep on plugging away. Greatly appreciated. I am trying to find best MoBo to replace the bad one ASUS M3A32-MVP Deluxe is OEM I may throw in a ASUS M3A32-MVP Deluxe WiFi version to replace or search for a better upgrade. Hard to find upgrade history of people building these higher. May seek ASUS recommends. I am also trying to verify CPU cooling as it came stock from Alienware. My two are not watercooled however I have seen Aurora 9550's with water cooling. May be a add on / later model. cbx1170