What brand of computer do you have, and how good has it been?

Question

If you have used another brand previously, how good was that?

What problems have you had with the brands you have used?

Answer 1

Compaq laptop - 4 years, mostly okay, but intermittent fault on CD drive.

Toshiba laptop - faulty main board (twice), power supply (twice), screen, case, sound card, comms board - all in the space of four years.

Tiny desktop - HD failed after a few months

Apple SE, lasted 8 years until I took it on a journey - then HD failed.

Apple LC 2 - just carried on going, needed a new motherboard battery after 6 or so years.

2 Apple performas - kept on going for about 6 years. I just stopped using them.

Currently use an iMac, going well after 5 years. However, the first one I bought (ex-demo) had a HD problem after 1 week. 3 pm Saturday! I phoned the store (John Lewis), they put me onto Apple who confirmed the problem John Lewis replaced it the same day. So, from diagnosis to replacement was about 2 hours.

I currently use a MacBookPro - no problems in one year.

My son has an iBook. A problem occurred with this after about three months. Went into the Apple store, where they diagnosed the problem. They removed the HD and put it into a new machine. So, walk in with a problem, walk out with problem solved. No other problems.

eMac - no problems in three years.

MacMini - the remote control needed to be replaced (done by post). No other problems.

Computers are complex and things will go wrong. With Apple the build quality is very good, and the service is also good. You will get far fewer problems with the operating system than with and form of MS windows.

A recent newspaper article:
Alexander Chancellor
Friday June 8, 2007
The Guardian

While in New York, I paid a visit to a glamorous downtown computer shop in the hope of being tempted. Although I have a laptop that works perfectly well, I wanted an excuse to buy a new one, especially as computers are much cheaper in America than they are in Britain.

With my friend, Mike, a patriotic believer in the American way of commerce, I approached one of those knowledgeable and personable young salesmen that Macintosh employs to encourage customers to part with their money.

"What kind of computer do you have?" asked the salesman. "A PowerBook G4," I replied. "A PowerBook G4?" exclaimed Mike, striking his forehead with his hand in mock horror; for he knew that I wanted to be persuaded to replace it. "That's a good machine," said the salesman. "How old is it?" "About five years," I said. "Five years old!" shrieked Mike. But the salesman said: "I'd hang on to it if I were you. It should be good for a while yet."

"Who on earth trained you to be a salesman?" asked an astonished Mike before we left the shop empty-handed; the young man just smiled. I am beginning to be worried about the future of the United States.

in: http://www.guardian.co.uk/Columnists/Column/0,,2098261,00.html

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Answer 2

I use mostly Custom PCs built by DW Computers

I have 3 Custom PCs (one is setup as a MCE Computer and 2 are used for games etc...) These have all worked great except the hard drives in the MCE were setup as a RAID 0 and one died one time, cant really blame DW Computers it worked flawless for 1.5years on 24x7and has been running now for another year without issues.

I also have a Dell Inspiron Laptop which has been very good to me. Runs things very well. Tech support messed up and didnt ship the right cds to me and still havent. Their support blows!!!

I have an HP Zt3xxx series laptop. This i got used and it has worked very well, except the battery only lasts 5 mins.

All in all if your buying a Desktop go with a custom pc with name brand parts. Laptops, well get something you want and hope it doesnt have issues. So far i have had good luck with HP and Dell on the Laptops and No real problems with my desktops from DW Computers

Answer 3

I have a computer shop own brand pc. Its a athlon sempron and it has been pretty reliable. Ive had it 2yrs now and it has never frozen screen. It has slowed down a bit though as i have about 180ghz of memory filled and its only got 500 ram.

When i used to have an old pentium 4 the thing was so unreliable in that it froze so often i couldnt do impoRtant work on it. I have never played online games on the pentium but on the athlon i have never had a problem playing games online.
I do want to upgrade though as some time soon it will be outdated.

Answer 4

Built all my own systems, never had any problems.

That's because I build the systems to do what I wanted them to do, so there are no extraneous devices, software or the problems that go with it.

If something goes wrong (rare), because I built the system, I know immediately what the issue might be, and can resolve it without the monkeys at PC world taking it to bits.

My biggest issue with pre-built PCs, especially those that come with Windows installed is that you can rarely do anything good with them, be that make changes to the BIOS to improve performance/stability etc, or even setting up the hard-drives in the way you want.

Self-build PCs are generally easer to upgrade as well, graphics cards etc.

Retailed PCs tend to be pretty generalist - perfectly capable bits of kit, can undertake most tasks pretty well, give or take, but there is no way on Earth that a PC World Special or a Dell type system is as good as a well-specced self-build, particularly for gaming and the like. My favourite system is for gaming, and so is built specifically for that - top-end graphics cards, fast RAM & processor, top-level soundblaster card and a 160Gb SATA drive. Nothing else - it's not needed and anything else would drain system resources and slow-down gameplay, especially on on-line multiplayer games..oh, tons of cooling as well, to increase stability and system capability.

I have a second "admin" type PC that has entry-level graphics & sound cards, a mid-range processor & ram al on a bog-standard motherboard using IDE drives. Fit for purpose, nothing more, nothing less.

More than happy to give you advice of you want to build your own system - it's not as complex or scary as some people would have you believe.

Answer 5

Have worked in IT for 15 years. Supported a site that was all Compaq computers for everal years. We use to assume that 10% of them would be bad right out of the box. Another 10-15% would fail within the first year. That was about 5-6 years ago. With Compaq now being owned by HP, I have no clue....

HP: Solid machines, but a pain to work on. Usually poorly laid out, difficult to get into anything. Wires and ribbons all over the place, often held in place by duct tape. Difficult to find part information when needing repair. But when they are up and working, they are top line machines. So parts are generics, others are not. So they are not always the easiest machines to upgrade.

Dell: Have supported most Dells for the last 6 years. Well laid out, excellent web site for tech information, part numbers, and step-by-step for almost any repairs. Machines are well laid out inside. Easy to service. Dell is very good about getting parts to us. Experience about a 5% failure rate "out of box and first year" with them. Like that the parts in them are "generic" for easy upgrades. Currently own four Dell PCs/laptops.

Answer 6

I had a compaq but that did not last very long. I decided to get one custom made from my local PC shop and this has done quite well. If I were to buy a branded PC I would go for HP, Fujitsu or Dell.

Answer 7

It relies upon on what you prefer to apply the workstation for. if it somewhat is in straightforward terms going for use for the internet, homework, music, and flicks I say purchase a save offered one. catch a good sale you are able to in all probability %. up an entire device for $500 or much less. i'm speaking a minimum of a superb twin middle CPU (if no longer a quad middle), 4GB's of ram, a minimum of a 500GB puzzlingcontinual, domicile windows 7 domicile top rate sixty 4 bit, a 20" to 23" reveal screen, keyboard, mouse, and a guarantee. With Black Friday arising ought to in all probability do much extra valuable. difficult to construct a working laptop or workstation like that for $4 hundred without the reveal screen, keyboard, and mouse. Now in case you activity or use it for video or music production definetly build your individual. i ought to upload one element. there's a undeniable satifaction to development your individual workstation. desire this permits. good success.

Answer 8

I am using a toshiba portege laptop and I am really pleased with it so far. The worst one I ever had was a packard bell. Whatever I tried to do i.e install software, it never did it properly. I lost count of the number of pc restores I had to do on it. I also had a Dell Dimension which my hubby got custody of and that was good value for money.

Answer 9

My PC is a junk.It's a assemble PC with P4 ,180GB HDD ,p4iGV chipset ang it's of 2.4ghz but it has got a heating problem thus it's a junk.I prefer you to buy a HP or a COMPAQ
desktop because they are the best in world.If you want to buy a a notebook then i prefer you to get a notebook of the new sony vaio series.Happy Shopping.

Answer 10

Well my computer (the big box looking thing) is an eMachines - no problems. My monitor is a Mag Innovision. Well I don't know if its a Mag or Mac but its pretty good.

I hated my other computer set. It was old and it wasn't a flat monitor like mine. It was one of those older monitors that were big and chinky and took up too much space. Plus the keyboard was sticky and one of the letters wouldn't work.